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Ask HN: Ultrabook for programming?

137 points by drKarl 10y ago

I was considering buying an Ultrabook for a long trip. I don't want to make a big investment, so something like a Surface Pro is too expensive, but I would like to be able to use it both as a tablet and as a desktop while travelling, with a keyboard. I have found 2 options with similar specs and prices, the Chiwi Hi10 (with variants, Plus, Pro), and the Teclast x98 (with variants Plus, Pro). Both have a decent 4 core Cherry Trail Z8300 CPU, 4Gb of RAM, 64 Gb of ROM, a decent screen (1080p Hi10 and Retina-level the Teclast). Both dual-boot Android and Windows 10 (and probably you can install Linux on both). The Hi10 has a dock for a keyboard, and 2 full size USB ports, and is 10.1", while the Teclast has a better battery life, better screen resolution and is 9.7". They both seem to have specs that in my opinion would be capable for programming. My question is, would they be good enough for programming? Is it possible to install any desktop app on Windows 10 in a tablet, i.e. IntelliJ IDEA? Is it possible to enable WPS (Windows Subsystem for Linux, aka Bash on Ubuntu on Windows) on Windows 10 in a tablet? Also there is a version of the Hi10, the Hi10 Plus, which is slightly bigger (10.8") has better battery and screen resolution and comes with RemixOS instead of Android. Can you install any Android application on RemixOS?

SixSigma 10y ago
I still use me Eepc from 2007 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asus_Eee_PC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asus_Eee_PC
osullivj 10y ago
You mention IntelliJ IDEA and Win10, so I'm guessing you want a Windows based Java dev env. 4Gb RAM won't be enough for that. I use a 4 year old Samsung Ultrabook: i5, 6Gb RAM, 500Gb disk, Win8. I'm building a cloud system with Angular GUI, RethinkDB and Python/C++ servers using Visual C++ and PyCharm. I can't run all that at once. Chrome, especially running dev tools, and PyCharm are real memory hogs. I'd love to switch to a Surface Pro with 16Gb RAM, but it's too expensive. My view: 8Gb RAM minimum for a dev env.
- drKarl 10y ago
  Thanks, that's the kind of feedback I need. For developing while not travelling I currently use a Macbook Pro 2015 with 16Gb of RAM and I'm happy with it, and I've previously used Windows or Linux desktops and laptops, so I'm OS agnostic, I can be productive with any OS (on Windows I'd just install cygwin with console2, or cmder, or lately Babun which is a preconfigured cygwin with a package manager). I remember the time years ago when I was programming with 1Gb of RAM (that was the normal for computers at the time) and it was a painful experience with Eclipse and other tools. As computers evolved with Moore's Law, 2Gb was a better experience and I think 4Gb was fine at the time. Then 8Gb should definitely be good and 16Gb is plenty even to run VMs. Thinking that it would not be for a full time developing environment, just to be able to do some work while travelling in a long trip where I don't want to bring an expensive laptop like a Macbook Pro, I thought 4Gb might be enough, so your feedback is really appreciated.
  - syntheticnature 10y ago
    Also worth noting the Z8300 is an Atom device. Here's a comparison of the processor in these devices vs. what I believe to be the lowest-end processor from a 2015 MBP: http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Core-i5-5257U-vs-Intel-Atom-x5-x5-Z8300#performance http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Core-i5-5257U-vs-Intel-Atom-x5...
dotdi 10y ago
I would never go for less than 8gigs of RAM for a dev machine. My current machine sports 8GB and it's often frustrating.
- KurtMueller 10y ago
  What languages do you program in and what toolsets do you use?
  - dotdi 10y ago
    Depends, but most of the time it's either - Java: Eclipse and the actual application running that I am working on, or - JS: Sublime, a server for running and testing, a few Chrome tabs + Chrome Dev Tools. While both of those would work fine with 8Gigs, if I ever happen to have to run more things (as in, the aforementioned things at the same time or a VM next to any of them) at the same time, things slow down considerably.
mindrunner 10y ago
Don't even bother with those Chinese tablets. They are passable for media consumption, but absymal for anything else. Buy something like a refurbished Dell Latitude series instead. Keyword here is you said "long trip'. When you buy something that made a lot of tradeoffs to achieve that price point, you are going to be frustrated.
- jetti 10y ago
  How about for app development? I got a small Windows 10 Chinese tablet that I want to use for testing Windows 10 UWP apps but don't want to open it (haven't had time to use it yet) if it wouldn't be worth it.
  - mindrunner 10y ago
    I have a Chuwi. Honestly, from the get go, you will know that its not a development machine. As for testing apps, If you wish to simulate the user experience on a cheap Atom, this would be the thing for your. Else, you're bound to be frustrated.
    - jetti 10y ago
      Thanks. I misspoke, I meant to that I want to use it as a testing device and not a development device. I don't think I could do development on a 13" laptop let alone a tablet
- akhilcacharya 10y ago
  I'm considering one for media consumption (Netflix, high-bitrate 1080p video) - do any have good battery life?
  - kyriakos 10y ago
    There's a site and YouTube channel called techtablets.com, the guy does good (and possibly unbiased) reviews of most of these tablets you should check it out it will answer your question.
