7 ms·

Yeah so basically in the windows world, a lot of the good laptops are under the "business class" of the various manufacturers: Dell Precision, HP Elite Book, M

Yeah so basically in the windows world, a lot of the good laptops are under the "business class" of the various manufacturers: Dell Precision, HP Elite Book, MSI Prestige In the consumer world the Dell XPS, Asus Zenbook, Asus Pro Art are the way to go for a designer. Dell Precision is probably the overall best laptop. MSI Prestige is targetted right at you though, with color accuracy and a good display. The only brand I can personally vouch for is Dell. I and my partner use XPS's, and a good friend of mine has a super nice Precision that I am jealous of (specifically the ports! I'm so over USB-C)

LeifCarrotson 6y ago
Lenovo Thinkpad is another popular line, seems conspicuously absent from your list. They're known to have good resale value, and to work well with Linux. If you're getting up to the Precision line, the Lenovo P series workstations are also worth considering, though given they're actually professional-grade machines with Xeon and Quadro parts they'll be more expensive than a Macbook Pro. There are also boutiques like System76, that white label, upgrade, and manage driver compatibility for Clevo laptops which may be worth considering, they just came out with a new Lemur Pro like yesterday.
- rishav_sharan 6y ago
  Having used everything from xps to surface book 2, no laptop comes close to a ThinkPad. I am pretty much a fanboy of ThinkPad keyboards
  - SonOfLilit 6y ago
    I used to be too, until they changed them
- orhmeh09 6y ago
  Lenovo might be known that way, but they are exceptionally bad at supporting Linux. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-admits-ThinkPad-CPU-throttling-problem-when-running-Linux-fix-in-development.435549.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-admits-ThinkPad-CPU-thr... As far as I know this issue is still not fixed so I have to use this hack: https://github.com/erpalma/throttled https://github.com/erpalma/throttled I’ve also had tremendous Thunderbolt-related firmware issues that could only be fixed in Windows. If you use Linux, there are much better options than Lenovo. I still use my T480 daily but I miss my old XPS 13, which gave me no issues ever.
  - tobinfricke 6y ago
    I run Linux (Debian) on my Lenovo X1 Carbon and it works perfectly.
    - bluedino 6y ago
      Linux works perfectly on mine as well, but I use Fedora. The trackpad is bearable, and I have a 3rd generation so my 1080p screen isn't IPS, but it works well enough for $200.
      - vetinari 6y ago
        Not sure about Carbons, but for T-series there are aftermarket IPS displays that you could swap for the original TN ones. Could be done in 30 min, with no previous experience, just with the service manuals from Lenovo and enough dexterity to handle a screwdriver.
  - snvzz 6y ago
    >Lenovo might be known that way, but they are exceptionally bad at supporting Linux. Absolutely no trouble on x395. It's been running Linux (Arch) for a year, and it is my main system.
    - nemosaltat 6y ago
      Piling on to say I cut on teeth on Linux installing Breezy Badger on a Thinkpad T20. Since then I’ve never struggled with a Debian based OS on Thinkpads.
  - bayindirh 6y ago
    Thinkpad was one of the first laptop series which supported Linux explicitly. Their competitor was Compaq NX series (HP EliteBook of today). Dell was late to the party and closed the gap by actively developing software for Linux (DKMS, Privacy Drivers, etc.).
    - 6y ago
- hackerfromthefu 6y ago
  Check Thinkpad screens carefully as a lot of the new amd ones come with terrible 'business class' screens that I don't want to use as a developer, let alone as a designer .. and a repairman told me they are glued on these days so you can no longer swap them as you used to be able to.
