The more portable the device, the worse hardware support seems to be, unless we're talking about the one operating system it was sold with (and then only maybe)

The more portable the device, the worse hardware support seems to be, unless we're talking about the one operating system it was sold with (and then only maybe). Laptop ACPI is often purposefully malignant, wifi cards still have their bugs (hard to fix with proprietary firmware blobs) and let's not even get started about specially built interfaces and connectors. And that's true across most operating systems. I recently upgraded my Dell tablet to Windows 10. Oh the humanity. And with every OS X version, problems with my 2009 Macbook are increasing, especially in the first few iterations. Apple's post-90s hardware selection scarcity is a boon for them, as you don't really need to check that many configurations. Similarly, running Linux on slightly older Thinkpads is usually a very good bet. Doubleplus that if the wifi card is either libre enough or is replaced with one that is. But as I'm not doing the hyper-mobile thing (I don't work from a beach or cafe and don't even like conferences), a desktop is usually the best choice for me. Cheap, fast and you can build one with fewer faulty components.