Somebodywashere 10y ago
I'd recommend against the Teclast and Chuwi hardware. They're cheap and they look like it works well (and spec wise it isn't too bad), but the user experience isn't the best. If I recall correctly their touchpad experience is pretty lacking (I think Chuwi one lacks the pressure sensitivity). While they are Cherry Trail Z8300 Atom CPUs, they're mostly for lightweight usage, like web browsing and youtube max. Also they should be using a brand of eMMC for storage which doesn't have the best I/O rate. It's nice as a gimmick, but not a great one for development. If you're on a budget, I've seen fairly cheap but great second-hand hardware on ebay or craigslist. Maybe check those out. A few years ago I bought a Thinkpad X240 for around 200 dollars, it was an i5 with 8 GB RAM and I bought my own SSD to put in it. That laptop has been fairly solid for me especially with the expanded battery pack I purchased.
jagtesh 10y ago
If you are a power multi-tasker (20+ browser tabs at any given time) running IntelliJ with a couple of electron apps (Slack, Spotify), it will slow down your system with constant disk-thrashing on a 8 GB machine even with an SSD. I use a Macbook Pro 2015 (8GB RAM/128 GB SSD) and I cannot run a fully featured IDE anymore. No more WebStorm or RubyMine. Vim is the only way to go! You're a little bit in luck as Windows machines are considerably cheaper. Go for at least an i5/16GB/256GB SSD.
- drKarl 10y ago
  I use Vim on the command line, but for Java programming I also like to use the features of an IDE like IntelliJ (or at least Eclipse). I always use Vim plugins for those (Vrapper for Eclipse or Idea-Vim for Idea).
- BoorishBears 10y ago
  > I use a Macbook Pro 2015 (8GB RAM/128 GB SSD) and I cannot run a fully featured IDE anymore. No more WebStorm or RubyMine. Vim is the only way to go! I use an identical i5 model with Android Studio (think IntelliJ with more resource usage), an Android emulator/VM, a Gradle daemon taking up 2-3GBs for builds, Safari with umpteen tabs, Slack, Outlook and Spotify open and don't have issues with disk thrashing (or at least, none I can tell based on usage and the Activity Monitor memory pressure). I don't know how you're forced to use Vim. I've noticed that OSX will do what I'd like any modern OS to do and use the majority of my ram with a few things running things running. But adding more of a workload when it's using nearly 8GB doesn't instantly make it "run out of memory", more paging occurs but not nearly enough to cause disk thrashing (or be easily perceptible)
  - jagtesh 10y ago
    I'm not forced, I quite like working on Vim. However I develop on a multi-app setup, 3 backend services and 4 npm based frontend apps with watchers and works running in background. RubyMine/Webstorm has a hard time keeping up and the memory usage shoots up to several gigabytes. As for Slack, I counted just now - the compressed memory usage is ~750MB! These things seem insignificant but do add up, especially with Chrome which itself takes a few gigabytes.
aelmeleegy 10y ago
I am currently using a retina Macbook Pro 2015, but I am getting to the point of needing something with stronger specs and more configurability. Here's what I think I'll, and let me know if you think that would work for you, I am thinking of buying a slightly used lenovo X1 Carbon. So it would cost less, but has great battery life and very decent specs, specially for such a small footprint. I'll then install linux (probably Ubuntu) and run that as a dev machine.
RossBencina 10y ago
It doesn't look like Cherry Trail Z8300 has VT-x (hardware virtualization) -- that's something you might want to consider. Not a tablet, but I recently bought a factory reconditioned ASUS Zenbook 305CA (8GB, M-5Y71 CPU) for a similar purpose. So far so good. It seemed to me to be at the bottom end of the premium ultrabook market and about half the price of a XPS 13, much cheaper than an X1. Also, Linux support is good. Windows 10 memory management seems better than Windows 7. You might get away with 4GB for some things but my gut feeling is that 8 would be preferable. My Win 10 desktop is currently sitting at 7.3 GB with Visual Studio and a bunch of Chrome tabs open.
Uberphallus 10y ago
Don't go for Cherry Trail devices https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155241 https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155241 While waiting for that to be fixed I got one for double the price, but 2x-4x the specs.
- tbiteteitb 10y ago
  If I may ask What did You end up buying?
- milankragujevic 10y ago
  Agreed. I got myself a Braswell (N3160), 4GB RAM, 32GB eMMC (but it has an unused SATA port and bracket, so I will put in a 240 GB SSD for storage and OS and use the eMMC as a backup solution). It's the Acer ES13. Cost me 24990 RSD, or in USD $215. Pretty nice, typing this on it. Using Ubuntu as the main OS with kernel 4.9.0 (the default Ubuntu 16.10 one cannot return from suspend properly) using Remmina to access a OVH Ubuntu server which runs Windows 10 in VirtualBox. It's a decent and very portable setup, if you have Internet ofcourse. The battery lasts me 5 hours, it's a 3 cell built-in LiPo, but I can't remember the watt-hours rating, however the CPU is only 4 W, and I use the screen at half brightness.
cmdrfred 10y ago
On a extreme budget a Chromebook with crouton running Ubuntu has served me well. I use it mostly as a thin client for the server in my basement.
- bostand 10y ago
  I second that! Furthermore, the latest chromebooks from Asus and Samsung are a bit more expensive but have a touch screen and impressive battery life (15-25 hours)
- Theodores 10y ago
  Me too. Delighted with my Acer 14" screen with aluminium body and all day battery, plus the sound only works through HDMI so no YouTube time wasting. 250 quid - bargain.
nmstoker 10y ago
Is it a given you'll be wanting to develop whilst unconnected? (with travel that could be likely but it depends on where you're going and how much you'd make the effort to seek out WiFi) If you are able to be connected, maybe consider going with a physically small but well built machine but with specs inline with your budget and then remote to a development PC (ie at home) that has the kind of ram and specs you need. This will probably not be good for more GUI heavy development but command line stuff would be largely okay. Clearly you mentioned some tools that are GUI heavy, so YMMV, but thought it worth weighing up too
scotty79 10y ago
I was considering Asus Zenbook 3. Very light, very powerful. Reasonably priced. 12.5" It's basically a MacBook but stronger and with decent file and window managers and pc keyboard.
