5 ms·

I disagree. The hardware and build quality of the XPS13 is notably better than my MBP, except for better CPU performance which I do not notice at all in daily u

I disagree. The hardware and build quality of the XPS13 is notably better than my MBP, except for better CPU performance which I do not notice at all in daily usage (I know all ultrabook keyboards are terrible but the MBP is an a whole other level of awful.) Linux on the XPS has surprised me. I hadn't used desktop Linux for ~6 years, but I remember lots of tinkering to get what I wanted. Now... If I had to describe it in one word it would be "boring". Boring because it just works. Honestly, I have spent significantly more time fixing problems in OSX behaviour than I do fixing problems on Linux. Even just weird things like Terminal text rendering breaking after an OS update which I've never seen on Linux. Admittedly I have never used the default Mail/Calendar apps on either OS. I appreciate I'm biased because I know how to use Linux fairly well, in spite of a 6 year hiatus. The writer can of course hold his own opinion, but I take it with a large grain of salt. It's also disingenuous to present his own problems as reasons not to use something. It's fine to have a preference but I don't see why he needs to try and influence other people's decisions.

Klonoar 6y ago
You have to be doing something out there if text rendering in Terminal of all things breaks after an update.
- turbinerneiter 6y ago
  No matter who reports breakage ever, on whichever machine, on whichever OS - this is always the answer. "If it doesn't work for you, you are doing something weird." It's both true and false - it's true, I've progressively gone more vanilla in my desktop Linux setup, because the more boring and closer to the original developers intention you run it, the less hassle and issues you have. Its false because -everyone- is doing something weird, and nothing should break ever. Breakage will always occur more often in the edge cases then mainstream use. Its still bad tough.
c7DJTLrn 6y ago
I have an XPS 9370 and it feels rickety and poorly made. It can't be opened without holding it with both hands. The screen gets smears on it from getting in contact with the keyboard. The bezels scratch very easily. The light from the LED in the power button bleeds out from the edges. The charging brick makes a high pitched whine when being used. I use a MacBook 2015 for work and that feels much nicer and has better build quality. I don't plan on buying another XPS.
brabel 6y ago
> The hardware and build quality of the XPS13 is notably better than my MBP Strongly disagree... the trackpad is much worse on XPS13, and the power plug is a joke. Mine broke, I took it to a technician to fix and he said it's very common to break that on XPS13's, just have a look at the stupid plug they use... after that, the plug didn't quite fit anymore and when I tried to make it fit better, the metal base for the plug broke completely (and I was being really careful!). Now I have a plug hanging outside and the only way to fix it is to buy a new frame (which I haven't been able to so far). Bought a MacBook Air to replace it and couldn't be happier with my choice... it's a bit slower but so much quieter, better hardware in every way, and MacOS is actually very polished compared to Ubuntu and KDE.
- eertami 6y ago
  > MacOS is actually very polished Anecdotal I know, but my experience differs. I'm fixing problems more frequently on OSX than Linux. I started using OSX in 2015 and honestly I now consciously fear the "System update available" notifications. I can't speak to your plug issues, as both the Macbook and XPS (2021) I have are USB-C and appear to function identically. Sounds annoying though for sure. I don't notice any difference in the trackpads, but admittedly I use them infrequently. Sorry to hear about the QC issues. I suppose my opinion will sour if I run into them later down the line, but for now it's certainly the preferred option. Slightly smaller and lighter with a better (but still terrible) keyboard, and feels much more comfortable for my palms vs the MBP. And native Linux is very well supported so I don't need to deal with Docker for Mac or virtual machines to do day to day development work.
alias_neo 6y ago
The author is speaking authoritatively while coming from a very narrow, specific perspective, which seems pretty common on hacker news with Apple users who write about "my platform is better than yours" to the point of being disingenuous. This type of thing pops up pretty often on HN from Apple users and it's almost always the same, I don't every see Linux users posting this sort of thing, different mentalities I guess. Full disclosure, I didn't finish reading because it quickly devolved into fanboyish propaganda. It showed the typical fanboyism we should all be grown up enough to get over by now and not just "use my platform, it's better for everyone because it suits me better than yours does". I (and my entire team; backend development) have been running Linux on our XPS 15's for the best part of a decade now. The Android development team at my place all run Linux too. The iOS Devs run on Apple devices, and the Windows Devs run on Windows, operations team all run Linux but they're using Latitudes (I think? The chunkier ones which still have ports and ethernet), management run a mix of Windows and Mac. I have been exclusively running Linux on my personal XPS 13 for 2-3 years (since buying it), and on my MSI gaming laptop 5-6 years before then. I also run it on my gaming Desktop and have no major issues on any of those. I have been running 4K displays (which has gotten better in the past couple of years, particular with Gnome), and using Thunderbolt docks. My laptops and desktop sleep and wake just fine, CPU scaling works, I run a mixture of AMD Ryzen, and Intel Core CPUs and I've never had to touch a driver (Nvidia on work XPS is disabled at the moment). My desktop upgrades the Nvidia driver as part of its normal routine. Let's be clear, the email apps aren't great on Linux, but I'm a backend software engineer, I don't care about email, it's just a thing I need to use occasionally to reply to my colleagues and sometimes our clients. I don't need HTML emails, in fact, it's almost always junk if it is HTML, calender I use but don't need anything advanced, just to know when meetings etc are. Keyboard? My XPS 13 (2019) has much nicer keys than my work XPS 15 (2017) so they're improving for sure, however, I write code for a living, I have hundreds £££s worth of keyboards to type on, so the built in keyboard is a minor point. Use the tool for the job and all. What I'm not blind to is that gaming would be easier/more reliable if I ran Windows, you won't catch me telling everyone to switch to gaming on Linux, I have my reasons for doing it, but it can be done if you really want to, you'll have to accept some compromises. If you design/content create, Mac, I'm told is the best platform, you won't find me telling people to do that on Linux, but if you _really_ want, you can. Guess what, if you write server software targeting Linux, use Linux, it has the best tools for the job. The build quality of the XPSs is excellent. Unless I wanted to spend a lot more money on a specced thinkpad-carbon, I'd always buy an XPS over any other brand, they're super thin, very strong, great battery life, and DELL isn't hostile to you repairing them, you can buy a battery and change it yourself, the service manual is even on the website.