  - IntelMiner 6y ago
    Can confirm. I made the mistake of buying a T14s with a Ryzen 4000 CPU in it The screen was something like 30% color accurate Using something like F.Lux or Redshift to shift the color space at night resulted in...this Linux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhLBx4mmPrM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhLBx4mmPrM Windows: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgjqeDF9c50 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgjqeDF9c50 Lenovo refused to replace the panel with a less atrocious SKU, claiming I could instead purchase it for a "mere" $600 USD(!) Thankfully Australia has strong consumer protection laws and I was able to get the unit returned and refunded
- Ziggy_Zaggy 6y ago
  Lenovo has got to be amongst the top, imho.
- dagw 6y ago
  Lenovo P series workstations are also worth considering I have a P72 and it is garbage. Plugged into a docking station it works OK as really expensive mid-range workstation. Trying to use it as a laptop causes the fans to spin like crazy, performance throttled to shit and the and battery life of maybe 90 minutes for even fairly modest workloads. The similarly specced Dell Precision I had before was much better in every way and was actually usable as a laptop. The P5X series that many of my colleagues have seem much better.
  - KptMarchewa 6y ago
    >Trying to use it as a laptop causes the fans to spin like crazy, performance throttled to shit So, just like macbook?
    - nbevans 6y ago
      I was going to say - that does sound very much like my MacBook Pro.
  - tallanvor 6y ago
    The P4X series is also working quite well - I went with that for the smaller footprint. Since I mostly dock it, the smaller screen is acceptable for the limited amount of time I use it undocked.
- Jonnax 6y ago
  I've got a P51. It's essentially always on fire and the fans are really loud. Not sure I'd recommend it. Build quality is very good however.
  - bluedino 6y ago
    P51S might have been a better choice then.
    - LeifCarrotson 6y ago
      The P51S is "slim" and has poorer thermals than the P51. Why would it be a better choice?
      - Zak 6y ago
        It uses low-power components (U rather than H CPUs for example) and isn't capable of generating nearly as much heat, regardless of what you're asking it to do.
        verall 6y ago
        Switching from a core H to core U will cut your perf in half. I like my xps 13 but in all fairness it struggles to run Firefox with youtube+gmail+slack and Office open all at the same time. As someone who primarily uses beefy desktops, it feels about as snappy as a Core 2 Duo machines with DDR-400.
- jMyles 6y ago
  I sent my Lenovo in for warranty service for a faulty SSD ribbon cable and... they lost it. And they haven't replaced it. They've told me four times over the course of the last five months that I'll get a call in 3-5 business days. It has never come of course. I know I'm not alone; even just in my circle there are two other stories of horrible mishaps with this company. Lenovo makes some decent machines, sometimes, but their warranty service is not to be trusted.
  - iamcreasy 6y ago
    Lenovo took around 100 days, within warranty period, to replace my motherboard of my Ideapad Y500 because the parts were not available. I am never buying any Lenovo product ever again.
  - bluedino 6y ago
    I have always used their on-site service. Tech always comes out the next day and fixes the issue.
- detaro 6y ago
  Big bonus of the proper "business" laptops also is support. Wouldn't want a work machine I rely on without on-site support anymore (of course ideally you want a machine that never needs support, but since you can't rely on that from anybody...)