- realusername 10y ago
  I can only say good things about the Zenbook. It also has an amazing linux support, just one package to install for the two finger scrolling on Ubuntu and that's it, no issues whatsoever.
tehwalrus 10y ago
Doesn't fold out as a tablet, but my dell XPS 13 is epic. I did swap out the WiFi card, but only because I run Linux, and the broadcom one had crappy driver support.
- dagw 10y ago
  Dell is releasing a version of the XPS 13 that converts to a tablet. Although I doubt it will classify as cheap
  - rhodysurf 10y ago
    Also only with Core M processors I think
    - dagw 10y ago
      The latest iteration seem to ship with 7th gen i7 or i5 processors, but the lowest powered and slowest Y-series versions of those processors. No idea what that means in real-world performance though.
      - scholia 10y ago
        All the Y chips are Core M chips, as used in the MacBook...
- orensol 10y ago
  The XPS 13 made me smile again while developing. Running Ubuntu.
grigio 10y ago
Xiaomi Notebook Air 12.5 is a good ultrabook, it has a good build quality and Linux support https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9xqJK2Hlb3U https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9xqJK2Hlb3U
- bostand 10y ago
  It is very hard to get hold of one in west for anything close to the original price.
  - bpicolo 10y ago
    Seems to be purchasable on their site? http://xiaomi-mi.com/notebooks/xiaomi-mi-notebook-air-125-silver/ http://xiaomi-mi.com/notebooks/xiaomi-mi-notebook-air-125-si... With this disclaimer: Please pay attention: both versions of Mi Notebook Air will be run on Windows 10 Home Chinese Edition
    - eustar 10y ago
      This is no problem. You can get a Windows key on ebay or Amazon for 20 bucks and reinstall an English version or as I did Linux (Arch).
      - bostand 10y ago
        What happens if you just reinstall a standard win10 image from usb?
        eustar 10y ago
        As I wrote, super easy and no problem.
  - eustar 10y ago
    There're two Chinese online shops doing quite sophisticated shipping to EU countries via UK. This seems to be legal and you get it for the Chinese price.
analog31 10y ago
I kind of had the same idea, some time ago, and got an Asus T100 series with Bay Trail, 2 GB of RAM and 32 GB of flash. So it's one generation behind the devices you're talking about. The keyboard is detachable, so I can use the thing as a tablet. Battery life is great -- no problem charging it overnight and not worrying about charging during the day. In my case, I'm not a commercial developer, but I do "scientific programming" using primarily Jupyter/Python. It works comfortably on the little Windows 10 machine, but is noticeably slower. Perhaps a bigger issue than horsepower for me is the screen size and attachment of the screen to the keyboard. Those things make it hard for me to spend long amounts of time doing really detailed or complicated stuff. You can always adapt to lower processing power by using simpler tools, but trying to program on a 10" screen may end up being the main issue.
- fnl 10y ago
  Have you considered getting something like a mobile beamer to get a bigger screen? Particularly if the ultra-book is already HD capable. Yes, it would require a "free" wall, but maybe that's OK. A bigger problem might be power consumption. So overall likely not very viable, but maybe someone has some experience with this?
- imaginenore 10y ago
  2GB of RAM is barely enough for browsing, let alone for comfortable programming. 16GB should be the ideal minimum, 8Gb the absolute.
  - analog31 10y ago
    Browsing is the one thing that seems fine. How does the lack of memory manifest itself? It may be due to my particular activities, but for more than two decades I've been aware of what is considered the minimum RAM for a developer system at any given time, and have gotten away with 1/2 to 1/4 of that amount, typically due to starting out with a cheaper system and then keeping it for a long time. Using a cheaper system, if possible, is my "protection plan." I like to stay within what I could afford to replace out-of-pocket if something happens like the device gets stolen or I crash my bike. But your point is well taken, and a developer should consider the typical system for their own preferred environment, which is likely to be more sophisticated than mine.
oops 10y ago
What sort of software are you planning to write? e.g. apps, webdev, games, command-line utils, etc. In what language? Do you need to be able to code while offline? An iPad with the keyboard case could work, particularly if you'll always be online. You can just use it as a dumb terminal to ssh into a more powerful remote server. Another idea is the old MacBook Air 11". It doesn't meet your requirement of being a tablet but it's just as portable and would give you a lot more grunt. You can probably get a refurb or used one fairly cheap. 8GB RAM, SSD, good battery life...
- reacweb 10y ago
  I fully agree. A phablet, a bluetooth keyboard and a cloud hosting (I use scaleway) is enough for many kind of development (web, command line, ...). I am switching from emacs to vi mainly because of this setup.
- jaegerpicker 10y ago
  I use a iPad Pro for exactly this case. I do 50-75% of my everyday work on it. I develop node.js and web frontends and iOS apps. I mostly do my node work on emacs on a remote server via Coda. Recently I've using swift playgrounds to do real work on the iOS side and it's been great, though often I need to break out the macbook pro for debugging sessions.
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tronje 10y ago
I'd recommend Lenovo laptops. I have a Thinkpad T460s, which is awesome. If you really want the tablet/laptop hybrid, maybe a Thinkpad X1 Yoga, or something from the 'regular' Yoga series will work for you. Yoga-series laptops start at around $500, whereas the premium X1 Yoga starts at something like $1.400 I believe. Edit: Linux support on Lenovo laptops is pretty good overall, and if you're a Windows person, they ship with that by default. If you're a student, they offer discounts as well, I believe. I got mine from a local seller without an OS and put Linux on it.
