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IMO, it does not make sense to buy any of those new models: whether it's Dell, HP, or else--before we see models with 32Gb of RAM. It's been told here over and

IMO, it does not make sense to buy any of those new models: whether it's Dell, HP, or else--before we see models with 32Gb of RAM. It's been told here over and over since 2016 when first Touchbar MacBook got released. It's 2018 and all of us, including manufacturers, are locked with 16GB of RAM and those upgrades look like a joke. Within last month I noticed myötähäpeä when someone asks me for laptop advice. Hopefully this situation will make enough professionals pissed off so both them and manufacturers would look into RISC. It's going to get worse before it gets better.

aidenn0 9y ago
I've been using an HP zBook for a while now with 32GB of RAM and it could be configured up to 64 GB of RAM. ECC is an option too on it.
wmf 9y ago
Note that 32GB is available if you move up to 15": https://bartongeorge.io/2017/01/09/welcome-the-new-ubuntu-based-precision-line-up-mobile-workstations-plus-a-new-all-in-one/ https://bartongeorge.io/2017/01/09/welcome-the-new-ubuntu-ba...
rcpt 9y ago
There's a global RAM shortage now. 32G would likely put too much of a sticker shock on the price tag.
- cptskippy 9y ago
  When was the last time RAM prices were low? 2006 after the US DoJ got done suing everyone for price fixing? Maybe I'm a crazy conspiracy theorist but I wouldn't at all be surprised if DRAM manufacturers weren't colluding to limit supply to inflate prices rather than competing with one another on the open market. I think the same of Flash prices too.
  - rootbear 9y ago
    DDR3 RAM was dirt cheap just a few years ago. I maxed out several of my systems.
cptskippy 9y ago
Most vendors are looking to prolong battery life and increasing RAM will do the exact opposite. Most software is still 32 bit and can't take advantage of the added memory. Even apps that can still don't really need that much. Workloads requiring gobs are RAM are niche and 8GBs works well for most people. My personal server with 16GB of RAM runs at around 48% utilization hosting 16 sites, multiple databases, a transcoding media server, and a transcoding DVR. My work issued laptop with 8GB of RAM is running under 75% utilization. My development VM with 6GB of RAM is only running at 75% utilization. Apart from video editing or data analysis, what sort of workloads would a user be running on a laptop that demand every ounce of RAM you can give them?
- solotronics 9y ago
  multiple VMs
  - cptskippy 9y ago
    The average user won't be doing this. What sort of workloads are you running on your VMs? My VMs are typically provisioned for 512-2048MBs of RAM and given 16GB of RAM that's more VMs then I'll ever need running at once.
- LeifCarrotson 9y ago
  Two 32-bit apps on a 64 bit operating system (and everyone is running a 64-bit OS now) can each use 4 GB of physical RAM. They're each in virtualized address spaces. A typical example of a workload that would use more RAM would be a bunch of big Excel documents open, a couple Chrome windows each with a bunch of tabs, Outlook and a chat app running in the background, and a profession-specific app like Visual Studio, Labview, Photoshop, Quickbooks, Solidworks, or whatever your specific job requires. Which represents just about every use case there is. This results in a consistent 70% usage on the 16 GB desktops across our office...and also about 90% usage on the older 8 GB machines. Like Parkinson's Law for computers, apps expand to use the computing power available to them. And if you want this machine to be usable 2-4 years down the road, you should desire the possibility of increasing to 32 GB.
chimeracoder 9y ago
> IMO, it does not make sense to buy any of those new models: whether it's Dell, HP, or else--before we see models with 32Gb of RAM. It's been told here over and over since 2016 when first Touchbar MacBook got released. What are you doing on an Ultrabook that actually needs 32GB of RAM? Even on my work laptop (Macbook Pro, 16GB), I pretty much never have issues that would be addressed by having 32GB of RAM. (Note: Just because toph/htop/etc. show >16GB of data in memory, that doesn't necessarily mean your workload would be noticeably impacted if you were limited to 16GB of RAM.)
- FBISurveillance 9y ago
  I my case it adds up: Slack, Docker CE (that spins up a VM on Mac) for tests, corporate Docker EE setup (runs alongside Docker CE), elasticsearch, kafka, and 9 more services inside that corporate Docker setup, two Chromes (Chrome Stable and Chrome Canary), multiple VSCode instances. And if you need to build something with boost or folly you can add 3GB ram just for that. I realize that my setup is not common but I'd appreciate to have an option. (Mind you, I'm primarily talking in Mac perspective because work laptop has strict platform requirements.) Edit: Disclaimer: currently using MacBook Pro 15".