  - qz2 6y ago
    Indeed. Worth looking at the Thinkpads with this as well. A lot of the 3 year old discarded corporate units still have a couple of years of warranty left on them and Lenovo actually honour it!
areoform 6y ago
Interestingly, Apple covers more than sRGB, their panels are now being set to the broader DCI-P3 gamut. Whereas these laptops (at least in 2019) were slightly less than the sRGB gamut on testing. Except for the surface book, https://imgur.com/a/6dGz3LO https://imgur.com/a/6dGz3LO I got these results from, https://www.notebookcheck.net/MSI-Prestige-15-A10SC-Laptop-Review-One-of-the-Best-Dell-XPS-15-Alternatives.441280.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/MSI-Prestige-15-A10SC-Laptop-R...
- klaushardt 6y ago
  I got a 2019 Dell Precision 5540 with an UHD OLED, 3.840 x 2.160 and have 100% DCI-P3. And i think many other OLED Screens have it too. When i configured the Laptop i could choose from these options: FHD IGZO4, 1.920 x 1.080, 100% sRGB UHD IGZO4, 3.840 x 2.160, 100% AdobeRGB Touch UHD OLED, 3.840 x 2.160, 100% DCI-P3
- dvdkon 6y ago
  Almost no displays get 100% when tested for gamut coverage. I'm not really sure why, I think it's some testing artefact. At this point (around 99% sRGB) what you should be looking at is coverage in larger gamuts (here 84.8% AdobeRGB).
fn1 6y ago
> In the consumer world the Dell XPS [...] are the way to go for a designer I have to use a Dell XPS 9560 and had two issues with it, most people never realize: 1. The Intel Thermal management driver is buggy so the device shuts off on very high-load tasks. You have to find the old driver on the internet and install it, and prevent windows from reverting to a new driver. 2. Only after two years of hanging connections and dropped UDP-packets I ran a speedtest and realized that this is not my home-internet being weird, but a systemic problem of the Wifi-card, which others have reported on the internet as well. Switched cards - getting windows to recognize the new one was difficult - and now I have normal Wifi. Both of these issues are terrible for customers, and I still wish I wouldn't have ignored/overlooked the Wifi-issue for so long, as it interrupted work for a very long time.
- tored 6y ago
  Dell XPS 9360, good keyboard and touchpad, but my two issues, Dell software for updating drivers is just buggy. In general Dell can't write good consumer software. Second is the same as yours, the Killer Wi-Fi is subpar. Can't keep a steady connection. Can trigger bluescreens if resuming without power cable and running Firefox (I think). Have not changed my Wi-Fi card yet.
  - fn1 6y ago
    I seriously recommend the switch. I went for an Intel ax200, costs about 50$, and my download speed went up 8 fold.
- sixbrx 6y ago
  I got an XPS 15 7590 in part because I read that the "Killer" Wifi problems of old were finally fixed. Well not for me, after waking the laptop I have to manually disconnect and reconnect Wifi for it to work. Have not had time to contact support about it yet, but I'm very disappointed that they've stayed with "Killer Wifi" after the long history of problems.
netflixandkill 6y ago
I use MSI laptops almost exclusively although they're definitely wiped and reinstalled to win10 ltsc or freebsd. In as much as I love the Mac touchpad for kanji/hanzi input the 2015 pro will probably be my last.
yabatopia 6y ago
I looked up the MSI Prestige and apparently there exist a limited edition of it that's completely pink, I mean really, really pink: https://www.msi.com/Business-Productivity/Prestige-14-A11X-Pink https://www.msi.com/Business-Productivity/Prestige-14-A11X-P.... Not a big fan of the color, but it sure is interesting to see. I now wonder if the color would be a good deterrent for thieves.