- drKarl 10y ago
  I saw the Yoga, but I wanted to spend around $250 or less on this. I have 2 laptops and a desktop which are great for programming, but I wouldn't want to risk bringing an expensive laptop to this trip, I want something portable and cheap in case I get robbed or something, with the convenience of a tablet when I just need to read an ebook or browse some webs, and the ability to do more advanced stuff with a keyboard as a desktop, even programming.
  - tortasaur 10y ago
    Maybe a Chromebook with Linux? Mine lasts around 9 hours, has a tablet mode, and was about $250-$300. Chromebooks really are the best bang for your buck for a Linux laptop IMO.
  - tronje 10y ago
    I see. Perhaps a tablet (can't recommend any, I've never owned one) with a bluetooth keyboard is a solution? Myabe you can also find a used Yoga or use two devices; a cheap laptop and a cheap tablet? I feel like a hybrid laptop/tablet is a bit cumbersome as just an e-reader anyway? Not sure...
  - blauditore 10y ago
    What about a second-hand Yoga 2 Pro? This should be in that price range now, roughly. I've been using this for a couple of years now and was quite happy. It's a good trade-off between performance, weight and size in my opinion. Except some minor inconveniences[1], my Linux/Windows dualboot setup works quite well. Heads-up: If you consider it's successor, the Yoga 900, make sure you don't get one of the series not supporting Linux (Google is your friend). [1]: The biggest issue I've faced is inaccuracy of yellow colors on the display; they're dark and pale. Lenovo published a BIOS fix for Windows, but this doesn't work for Linux. However, if you don't plan to do any visual work like photo editing or designing color palettes, you should be fine.
LeonM 10y ago
Since price is an issue, I'd consider a second hand or refurbished Asus UX ultrabook. They are light, well constructed (aluminium unibody if i'm not mistaken), have a high dpi displays and SSD comes standard. Linux support is supposedly very good out of the box. If you are planning to run IntelliJ (or other JetBrains IDE's for that matter) I'd go for at least 8GB or memory though. I wouldn't recommend running Android or other mobile oriented OS's for development, getting the tools up and running will be a pain.
mergesortsalad 10y ago
I've got a Dell XPS 12 and can only recommend getting an Ultrabook like this one. Yeah it is expensive and yeah it definitely had its quirks in the beginning. However performance is crazy, I'll get easily 6hrs+ battery life on programming workload (in energy saving mode of course). I have no experience with passively cooled Core M processors or the cheapo tablets you are currently considering, but having a full Intel CPU inside this horse is definitely noticeable. If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer
ptero 10y ago
Consider getting a good used system and budget for a new battery -- battery life on used laptops is a (loaded) coin toss. If you are price conscious you will likely get a better value than from a cheaper new one. On choosing the model for a portable -- IMO the #1 goal is to get one with physical characteristics that work for you (size, weight, monitor, keyboard, ability to be a tablet, etc.). CPU/Memory/storage is a very distant second. Go to a store and hold many models in your hands. If you work next to other techies, ask to see their travel computer option; ask for advice. This will likely give you a lot of honest info and demos. Extra 25% of CPU speed will get you little benefit if your ultrabook is not comfortable for you to work on.
- wineisfine 10y ago
  That's very true, you have to 'connect' to the machine.
- fnl 10y ago
  Agreed; My favorite mobile option still are 13" notebooks, but that isn't exactly an Utra-book. But I do wonder if I could do with 11", sometimes at least.
- CalRobert 10y ago
  I bought a used XPS 13 and put Ubuntu on it - I'm very happy with it. Dell ships it with linux stock, so support is good, and the battery can be replaced. Might be worth a look?
throw2016 10y ago
I'd suggest looking at the Asus Zenbook flip for a budget between $700-900. It has options for a 4k screen and i5 or i7. It plays in the same league as the HP Spectre 360 and Surface book but is cheaper. Another option is the brand new Chromebook pros by Asus and Samsung at $499-$550 powered by the Skylake i3. These are higher quality Chromebooks than previously. The Samsung has a nice IPS 2400x1600 resolution. They are Chromebooks though.
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xd1936 10y ago
I have a Dell Venue Pro 11 with it's keyboard dock, that I got for around $250 in total used on eBay. It's pretty good. It was a bit sluggish on Windows 10, but I run Elementary OS on it and it's been smooth sailing.
divbit 10y ago
I use similar tablets for development, and I think 4gb of ram is pushing it, if you want to have, for example a heavier web browser and a larger IDE open at the same time. It is doable though if you are willing to spend some time tuning your device, e.g. set the priority for some tasks lower than they want, so they don't hog the system resources while doing something. http://www.wikihow.com/Change-Process-Priorities-in-Windows-Task-Manager http://www.wikihow.com/Change-Process-Priorities-in-Windows-... I ran a 2gb ram, 10", dual core atom for 4ish years by doing this and using a lightweight browser, like opera or ie.
