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Much a matter of taste I guess; I like 11-12 inch displays with crazy high resolution. Unfortunately there are no ideal laptops that fit that criteria as far as

Much a matter of taste I guess; I like 11-12 inch displays with crazy high resolution. Unfortunately there are no ideal laptops that fit that criteria as far as I can see so I must be lonely in that demand. I really liked my 11 inch macbook air although the resolution was crap; that one with a very hd display and 15 hours battery life would definitely be my perfect machine. But I know i'm lonely in that; I never sit in a chair while programming; I program on the couch and have been for the past 30 years (I used to have a keyboard with a long cable and a couch in front of a low table when laptops were too expensive in the 80s/begin 90s); I shift position often and find screens that don't move with my line of sight incredibly annoying just as I find heavy things annoying and cables annoying. I use i3wm/ubuntu on my x220 which is currently my setup, but it's not ideal; too big and low res; great battery life though (19 hours). The resolution of the GPD Pocket is perfect but the screen too small and it's too slow; I used it when I do something urgent while travelling. If that would be 10 inch it would be perfect (I got used to the keyboard which was annoying at first; that would also benefit from a few sizes bigger).

bradfa 8y ago
Not quite as small as you'd like but my work issued Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 is quite small and light with high res. I haven't tried running any Linux on it yet but it should have decent software support with a recent kernel and modern distro.
- tluyben2 8y ago
  How is the battery life for a programmer? All machines I tried, esp Windows or Mac, have not given me more than 3 hours for my normal workload (while Ubuntu with i3wm on Pocket or x220 give me 19 hours with the same workload so I do not quite get it but whatever) while reviews give 15 hours on normal use. I hear good stories about the xps 13 but the reviews and reddit stories about battery life vary very wildly; from excellent to absolutely miserable. I got a HP x360 something recently from work and reviews say excellent battery life under Windows: I get 2-3 hours for my workload, my wife max 4 and she does browsing and wordprocessing. Went to HP: called us heavy users, nothing wrong with the hardware. Same with the macbook pro I have.
  - bradfa 8y ago
    I've not used my XPS 13 long enough to really have a great feel for it but I'd estimate somewhere in the 5 to 9 hour range for light CPU/disk load (ie: mostly typing in a text editor, sometimes compiling and executing, maybe some web activity). Definitely not 19 hours. Your x220 battery life is impressive. Sadly, due to the form factor being super slim, there's no way to add-on or swap-in a bigger battery so it's not like you can improve upon the XPS with post-purchase mods/changes. It sounds like you aren't so concerned about performance as much as form factor and battery life. I'm not sure I have a great solution for you, the XPS might not be a good fit, but you might have a look at some of the Intel-based Chromebooks where you can load your own UEFI firmware and then boot directly to Linux. Some chromebooks have enough storage to be useful, sometimes have high resolution screens, and use rather low power consumption CPUs so they might fit your bill. It's a bit DIY but if you're into that kind of thing it might be worth your effort. https://mrchromebox.tech/#devices https://mrchromebox.tech/#devices

bradfa 8y ago

Not quite as small as you'd like but my work issued Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 is quite small and light with high res. I haven't tried running any Linux on it yet but it should have decent software support with a recent kernel and modern distro.

tluyben2 8y ago
How is the battery life for a programmer? All machines I tried, esp Windows or Mac, have not given me more than 3 hours for my normal workload (while Ubuntu with i3wm on Pocket or x220 give me 19 hours with the same workload so I do not quite get it but whatever) while reviews give 15 hours on normal use. I hear good stories about the xps 13 but the reviews and reddit stories about battery life vary very wildly; from excellent to absolutely miserable. I got a HP x360 something recently from work and reviews say excellent battery life under Windows: I get 2-3 hours for my workload, my wife max 4 and she does browsing and wordprocessing. Went to HP: called us heavy users, nothing wrong with the hardware. Same with the macbook pro I have.
- bradfa 8y ago
  I've not used my XPS 13 long enough to really have a great feel for it but I'd estimate somewhere in the 5 to 9 hour range for light CPU/disk load (ie: mostly typing in a text editor, sometimes compiling and executing, maybe some web activity). Definitely not 19 hours. Your x220 battery life is impressive. Sadly, due to the form factor being super slim, there's no way to add-on or swap-in a bigger battery so it's not like you can improve upon the XPS with post-purchase mods/changes. It sounds like you aren't so concerned about performance as much as form factor and battery life. I'm not sure I have a great solution for you, the XPS might not be a good fit, but you might have a look at some of the Intel-based Chromebooks where you can load your own UEFI firmware and then boot directly to Linux. Some chromebooks have enough storage to be useful, sometimes have high resolution screens, and use rather low power consumption CPUs so they might fit your bill. It's a bit DIY but if you're into that kind of thing it might be worth your effort. https://mrchromebox.tech/#devices https://mrchromebox.tech/#devices