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> This has been discussed before: similarly configured PC laptops cost just as much or more. What? * Razer Blade 14" [http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-systems/

> This has been discussed before: similarly configured PC laptops cost just as much or more. What? * Razer Blade 14" [http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-systems/razer-blade http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-systems/razer-blade] * Alienware 13" [http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/alienware-13-laptop http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/alienware-13-l...] * Alienware 15" [http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/alienware-15-laptop http://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/productdetails/alienware-15-l...] * Dell DE workstation [http://www.dell.com/learn/us/en/555/campaigns/xps-linux-laptop?c=us&l=en&s=biz http://www.dell.com/learn/us/en/555/campaigns/xps-linux-lapt...] [1] So basically every other power machine in that price range has better specifications for less or equal pricing (including premium niche brands like Razer) [1] These come with Ubuntu preinstalled if you want too! --- Edit: Just for grins I thought I would break down the comparison of the Macbook Pro 13" against the Razer Blade. Stats: MBP 13 (max configured), Razer Blade Price: $2,499, $2,299 CPU: i7 DUAL core, i7 QUAD core GPU: Intel Iris (integrated), Nvidia GTX 1060 RAM: 16 GB LPDDR3, 16 GB DDR4 Disk: 512 GB PCIE SSD, 512 GB PCIE SSD Display: Retina (2560 x 1600), QHD w/ Touch (3200 x 1800) Basically, the Razer Blade destroys the performance of the MBP for $200 LESS. --- Edit 2: The price discrepancies get even worse when talking about the 15" laptop...just saying.

eslaught 10y ago
Take any of your 15" options and try to satisfy the following requirements: * Quad core CPU * >= 16 GB RAM * >= 1 TB SSD * Retina display with resolution at least as good as the MacBook 15" * Battery life at least as good as the MacBook 15" * Weight at least as good as the MacBook 15" With those requirements---if you can meet them at all, which most can't---the price gap shrinks substantially. The Razer Blade, for example, is $2700 for the QHD+/1TB option, and it's not obvious if it can meet the last two requirements. The Alienware in a similar configuration is $2600 depending on the graphics card but the best screen option is 1080p and again, not obvious if battery is good and the weight is just a joke. No amount of money is going to get me to carry a > 7 pound laptop. And that's without going into more subtle issues like build quality, track pad quality, etc.
- JamesMcMinn 10y ago
  Dell's XPS 15 comes closest to that, although perhaps doesn't have quite the same battery life, it does have: Quad Core i7, 32GB RAM, 1TB SDD, higher resolution, approximately same weight, and a more powerful GPU.
  - gshulegaard 10y ago
    I would check into the battery life. But I did recall hearing that the new MBPs had battery issues? http://www.macrumors.com/2016/12/03/macbook-pro-battery-life-concerns/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/12/03/macbook-pro-battery-life...
    - JamesMcMinn 10y ago
      As I understand it, they fixed whatever issue was causing the battery life issues through a software patch. I've got a XPS 15 9560 and the battery life sits around 7 to 8 hours for "basic" tasks at around 30% brightness (which is still quite bright). This is running Fedora 25, so it's probably a bit longer under Windows. Not going to reach the 10 hours of a MBP, but it's still quite good.
      - thegayngler 10y ago
        I can confirm that whatever battery life issues I was seeing in my 2016 15" MBP before seem to have been resolved. I was in Xcode all day Saturday without being plugged in at all and still had like 60% left at around 6:30pm Saturday after having been on my computer since like 10:30am.
- comex 10y ago
  Last I checked, your last three conditions (display, battery, weight) are simply impossible to satisfy simultaneously in any of the available 15" Windows laptops, regardless of price. You mostly get to choose between 1080p with good battery life, and QHD+, which is admittedly a much higher resolution than the MBP has, accompanied with much worse battery life (Apple advertises 10 hours with light usage). Or, of course, you can get a thick and heavy laptop with everything. None of those options are to my liking, so I'd love to learn about anything that can fit the bill...
caycep 10y ago
Not having used any of their laptops, I can't really comment, but I HAVE sworn off Razer mice and keyboards....plastic pieces of crap...
samfisher83 10y ago
The 1060 is monster card. I don't know if it was meant to be put in such a thin and small frame. The blade 14 has issues with throttling.
- intoverflow2 10y ago
  Any Nvidia is better than no Nvidia (All Apple machines currently) in a world where almost all GPU based computing is CUDA not OpenCL.
legulere 10y ago
It is often the factors you cannot put that easily in numbers that make the difference. I googled for the razer blade and found pretty fast those issues: - It seems to have around 6 hours surfing time on a battery while the macbook has 10. - It seems to have a worse screen with bad viewing angles. - The razor weighs 1.93 kg while the macbook weighs 1.37 kg. This makes quite a difference when you e.g. travel a lot by public transport or by aeroplane. The razor also is marginally thicker (3 mm) - The razor has USB 3.0 while the macbook has USB 3.1 - The razor has a drastically slower SSD than the one of the macbook - The razor has shitty speakers, while the macbook has pretty good ones. - The keyboard seems to have some issues like the function and mediakeys not being lit. In the end it is pretty obvious, that they are completely different machines. The razor is a mobile gaming machine optimized for gaming performance, while the macbook is a high quality general purpose laptop, optimized for performance in general.
- gshulegaard 10y ago
  - Battery life is going to be a trade off for performance. Things like the 4k screen as well as the DDR4 (vs LPDDR3) RAM are going to come at a cost to battery life. - I don't know about the screen, but having owned both, viewing angles are not an issue on either. I _believe_ the MBP has better color accuracy, but the blade is no slouch with full sRGB coverage and 75% Adobe RGB [1] - I travel a lot by airplane and weights are going to be a personal preference, but I don't notice a difference...and I take public transit for 40 minutes and have a 2 mile walk to work. But again, personal preference. - Perhaps I am not in the know, but the Razer Blade has USB type-C (TB3) as well as USB type-A (ostensibly serving 3.0). MBP has 4 TB3 ports if I understand it correctly, so it has more, but I don't think it fair to say the Blade has none. - I don't know if the SSD is "drastically slower"...but it might be slower. Both are PCIE nVME SSD drives, the blade specifically has a Samsung SM951. Not the top of the line, but certainly not a bargin bin drive[1]. And for the price difference, you could replace the drive in the Razer with something better if you want...whereas the MBP is soldered on[2]. - I don't know, I am not terribly impressed by any laptop speakers in 13" form factors...but personal preference. I would have to agree, owning both, that I think the MBP has a slight edge as they don't distort at Max volume and the Blade does slightly...but I wouldn't say the difference between is huge. - Razer blade media keys are lit, the function labels are not...which is terribly annoying for me (but media _are_ lit). > In the end it is pretty obvious, that they are completely different machines. The razor is a mobile gaming machine optimized for gaming performance, while the macbook is a high quality general purpose laptop, optimized for performance in general. I would amend this slightly by saying the Macbook is a high quality general use laptop. Nothing about it is optimized for performance in my mind (LPDDR3, Retina not 4k, etc.). Most of the choices trade performance for battery (IMO). To be clear, this is not bad. The Razer is definitely a mobile performance focused machine... But the only reason I bring it up is because I was refuting the claim: > This has been discussed before: similarly configured PC laptops cost just as much or more. And I think it is pretty clear that for the hardware, the MBP is definitely more expensive than other options (by significant margins). [1] http://www.mobiletechreview.com/notebooks/2016-Razer-Blade.htm http://www.mobiletechreview.com/notebooks/2016-Razer-Blade.h... [2] http://blog.macsales.com/38719-commentary-soldered-ssd-in-touch-bar-macbook-pro-brings-potential-issues-disappointment http://blog.macsales.com/38719-commentary-soldered-ssd-in-to...
chrischen 10y ago
Razr 13" sports a 1080p display, and below average battery life. Please add that to your list.