LeifCarrotson 6y ago

Lenovo Thinkpad is another popular line, seems conspicuously absent from your list. They're known to have good resale value, and to work well with Linux. If you're getting up to the Precision line, the Lenovo P series workstations are also worth considering, though given they're actually professional-grade machines with Xeon and Quadro parts they'll be more expensive than a Macbook Pro. There are also boutiques like System76, that white label, upgrade, and manage driver compatibility for Clevo laptops which may be worth considering, they just came out with a new Lemur Pro like yesterday.

rishav_sharan 6y ago
Having used everything from xps to surface book 2, no laptop comes close to a ThinkPad. I am pretty much a fanboy of ThinkPad keyboards
- SonOfLilit 6y ago
  I used to be too, until they changed them
orhmeh09 6y ago
Lenovo might be known that way, but they are exceptionally bad at supporting Linux. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-admits-ThinkPad-CPU-throttling-problem-when-running-Linux-fix-in-development.435549.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-admits-ThinkPad-CPU-thr... As far as I know this issue is still not fixed so I have to use this hack: https://github.com/erpalma/throttled https://github.com/erpalma/throttled I’ve also had tremendous Thunderbolt-related firmware issues that could only be fixed in Windows. If you use Linux, there are much better options than Lenovo. I still use my T480 daily but I miss my old XPS 13, which gave me no issues ever.
- tobinfricke 6y ago
  I run Linux (Debian) on my Lenovo X1 Carbon and it works perfectly.
  - bluedino 6y ago
    Linux works perfectly on mine as well, but I use Fedora. The trackpad is bearable, and I have a 3rd generation so my 1080p screen isn't IPS, but it works well enough for $200.
    - vetinari 6y ago
      Not sure about Carbons, but for T-series there are aftermarket IPS displays that you could swap for the original TN ones. Could be done in 30 min, with no previous experience, just with the service manuals from Lenovo and enough dexterity to handle a screwdriver.
- snvzz 6y ago
  >Lenovo might be known that way, but they are exceptionally bad at supporting Linux. Absolutely no trouble on x395. It's been running Linux (Arch) for a year, and it is my main system.
  - nemosaltat 6y ago
    Piling on to say I cut on teeth on Linux installing Breezy Badger on a Thinkpad T20. Since then I’ve never struggled with a Debian based OS on Thinkpads.
- bayindirh 6y ago
  Thinkpad was one of the first laptop series which supported Linux explicitly. Their competitor was Compaq NX series (HP EliteBook of today). Dell was late to the party and closed the gap by actively developing software for Linux (DKMS, Privacy Drivers, etc.).
  - 6y ago
hackerfromthefu 6y ago
Check Thinkpad screens carefully as a lot of the new amd ones come with terrible 'business class' screens that I don't want to use as a developer, let alone as a designer .. and a repairman told me they are glued on these days so you can no longer swap them as you used to be able to.
- IntelMiner 6y ago
  Can confirm. I made the mistake of buying a T14s with a Ryzen 4000 CPU in it The screen was something like 30% color accurate Using something like F.Lux or Redshift to shift the color space at night resulted in...this Linux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhLBx4mmPrM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhLBx4mmPrM Windows: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgjqeDF9c50 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgjqeDF9c50 Lenovo refused to replace the panel with a less atrocious SKU, claiming I could instead purchase it for a "mere" $600 USD(!) Thankfully Australia has strong consumer protection laws and I was able to get the unit returned and refunded
Ziggy_Zaggy 6y ago
Lenovo has got to be amongst the top, imho.
dagw 6y ago
Lenovo P series workstations are also worth considering I have a P72 and it is garbage. Plugged into a docking station it works OK as really expensive mid-range workstation. Trying to use it as a laptop causes the fans to spin like crazy, performance throttled to shit and the and battery life of maybe 90 minutes for even fairly modest workloads. The similarly specced Dell Precision I had before was much better in every way and was actually usable as a laptop. The P5X series that many of my colleagues have seem much better.
- KptMarchewa 6y ago
  >Trying to use it as a laptop causes the fans to spin like crazy, performance throttled to shit So, just like macbook?
  - nbevans 6y ago
    I was going to say - that does sound very much like my MacBook Pro.
- tallanvor 6y ago
  The P4X series is also working quite well - I went with that for the smaller footprint. Since I mostly dock it, the smaller screen is acceptable for the limited amount of time I use it undocked.
Jonnax 6y ago
I've got a P51. It's essentially always on fire and the fans are really loud. Not sure I'd recommend it. Build quality is very good however.
- bluedino 6y ago
  P51S might have been a better choice then.
  - LeifCarrotson 6y ago
    The P51S is "slim" and has poorer thermals than the P51. Why would it be a better choice?
    - Zak 6y ago
      It uses low-power components (U rather than H CPUs for example) and isn't capable of generating nearly as much heat, regardless of what you're asking it to do.
      - verall 6y ago
        Switching from a core H to core U will cut your perf in half. I like my xps 13 but in all fairness it struggles to run Firefox with youtube+gmail+slack and Office open all at the same time. As someone who primarily uses beefy desktops, it feels about as snappy as a Core 2 Duo machines with DDR-400.
jMyles 6y ago
I sent my Lenovo in for warranty service for a faulty SSD ribbon cable and... they lost it. And they haven't replaced it. They've told me four times over the course of the last five months that I'll get a call in 3-5 business days. It has never come of course. I know I'm not alone; even just in my circle there are two other stories of horrible mishaps with this company. Lenovo makes some decent machines, sometimes, but their warranty service is not to be trusted.
- iamcreasy 6y ago
  Lenovo took around 100 days, within warranty period, to replace my motherboard of my Ideapad Y500 because the parts were not available. I am never buying any Lenovo product ever again.
- bluedino 6y ago
  I have always used their on-site service. Tech always comes out the next day and fixes the issue.
detaro 6y ago
Big bonus of the proper "business" laptops also is support. Wouldn't want a work machine I rely on without on-site support anymore (of course ideally you want a machine that never needs support, but since you can't rely on that from anybody...)
- qz2 6y ago
  Indeed. Worth looking at the Thinkpads with this as well. A lot of the 3 year old discarded corporate units still have a couple of years of warranty left on them and Lenovo actually honour it!