  - chimeracoder 9y ago
    > I my case it adds up: Slack, Docker CE (that spins up a VM on Mac) for tests, corporate Docker EE setup (runs alongside Docker CE), elasticsearch, kafka, and 9 more services inside that corporate Docker setup, two Chromes (Chrome Stable and Chrome Canary), multiple VSCode instances. And if you need to build something with boost or folly you can add 3GB ram just for that. Sure, but any Ultrabook is going to struggle running all of that, and more RAM isn't going to help by itself. You can run all of that on a Macbook Pro, but not a Macbook Air; the XPS 13 is intended to be comparable to the Macbook Air.
emilsedgh 9y ago
Do people actually need 32G ram though or is it just being obsessed with higher specs? I have an X1 Carbon with 16G. I rarely use 4G memory with a full KDE (+ KMail with hundreds of thousands of emails stored locally), a few atom based apps (Slack, Spotify) and a browser that is always open. My browser usually has only a few tabs open and I understand that people have browsers with hundreds of windows and full fledged IDE's (I tend to prefer editors). But 16G, I wouldn't know how to use that much memory. Even with an IDE and possibly a Windows VM.
- bluedino 9y ago
  I'm using 12GB in Windows 7, and I'm not even doing any development work (VM's). Firefox, Chrome, Outlook, a couple spreadsheets and text editors, Evernote, Winamp, a couple Putty sessions, IBM terminal...
- cardiffspaceman 9y ago
  It's not that I need to do many tasks, it's that this one task calls for lots of RAM, and it's best if I can do it freely instead of only doing it overnight like a batch-mode cave dweller. I have a build that when done from scratch calls upon the linker in such a way, it needs about 12G working set, and it's much faster if that's RAM. It took 'overnight' when I had 8G and if I was present, I could barely do anything else.
LeifCarrotson 9y ago
Agreed. 'Else' including the previously commendable Lenovo Thinkpad lineup: Today, they announced that the x280 (either that or the previously lighter and thinner X1 Carbon being the equivalent of Dell's XPS 13) will feature: - 16 GB max of soldered-on RAM. :( - Removed RJ45 Ethernet port. :( - Reduced battery capacity by 40%. :( - Removed external hot-swappable battery. :( - Removed 2.5mm SATA drive bay. :( - 2.5mm thinner and 0.21 kg lighter! Hooray...I guess. However, I'm not clear on how RISC would salvage the situation. It seems there's an obvious dilemma in play: Consumers are not rational, and businesses optimize to win these irrational decisions rather than focusing on long-term, difficult to define items like quality, repair/upgrade ability, and reliability.
- touristtam 9y ago
  Anniversary or x270 then? :(
  - LeifCarrotson 9y ago
    That, or x230 with 20-series keyboard swap, FHD screen mod, and an upgraded SSD. But there are only so many of those left and they get older every year :/
randyrand 9y ago
I really don't need 32GB, but considering my 15" Lenovo W520 from 6.5 years ago has 16GB too what on earth has happened to computer innovation!? 6.5 years without a DRAM increase for 15" laptops is bonkers. It was $1500 for the laptop, it wasn't even crazy expensive back then. On top of that it even supported 32GB. All in a rather sleek 15" form factor. (6.2 pounds vs 2018 XPS 15 4.6 pounds). Sources: https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-P-and-W-Series-Mobile/W520-Quad-Core-upgrading-to-16GB-Memory-Should-I-buy-One-2x8GB/td-p/904287 https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-P-and-W-Series-Mobile/... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih3rD2ccGkM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih3rD2ccGkM
- LeifCarrotson 9y ago
  The W520 was and is an outlier in just about every category, though. Not exactly a fair comparison... Also, if you're going to be talking about the form factor and weight, you should probably mention the power adapter...The XPS takes a 45W, 0.2 pound little USB C device. The W520 requires you to lug around a 1.7 lbs, 170W beast that definitely qualifies as a brick. That and a lack of support for the latest NVMe drives are some of the only shortcomings, IMO.
  - randyrand 9y ago
    The power adapter is a good point! It really is a beast. Including the AC adapter, the XPS 15 is 40% lighter than the W520 for roughly equal performance and similar battery life. Not too bad. It's still a bit sad though. After 5.5 years I moved to a macbook pro 13" 2016 and the performance was a drastic downgrade from it (the w520 finally broke...). Moore's "law" is clearly, finally, gone.
bproven 9y ago
They should, but I thought it was some sort of chipset limitation due to the usage of the low powered (laptop) Intel chip line. Which is why all these ultrabooks (under 15") have 16GB ceilings...