eslaught 10y ago

Take any of your 15" options and try to satisfy the following requirements: * Quad core CPU * >= 16 GB RAM * >= 1 TB SSD * Retina display with resolution at least as good as the MacBook 15" * Battery life at least as good as the MacBook 15" * Weight at least as good as the MacBook 15" With those requirements---if you can meet them at all, which most can't---the price gap shrinks substantially. The Razer Blade, for example, is $2700 for the QHD+/1TB option, and it's not obvious if it can meet the last two requirements. The Alienware in a similar configuration is $2600 depending on the graphics card but the best screen option is 1080p and again, not obvious if battery is good and the weight is just a joke. No amount of money is going to get me to carry a > 7 pound laptop. And that's without going into more subtle issues like build quality, track pad quality, etc.

JamesMcMinn 10y ago
Dell's XPS 15 comes closest to that, although perhaps doesn't have quite the same battery life, it does have: Quad Core i7, 32GB RAM, 1TB SDD, higher resolution, approximately same weight, and a more powerful GPU.
- gshulegaard 10y ago
  I would check into the battery life. But I did recall hearing that the new MBPs had battery issues? http://www.macrumors.com/2016/12/03/macbook-pro-battery-life-concerns/ http://www.macrumors.com/2016/12/03/macbook-pro-battery-life...
  - JamesMcMinn 10y ago
    As I understand it, they fixed whatever issue was causing the battery life issues through a software patch. I've got a XPS 15 9560 and the battery life sits around 7 to 8 hours for "basic" tasks at around 30% brightness (which is still quite bright). This is running Fedora 25, so it's probably a bit longer under Windows. Not going to reach the 10 hours of a MBP, but it's still quite good.
    - thegayngler 10y ago
      I can confirm that whatever battery life issues I was seeing in my 2016 15" MBP before seem to have been resolved. I was in Xcode all day Saturday without being plugged in at all and still had like 60% left at around 6:30pm Saturday after having been on my computer since like 10:30am.
comex 10y ago
Last I checked, your last three conditions (display, battery, weight) are simply impossible to satisfy simultaneously in any of the available 15" Windows laptops, regardless of price. You mostly get to choose between 1080p with good battery life, and QHD+, which is admittedly a much higher resolution than the MBP has, accompanied with much worse battery life (Apple advertises 10 hours with light usage). Or, of course, you can get a thick and heavy laptop with everything. None of those options are to my liking, so I'd love to learn about anything that can fit the bill...