areoform 6y ago

Interestingly, Apple covers more than sRGB, their panels are now being set to the broader DCI-P3 gamut. Whereas these laptops (at least in 2019) were slightly less than the sRGB gamut on testing. Except for the surface book, https://imgur.com/a/6dGz3LO https://imgur.com/a/6dGz3LO I got these results from, https://www.notebookcheck.net/MSI-Prestige-15-A10SC-Laptop-Review-One-of-the-Best-Dell-XPS-15-Alternatives.441280.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/MSI-Prestige-15-A10SC-Laptop-R...

klaushardt 6y ago
I got a 2019 Dell Precision 5540 with an UHD OLED, 3.840 x 2.160 and have 100% DCI-P3. And i think many other OLED Screens have it too. When i configured the Laptop i could choose from these options: FHD IGZO4, 1.920 x 1.080, 100% sRGB UHD IGZO4, 3.840 x 2.160, 100% AdobeRGB Touch UHD OLED, 3.840 x 2.160, 100% DCI-P3
dvdkon 6y ago
Almost no displays get 100% when tested for gamut coverage. I'm not really sure why, I think it's some testing artefact. At this point (around 99% sRGB) what you should be looking at is coverage in larger gamuts (here 84.8% AdobeRGB).

fn1 6y ago

> In the consumer world the Dell XPS [...] are the way to go for a designer I have to use a Dell XPS 9560 and had two issues with it, most people never realize: 1. The Intel Thermal management driver is buggy so the device shuts off on very high-load tasks. You have to find the old driver on the internet and install it, and prevent windows from reverting to a new driver. 2. Only after two years of hanging connections and dropped UDP-packets I ran a speedtest and realized that this is not my home-internet being weird, but a systemic problem of the Wifi-card, which others have reported on the internet as well. Switched cards - getting windows to recognize the new one was difficult - and now I have normal Wifi. Both of these issues are terrible for customers, and I still wish I wouldn't have ignored/overlooked the Wifi-issue for so long, as it interrupted work for a very long time.

tored 6y ago
Dell XPS 9360, good keyboard and touchpad, but my two issues, Dell software for updating drivers is just buggy. In general Dell can't write good consumer software. Second is the same as yours, the Killer Wi-Fi is subpar. Can't keep a steady connection. Can trigger bluescreens if resuming without power cable and running Firefox (I think). Have not changed my Wi-Fi card yet.
- fn1 6y ago
  I seriously recommend the switch. I went for an Intel ax200, costs about 50$, and my download speed went up 8 fold.
sixbrx 6y ago
I got an XPS 15 7590 in part because I read that the "Killer" Wifi problems of old were finally fixed. Well not for me, after waking the laptop I have to manually disconnect and reconnect Wifi for it to work. Have not had time to contact support about it yet, but I'm very disappointed that they've stayed with "Killer Wifi" after the long history of problems.

netflixandkill 6y ago

I use MSI laptops almost exclusively although they're definitely wiped and reinstalled to win10 ltsc or freebsd. In as much as I love the Mac touchpad for kanji/hanzi input the 2015 pro will probably be my last.

yabatopia 6y ago

I looked up the MSI Prestige and apparently there exist a limited edition of it that's completely pink, I mean really, really pink: https://www.msi.com/Business-Productivity/Prestige-14-A11X-Pink https://www.msi.com/Business-Productivity/Prestige-14-A11X-P.... Not a big fan of the color, but it sure is interesting to see. I now wonder if the color would be a good deterrent for thieves.