aidenn0 9y ago

I've been using an HP zBook for a while now with 32GB of RAM and it could be configured up to 64 GB of RAM. ECC is an option too on it.

wmf 9y ago

Note that 32GB is available if you move up to 15": https://bartongeorge.io/2017/01/09/welcome-the-new-ubuntu-based-precision-line-up-mobile-workstations-plus-a-new-all-in-one/ https://bartongeorge.io/2017/01/09/welcome-the-new-ubuntu-ba...

rcpt 9y ago

There's a global RAM shortage now. 32G would likely put too much of a sticker shock on the price tag.

cptskippy 9y ago
When was the last time RAM prices were low? 2006 after the US DoJ got done suing everyone for price fixing? Maybe I'm a crazy conspiracy theorist but I wouldn't at all be surprised if DRAM manufacturers weren't colluding to limit supply to inflate prices rather than competing with one another on the open market. I think the same of Flash prices too.
- rootbear 9y ago
  DDR3 RAM was dirt cheap just a few years ago. I maxed out several of my systems.

cptskippy 9y ago

Most vendors are looking to prolong battery life and increasing RAM will do the exact opposite. Most software is still 32 bit and can't take advantage of the added memory. Even apps that can still don't really need that much. Workloads requiring gobs are RAM are niche and 8GBs works well for most people. My personal server with 16GB of RAM runs at around 48% utilization hosting 16 sites, multiple databases, a transcoding media server, and a transcoding DVR. My work issued laptop with 8GB of RAM is running under 75% utilization. My development VM with 6GB of RAM is only running at 75% utilization. Apart from video editing or data analysis, what sort of workloads would a user be running on a laptop that demand every ounce of RAM you can give them?

solotronics 9y ago
multiple VMs
- cptskippy 9y ago
  The average user won't be doing this. What sort of workloads are you running on your VMs? My VMs are typically provisioned for 512-2048MBs of RAM and given 16GB of RAM that's more VMs then I'll ever need running at once.
LeifCarrotson 9y ago
Two 32-bit apps on a 64 bit operating system (and everyone is running a 64-bit OS now) can each use 4 GB of physical RAM. They're each in virtualized address spaces. A typical example of a workload that would use more RAM would be a bunch of big Excel documents open, a couple Chrome windows each with a bunch of tabs, Outlook and a chat app running in the background, and a profession-specific app like Visual Studio, Labview, Photoshop, Quickbooks, Solidworks, or whatever your specific job requires. Which represents just about every use case there is. This results in a consistent 70% usage on the 16 GB desktops across our office...and also about 90% usage on the older 8 GB machines. Like Parkinson's Law for computers, apps expand to use the computing power available to them. And if you want this machine to be usable 2-4 years down the road, you should desire the possibility of increasing to 32 GB.

chimeracoder 9y ago

> IMO, it does not make sense to buy any of those new models: whether it's Dell, HP, or else--before we see models with 32Gb of RAM. It's been told here over and over since 2016 when first Touchbar MacBook got released. What are you doing on an Ultrabook that actually needs 32GB of RAM? Even on my work laptop (Macbook Pro, 16GB), I pretty much never have issues that would be addressed by having 32GB of RAM. (Note: Just because toph/htop/etc. show >16GB of data in memory, that doesn't necessarily mean your workload would be noticeably impacted if you were limited to 16GB of RAM.)

FBISurveillance 9y ago
I my case it adds up: Slack, Docker CE (that spins up a VM on Mac) for tests, corporate Docker EE setup (runs alongside Docker CE), elasticsearch, kafka, and 9 more services inside that corporate Docker setup, two Chromes (Chrome Stable and Chrome Canary), multiple VSCode instances. And if you need to build something with boost or folly you can add 3GB ram just for that. I realize that my setup is not common but I'd appreciate to have an option. (Mind you, I'm primarily talking in Mac perspective because work laptop has strict platform requirements.) Edit: Disclaimer: currently using MacBook Pro 15".
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > I my case it adds up: Slack, Docker CE (that spins up a VM on Mac) for tests, corporate Docker EE setup (runs alongside Docker CE), elasticsearch, kafka, and 9 more services inside that corporate Docker setup, two Chromes (Chrome Stable and Chrome Canary), multiple VSCode instances. And if you need to build something with boost or folly you can add 3GB ram just for that. Sure, but any Ultrabook is going to struggle running all of that, and more RAM isn't going to help by itself. You can run all of that on a Macbook Pro, but not a Macbook Air; the XPS 13 is intended to be comparable to the Macbook Air.