Yizahi 10y ago
I have a budget ultrabook based on Pentium N3700. Despite the name it is also Atom core based and essentially just a tiny bit faster on paper than Z8300. Same 4 Gb memory and HDD instead of flash drive. Windows 10 installed. It boots up for a long long time. Win10 uses about 2.8Gb in idle state (which is good and bad both). Any significant drive activity locks the system for good - antivirus scan firing up, overloaded browser etc. Battery lifetime, despite having a 6 Watt SoC with integrated video and DDR3 memory, is average - maybe 4-5 hours top, doing nothing. My big old 15" laptop with 45 Watt cpu, geforce video and other older stuff lasted for 3 hours while it was new. I used Visual Studio on it - it is possible but painful. Building code takes significantly slower, all actions are slow. But it can cope with MSVS, open browser, books, iTunes and some other stuff simultaneously. Development in lightweight editors should be way better. 64Gb of storage for Win10 with IDEs should be just barely enough and I would not recommend that. If possible you should put inside 128Gb or bigger ssd and more RAM, I plan to do that at some point.
bharath_gh 10y ago
The linux support for these cherrytrail atom tablets is usually terrible. You will probably have issues with touch screen, webcam, sound drivers and power management. I tried a lot of these when trying to find a baytrail/cherrytrail tablet to run linux for a project and most of them were terrible with linux.
- slezyr 10y ago
  > touch screen, webcam, sound drivers and power management Not that big problem. I own Chuvi HI12 & Teclast X98 AIR and it's almost impossible to make WiFi work on these. But there is a custom ubuntu distro with all fixes http://linuxiumcomau.blogspot.com.au/2017/01/first-2017-1704-alpha-isos-for-ubuntu.html http://linuxiumcomau.blogspot.com.au/2017/01/first-2017-1704...
eustar 10y ago
I recently bought the Xiaomi Mi Air 12. tl;dr, it's the best ultrabook/notebook I've ever had and run Arch on it. I was looking for a light notebook also for programming for a long, long time (and I wanted this time Linux because of tiling window managers like i3). I finally got this Chinese model and what can I say, inside it's all Intel (Wifi, BT), Arch works flawlessly, touchpad is a glass trackpad and is for a non-Macbook just great, smooth and responsive and with Synaptics generic Linux driver you can really configure every tiny piece. I like the keyboard very much and the 176ppi screen is fantastic. It's also fast for a passive cooled device (it has a Skylake m3), and I get with Arch and 'powertop --autotune' easily 11 (!) hours surfing, sshing and coding. Only drawback it the 4GB RAM but it still works surprisingly well with the 4GB. And it has two SSD slots and one is even with the fast NVMe protocol. There's also a 13 inch model with 8GB and an i5 but way less battery time and it's slightly heavier (I always wanted a real ultrabook which also stays cool). I got it directly from a Chinese shop for €450 in an xmas sale. I think now it's around €530. However, it was so hard to find a notebook in this space. I you want a really light but somewhat powerful notebook you look at the Thinkpad X1C which is in some countries priced ok but in many, especially Europe super expensive (as the X260). But the X1 is still a great piece of hardware and as light as the Xiaomi at 14". Then we have the Macbook which is light, powerful but super expensive and runs well with macOS and Windows but people have mixed experiences when running Linux on that device. I looked also at HP (not really bad but also not exciting, the last gen Envy 13 is ok though), Acer have some new light ones but they are expensive and ASUS has the light Zenbook series which is ok but not that cheap. So considering that this was Xiaomi first gig in the notebook space they did it quite well.
- poyu 10y ago
  How's the build quality, comparing to other ultra books like ZenBook or MacBook. I don't have a chance to play with one yet.
  - eustar 10y ago
    Build quality is excellent, the aluminum is like that on Macbooks, it's very close, maybe slighlty rougher and the edges are a bit sharper. But you really need to have both next to each other to 'feel' this difference. It's a bit sad that they followed so closely Apple's design language and didn't create their own identity. The glass trackpad has the same build quality as an Apple device without the 3D force thing. The keyboard as said excellent, it's similar to to last gen Macbook Pros but still different, it's clicky and nice to write on, good spaced keys. The screen excellent, the lid when opening a bit less stiff than a Macbook. I don't know if they did this on purpose to let the device open with one hand... Comparing to the Zenbooks: same build quality, case is much less fingerprint prone than Zenbooks and the trackpad is better since it's glass, I don't think the Zenbooks have glass trackpads. I'd also say that the keyboard of the Xiaomi is better than the last gen Zenbooks, they had mushy/shallow keyboards. I think they solved this with the new slimmer gen.
johngalt 10y ago
Considering your goals and price range. I'd recommend shopping the refurb market. Specifically business laptops that are off lease. Bigcorp IT departments tend to cycle their hardware every 3-4 years and flood the market with used cheap/good used laptops. They won't be 'ultrabooks' but they will be cheap, reliable and easy to maintain. Something like a Dell E6430 would be a good bet. https://www.dellrefurbished.com/laptops/dell-latitude-e6430-30101.html https://www.dellrefurbished.com/laptops/dell-latitude-e6430-...? Keep in mind that raw stats/specs aren't everything. I've seen countless people held up by hardware issues that have nothing to do with the speed of the processor.
- jpalomaki 10y ago
  I second this opinion. There are for example lots of people who are happy with older Lenovo models. Performance wise you don't need to loose that much, since the Intel CPUs are not getting that much faster. Pick up some good model (for example on Lenovo side look at X2x0 or the T4x0 (where x=2,3,4,5,6) models) and swap HDD with some reasonably priced SSD and put in max memory.
  - coredog64 10y ago
    The SSD is key for the Latitude e6xxx. Some of my co-workers are stuck with those and spinning rust and they are hot garbage.
  - gamache 10y ago
    I just bought a 2015 Thinkpad T450 from eBay (I do mean "just bought", it hasn't even arrived yet). Beware the T440 and earlier because they max out at 8GB RAM. I got a T450 with an i7 processor and 8GB RAM expandable to 32GB, and it came in under $500 including the fancy Thinkpad dock. In general, nothing runs Linux quite like Last Year's Model.