caycep 10y ago

Not having used any of their laptops, I can't really comment, but I HAVE sworn off Razer mice and keyboards....plastic pieces of crap...

samfisher83 10y ago

The 1060 is monster card. I don't know if it was meant to be put in such a thin and small frame. The blade 14 has issues with throttling.

intoverflow2 10y ago
Any Nvidia is better than no Nvidia (All Apple machines currently) in a world where almost all GPU based computing is CUDA not OpenCL.

legulere 10y ago

It is often the factors you cannot put that easily in numbers that make the difference. I googled for the razer blade and found pretty fast those issues: - It seems to have around 6 hours surfing time on a battery while the macbook has 10. - It seems to have a worse screen with bad viewing angles. - The razor weighs 1.93 kg while the macbook weighs 1.37 kg. This makes quite a difference when you e.g. travel a lot by public transport or by aeroplane. The razor also is marginally thicker (3 mm) - The razor has USB 3.0 while the macbook has USB 3.1 - The razor has a drastically slower SSD than the one of the macbook - The razor has shitty speakers, while the macbook has pretty good ones. - The keyboard seems to have some issues like the function and mediakeys not being lit. In the end it is pretty obvious, that they are completely different machines. The razor is a mobile gaming machine optimized for gaming performance, while the macbook is a high quality general purpose laptop, optimized for performance in general.

gshulegaard 10y ago
- Battery life is going to be a trade off for performance. Things like the 4k screen as well as the DDR4 (vs LPDDR3) RAM are going to come at a cost to battery life. - I don't know about the screen, but having owned both, viewing angles are not an issue on either. I _believe_ the MBP has better color accuracy, but the blade is no slouch with full sRGB coverage and 75% Adobe RGB [1] - I travel a lot by airplane and weights are going to be a personal preference, but I don't notice a difference...and I take public transit for 40 minutes and have a 2 mile walk to work. But again, personal preference. - Perhaps I am not in the know, but the Razer Blade has USB type-C (TB3) as well as USB type-A (ostensibly serving 3.0). MBP has 4 TB3 ports if I understand it correctly, so it has more, but I don't think it fair to say the Blade has none. - I don't know if the SSD is "drastically slower"...but it might be slower. Both are PCIE nVME SSD drives, the blade specifically has a Samsung SM951. Not the top of the line, but certainly not a bargin bin drive[1]. And for the price difference, you could replace the drive in the Razer with something better if you want...whereas the MBP is soldered on[2]. - I don't know, I am not terribly impressed by any laptop speakers in 13" form factors...but personal preference. I would have to agree, owning both, that I think the MBP has a slight edge as they don't distort at Max volume and the Blade does slightly...but I wouldn't say the difference between is huge. - Razer blade media keys are lit, the function labels are not...which is terribly annoying for me (but media _are_ lit). > In the end it is pretty obvious, that they are completely different machines. The razor is a mobile gaming machine optimized for gaming performance, while the macbook is a high quality general purpose laptop, optimized for performance in general. I would amend this slightly by saying the Macbook is a high quality general use laptop. Nothing about it is optimized for performance in my mind (LPDDR3, Retina not 4k, etc.). Most of the choices trade performance for battery (IMO). To be clear, this is not bad. The Razer is definitely a mobile performance focused machine... But the only reason I bring it up is because I was refuting the claim: > This has been discussed before: similarly configured PC laptops cost just as much or more. And I think it is pretty clear that for the hardware, the MBP is definitely more expensive than other options (by significant margins). [1] http://www.mobiletechreview.com/notebooks/2016-Razer-Blade.htm http://www.mobiletechreview.com/notebooks/2016-Razer-Blade.h... [2] http://blog.macsales.com/38719-commentary-soldered-ssd-in-touch-bar-macbook-pro-brings-potential-issues-disappointment http://blog.macsales.com/38719-commentary-soldered-ssd-in-to...

chrischen 10y ago

Razr 13" sports a 1080p display, and below average battery life. Please add that to your list.