emilsedgh 9y ago

Do people actually need 32G ram though or is it just being obsessed with higher specs? I have an X1 Carbon with 16G. I rarely use 4G memory with a full KDE (+ KMail with hundreds of thousands of emails stored locally), a few atom based apps (Slack, Spotify) and a browser that is always open. My browser usually has only a few tabs open and I understand that people have browsers with hundreds of windows and full fledged IDE's (I tend to prefer editors). But 16G, I wouldn't know how to use that much memory. Even with an IDE and possibly a Windows VM.

bluedino 9y ago
I'm using 12GB in Windows 7, and I'm not even doing any development work (VM's). Firefox, Chrome, Outlook, a couple spreadsheets and text editors, Evernote, Winamp, a couple Putty sessions, IBM terminal...
cardiffspaceman 9y ago
It's not that I need to do many tasks, it's that this one task calls for lots of RAM, and it's best if I can do it freely instead of only doing it overnight like a batch-mode cave dweller. I have a build that when done from scratch calls upon the linker in such a way, it needs about 12G working set, and it's much faster if that's RAM. It took 'overnight' when I had 8G and if I was present, I could barely do anything else.

LeifCarrotson 9y ago

Agreed. 'Else' including the previously commendable Lenovo Thinkpad lineup: Today, they announced that the x280 (either that or the previously lighter and thinner X1 Carbon being the equivalent of Dell's XPS 13) will feature: - 16 GB max of soldered-on RAM. :( - Removed RJ45 Ethernet port. :( - Reduced battery capacity by 40%. :( - Removed external hot-swappable battery. :( - Removed 2.5mm SATA drive bay. :( - 2.5mm thinner and 0.21 kg lighter! Hooray...I guess. However, I'm not clear on how RISC would salvage the situation. It seems there's an obvious dilemma in play: Consumers are not rational, and businesses optimize to win these irrational decisions rather than focusing on long-term, difficult to define items like quality, repair/upgrade ability, and reliability.

touristtam 9y ago
Anniversary or x270 then? :(
- LeifCarrotson 9y ago
  That, or x230 with 20-series keyboard swap, FHD screen mod, and an upgraded SSD. But there are only so many of those left and they get older every year :/

randyrand 9y ago

I really don't need 32GB, but considering my 15" Lenovo W520 from 6.5 years ago has 16GB too what on earth has happened to computer innovation!? 6.5 years without a DRAM increase for 15" laptops is bonkers. It was $1500 for the laptop, it wasn't even crazy expensive back then. On top of that it even supported 32GB. All in a rather sleek 15" form factor. (6.2 pounds vs 2018 XPS 15 4.6 pounds). Sources: https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-P-and-W-Series-Mobile/W520-Quad-Core-upgrading-to-16GB-Memory-Should-I-buy-One-2x8GB/td-p/904287 https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-P-and-W-Series-Mobile/... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih3rD2ccGkM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ih3rD2ccGkM

LeifCarrotson 9y ago
The W520 was and is an outlier in just about every category, though. Not exactly a fair comparison... Also, if you're going to be talking about the form factor and weight, you should probably mention the power adapter...The XPS takes a 45W, 0.2 pound little USB C device. The W520 requires you to lug around a 1.7 lbs, 170W beast that definitely qualifies as a brick. That and a lack of support for the latest NVMe drives are some of the only shortcomings, IMO.
- randyrand 9y ago
  The power adapter is a good point! It really is a beast. Including the AC adapter, the XPS 15 is 40% lighter than the W520 for roughly equal performance and similar battery life. Not too bad. It's still a bit sad though. After 5.5 years I moved to a macbook pro 13" 2016 and the performance was a drastic downgrade from it (the w520 finally broke...). Moore's "law" is clearly, finally, gone.

bproven 9y ago

They should, but I thought it was some sort of chipset limitation due to the usage of the low powered (laptop) Intel chip line. Which is why all these ultrabooks (under 15") have 16GB ceilings...