    - beryleo 10y ago
      It's not quite true that T440 and earlier max out at 8GB RAM - I'm writing this from a T430s w/ 16GB RAM. A T430 can also go to 16GB, and a T440s can go to 12 GB.
amorphid 10y ago
I was playing around with the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) a couple weeks ago. I tried & failed to install two programs on WSL, Elixir & Debootstrap. It's worth mentioning that WSL isn't intended to be 100% Linux compatible. From the WSL FAQ (https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/commandline/wsl/faq https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/commandline/wsl/faq): Can I run ALL Linux apps in WSL? No! WSL is a tool aimed at enabling users who need them to run Bash and core Linux command-line tools on Windows. WSL does not aim to support GUI desktops or applications (e.g. Gnome, KDE, etc.) Also, even though you will be able to run many popular server applications (e.g. Redis), we do not recommend WSL for server scenarios – Microsoft offers a variety of solutions for running production Ubuntu workloads in Azure, Hyper-V, and Docker.
- shados 10y ago
  The biggest hurdle so far for me to make WSL useful is the file watching. A lot of my CLI tools won't work because of it. They fixed a TON of stuff in the next update preview though, so maybe then it will be a better contender.
- yellowapple 10y ago
  Doesn't Erlang (and thus Elixir) have a native Windows version anyway? Or was that just a test to try out WSL?
  - amorphid 10y ago
    Elixir does have a Windows installer. And yes, I was testing out the WSL.
rak 10y ago
I ended up buying a used Lenovo x250 off ebay for a code training program that required Mac but made case by case exceptions for Linux users. It runs pretty well with Ubuntu out of the box. I got some additional power savings with installing TLP and etc for Thinkpads.
rhodysurf 10y ago
I recently got a new Surface Pro 3 for 450 on Ebay and love it, even runs linux well.
g105b 10y ago
My choice: Lenovo Thinkpad Carbon X1. Perfect Linux support, great battery, well built solid chassis, thin. Negatives: Costs a fortune, and some people simply don't like Thinkpads.
- Tushon 10y ago
  Completely agree with both points. My PYOD from work was a carbon and total cost with dock and RAM/SSD "requirements" ended up north of $2k. However, it is basically the best work PC I've used.
tmaly 10y ago
The 15 inch Acer Chromebook allows you to upgrade the SSD to a larger one for around $50 and you can install Linux on it as a dual boot. I paid around $225 for my Chromebook on Amazon. This particular model will is slated to get Android app store support sometime this year.
Const-me 10y ago
Programming something professionally in C++, definitely no. The main factor is CPU, #2 is RAM amount. But if by programming you mean learn python or C#, most likely yes. P.S. Couple months ago bought Acer V3-372-34W8. Not an ultrabook, but weights under 1.5 kg, not too large, thanks to its Iris GPU has 64MB of L4 CPU cache, and unlike real ultrabooks this one is upgradable.
GiorgioG 10y ago
I bought the Hi10 Pro + keyboard and it arrived Sunday. Last night it refused to turn on, got warm, then got uncomfortably hot. It's going back to Amazon today and I've ordered an iPad Pro (for my needs it's a better fit anyway (reading brooks.)) General observations - Windows was sluggish, no way you're going to be happy with IntelliJ performance on it. I installed VS Code but did not attempt any real work on it. Yes you can install any Windows app on it. The keyboard attachment is really heavy. Get a 12" MacBook or similar laptop. They are more reliable, powerful and seemingly less likely to catch fire due to cheap electronics.
siphr 10y ago
Lenovo x220/x230.
lcnmrn 10y ago
New MacBook Pro 13" sans Touch Bar is the best for what you need.
- pswenson 10y ago
  "I don't want to make a big investment"
- deathanatos 10y ago
  I just got a new MBP 13", without the touchbar. The keyboard is terrible, IMO, compared to prior models. The keys are shallower, and give less; compared to e.g., a Lenovo Thinkpad (I also bought recently), it's like typing on the desk itself. No give. My "a" key gets stuck, and it's not two weeks old. Before you buy one, go by an Apple store and type on one for yourself. The adapter situation is nuts. the MBP 13" w/o touchbar has two USB-C ports — that's it. You're effectively using one for power, leaving you with a single port that basically won't plug into anything you have. If you have a pre-existing dual monitor setup, AFAICT you're expected to sink ~$200 into adapters and hubs. (Note that most hubs seem to come with a USB-C port, so you can get a USB-C hub that will add several USB-A ports, w/o losing any USB-C ports.) Otherwise, it seems like a MBP. Apple did finally start putting a decent amount of RAM in them. This one has 16GB compared to my last MBP's 8GB (which Chrome just devours…) It ironically has a headphone jack though.
  - ttub 10y ago
    I share your sentiment. I got a 13" TB in Novemember, and I just had to return it to an apple store and have the keyboard replaced because the shift/enter key was stuck. The TB (100 % gimmick) also sometimes randomly looses light on some of the buttons (which re-appear when I touch them) I thought I would get used to the keyboard, but I dislike it so much that I am selling it and getting a 2015 MBP instead. This proved to be one gigantic time-wasting, expensive, and annoying experience.
soyiuz 10y ago
I recommend the Asus Flip Chromebook (running Debian under Crouton for development) or a refurbished Lenovo X2xx series. The ASUS is tiny for travel. The X2xx is larger, still pretty mobile, and built like a tank (military spec moisture and dust resistance). As a side-note, the ASUS died on me during my India trip due to moisture.
- DanBC 10y ago
  > The ASUS is tiny for travel. The X2xx is larger, still pretty mobile, and built like a tank (military spec moisture and dust resistance). The X205ta is not robust and not recommended if you want to run Linux, unless you enjoy painful noodling to get anything working. It's a nice machine for what it is (A windows 10 machine for Youtube video and social media).
  - chx 10y ago
    Parent didn't recommend an Asus Eeebook X205TA but a Lenovo ThinkPad X series tablet.
- uniclaude 10y ago
  I second the lenovo recommendation. An X220t with 16gb ram and ssd would fit your needs and budget for sure!
  - bluehazed 10y ago
    Not to mention the optional 2nd mSATA SSD!
BoppreH 10y ago
I recently bought a new HP ProBook 440 G3, for 610 €. Not a tablet, but thin and light. 6th generation i5, 256GB SSD, 4GB DDR4 dual channel (I upgraded to 16 GB for 99 euros), full HD screen, fingerprint reader, plenty of ports (VGA, HDMI, many usbs, SD card, ethernet, which is surprising in a thin notebook). Easy to take apart too. Only downside is the TN screen. In the US it's probably even cheaper.
PascLeRasc 10y ago
Check out the Acer C720 running Gallium OS (Xubuntu). They're available with i3s and 4gb of ram and they're quite sufficient and have a great community.
- yathern 10y ago
  I wholeheartedly agree - though I chrooted mine instead of running Gallium. It allows me to use the super easy ChromeOS, and instantly switch to Debian when I want to do anything more. It's light, small and has a good battery life, and cheap. All things I want in a laptop so I can throw it into my bag and forget it till I need it.
- hguant 10y ago
  Came here to recommend a modified chromebook. Excellent little computer - I got mine when I needed to go to Taiwan and didn't want to lug my monster of a laptop around a bunch of hostels.
genericacct 10y ago
Avoid Chuwi at all costs
harel 10y ago
Carbon X1 - hands down, no doubt, go for it. Get the 4th gen and you can max it to 16gb ram. Otherwise you're limited to 8GB. Excellent linux support (which I need), fantastic resolution, I love the keyboard. Touchpad can be a bit too sensitive but i got used to it. Great machine.
dalacv 10y ago
With Chuwi, you might find issues with hardware drivers for sound and touchscreen: https://techtablets.com/forum/topic/linux-mint-on-a-chuwi-hi10-tablet/ https://techtablets.com/forum/topic/linux-mint-on-a-chuwi-hi...
nix0n 10y ago
I used an Atom-based netbook as my primary dev machine for a while as a student, and it was ... okay, but not recommended. I used GUIs, but not full IDEs. (I highly recommend KDE's Kate text editor.) I've since upgraded to an Intel i3-based system which is much better (for a total budget of $450 including doing my own SSD upgrade). Both machines are Asus. If you want to use an IDE, make sure you also get a big enough screen for it. If all you need from Linux is Bash, Cygwin will be enough.
scholia 10y ago
> decent 4 core Cherry Trail Z8300 CPU None of the Atom chips is decent for anything that requires heavy lifting. You really need a Core processor. > 4Gb of RAM, 64 Gb of ROM 4GB is workable but 8GB is obviously better. However, I think you mean 64GB of storage. This is usually in the form of an eMMC chip soldered to the motherboard. The performance is similar to an ordinary SD card. It's nowhere near the performance of an SSD. If you want the tablet functions, your best bets are a second hand Surface Pro 2, one of the Lenovo Yoga's, or an Asus ZenBook -- they're all available with SSDs and 8GB or more RAM. The Surface Pro 2 keyboard isn't good and the touchpad is awful, but you can get a nice portable Microsoft Bluetooth mouse instead. If you can live without the tablet functions, go for a refurbished ex-corporate ThinkPad X range with an i5 or i7, and fit your own SSD. The X220 was the last model with a "real" keyboard, but the newer keyboards are not too bad. (Most of the alternatives are worse.) Battery life isn't great but look for a model where you can buy a second extended battery. I spent many years with a ThinkPad X and two extended (9-cell) batteries and I could outlast anybody ;-) I shared your doubts about Lenovo products but you should get over it: I've bought three in the past 18 months and they've been fine. It's the highest-volume PC manufacturer today and nobody else is competitive at the really cheap end of the market. Also, you can often pick up sale bargains when it's clearing out overstocks, which is what I've done.
- tekklloneer 10y ago
  > This is usually in the form of an eMMC chip soldered to the motherboard. This is something to watch out for, but hasn't been done commonly for years. Those are the most likely parts to fail and manufacturers hate replacing an entire mobo under warranty just to replace a flash chip.
  - scholia 10y ago
    Thanks for the info. What do they do instead?
lukaszkups 10y ago
Zenbook UX32LN - I've got it since 2015 and still can't stop feel how amazing machine it is. Running elementaryOS on it (linux), coding in Node.js, python, cordova, rails and everything works like a charm.
fest 10y ago
I own Chuwi Hi10 Plus with soft keyboard/case. It's a decent general purpose tablet but I wouldn't use it for work unless I had no other option. Reasons: * keyboard is too small for me (I find T430s keyboard much more comfortable); * Windows performance was terrible (again, compared to 2nd or 3rd gen i5). I ended up removing windows and installing Cyanogenmod. Oh, and the stock RemixOS software was buggy to the point where it was unusable: crashes when using SD card and about 12 hours of standby time when keyboard is attached. CM build fixes these issues. Also, if you're wondering: Chuwi's active stylus is not worth it- it's laggy, has bad palm rejection and needs too much pressure.
badloginagain 10y ago
http://www.lappylist.com/ http://www.lappylist.com/ is a fantastic, comprehensive comparison for a range of laptops. It also dispels a lot of the myths I had about laptops, what is important in them, etc. I can't recommend it enough.
- pthreads 10y ago
  Thanks for link. It looks very useful.
jwatte 10y ago
Program what? 4 GB is a little low these days, unless you're an Unix text editor and makefile person. Also, the rigidity of the keyboard and connection to it will be super important. Most detachable keyboards will cause trouble (especially the cheap ones.) I'd recommend going for more ram, as big a screen as you can stand, and solid keyboard.
gens 10y ago
"for programming" ... I programmed just fine on a single core idk-what older celeron with 512MB of RAM and a.. idk ~1000x700 resolution (and even all that was waaaay too much). Next time say what you want to program, as for web and such programming you need a ton of RAM (and probably cpu) while some things/languages you can program just fine with 256MB and a weak cpu. Bdw cherry trail has a sound card in the cpu that doesn't yet work under linux. edit: ".. IntelliJ IDEA?" Requirements are clear: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IntelliJ_IDEA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IntelliJ_IDEA . And you can just open your task manager and see how much memory or cpu it uses.
cleaver 10y ago
If it's for a trip mad you don't need it afterwards, you might think about a refurbished MacBook. The initial outlay will be more, but the resale value is good. I know people who've done this and actually came out a little ahead.
baybal2 10y ago
Panasonic RZ6 - 18 hours battery life, i7 (not a real "U" series one, though), 18 hours idle battery life
werber 10y ago
I'd suggest a used macbook air, try to go a couple years back, and look for a little bit of cosmetic damage to drop the price super low.
gpascii 10y ago
I've owned two Asus Transformers: a T100 and a T200. Both beautiful convertibles, the T100 build quality is imho better having a sturdier keyboard and being more solid overall. Anyway the developing experience on the Intel Atom is far from optimal. I do fullstack web dev and some Java on Android; VMs on BayTrail (either with 2 or 4 gb of ram) are a pain to use, everything is slow and simple tasks become very time consuming. No real multitasking with 4 gb of ram, Chrome will start to kill background tabs as soon as you open Photoshop or similar. That said I've recently bought a refurbished Thinkpad T430 for about $300. Best purchase for my productivity: runs Linux very well, is fast with an i5 and 8gb, is silent, the keyboard is very very good, ssd is fast, build quality is among the best you can find. Try a Thinkpad, you'll love it.
ancymon 10y ago
I didn't try it but lately I was thinking about the same thing. I came up with conclusion that I'll try to get myself the cheapest laptop and try to log in from it to some remote dev machine. I think renting for hours Amazon Workspaces: https://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/pricing/ https://aws.amazon.com/workspaces/pricing/ and working from cheap laptop might be not a bad idea.
jakeogh 10y ago
Are there any ultrabooks with OTG/USB charging support? (edit) Found: http://www.pcworld.com/article/3017182/hardware/usb-c-charging-universal-or-bust-we-plug-in-every-device-we-have-to-chase-the-dream.html http://www.pcworld.com/article/3017182/hardware/usb-c-chargi... https://www.quora.com/Why-dont-laptop-manufacturers-use-usb-charger-adapter-as-default-source-of-power https://www.quora.com/Why-dont-laptop-manufacturers-use-usb-...

heywire 10y ago

This is the exact laptop that my employer provides me. While it is not thin or light, it is a pleasant machine to use. I have no problems using it on my lap on the couch or at a coffee shop. My machine is configured as an i5-3340 with 16GB RAM and a 256GB SSD (I also added a second SSD in place of the CD/DVD drive). I frequently have 3 or more VMs running under VMware, an instance or two of Visual Studio, Chrome, Outlook, and half a dozen other small utilities (text editors, skype for business, etc). I have no complaints whatsoever about performance. The touchpad isn't the greatest (I prefer my T420 in this department), but the keyboard is fine, and the screen as well. As someone else mentioned, the T4x0 series are also very good. I have a personal T420 that I have upgraded to 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, and Blu Ray that has held up very well over the years. To be honest, aside from the screen resolution, there is nothing pushing me to upgrade to a newer machine, and this thing was released in early 2011. When I am looking for something thin and light, I use an Acer C720 Chromebook which has been reloaded with a full Linux install. It is perfect for SSHing into a more powerful machine if I'm just going to be in vim / bash all day. I get 8-10 hours of battery life in this mode. I picked this machine up for $130 a year or so ago (refurbished).

wj 10y ago
I tried Ubuntu on my c720 and had issues with the cursor. I think it might have been me brushing my hand against the trackpad which I believe the Chromebook os recognizes as accidental but Ubuntu did not. Have you had this issue?
- heywire 10y ago
  I don't remember having that issue specifically, but I do know that on a fresh install the touchpad is not very responsive. I'm currently running arch with the following as /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/50-synaptics.conf: Section "InputClass" Identifier "touchpad catchall" Driver "synaptics" MatchIsTouchpad "on" MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*" Option "FingerLow" "5" Option "FingerHigh" "10" Option "VertScrollDelta" "-25" Option "HorizScrollDelta" "-25" Option "CoastingSpeed" "5" Option "CoastingFriction" "20" Option "TapButton1" "1" Option "TapButton2" "3" Option "TapButton3" "2" EndSection There's also a specialized Ubuntu-derivative called GalliumOS [1] that you might try. They try to work out all these configuration oddities before you get it loaded. [1] https://galliumos.org/ https://galliumos.org/
- davidbanham 10y ago
  Palm detection is turned off by default for some reason, but you can just turn it back on.