Klonoar 6y ago

You have to be doing something out there if text rendering in Terminal of all things breaks after an update.

turbinerneiter 6y ago
No matter who reports breakage ever, on whichever machine, on whichever OS - this is always the answer. "If it doesn't work for you, you are doing something weird." It's both true and false - it's true, I've progressively gone more vanilla in my desktop Linux setup, because the more boring and closer to the original developers intention you run it, the less hassle and issues you have. Its false because -everyone- is doing something weird, and nothing should break ever. Breakage will always occur more often in the edge cases then mainstream use. Its still bad tough.

c7DJTLrn 6y ago

I have an XPS 9370 and it feels rickety and poorly made. It can't be opened without holding it with both hands. The screen gets smears on it from getting in contact with the keyboard. The bezels scratch very easily. The light from the LED in the power button bleeds out from the edges. The charging brick makes a high pitched whine when being used. I use a MacBook 2015 for work and that feels much nicer and has better build quality. I don't plan on buying another XPS.

brabel 6y ago

> The hardware and build quality of the XPS13 is notably better than my MBP Strongly disagree... the trackpad is much worse on XPS13, and the power plug is a joke. Mine broke, I took it to a technician to fix and he said it's very common to break that on XPS13's, just have a look at the stupid plug they use... after that, the plug didn't quite fit anymore and when I tried to make it fit better, the metal base for the plug broke completely (and I was being really careful!). Now I have a plug hanging outside and the only way to fix it is to buy a new frame (which I haven't been able to so far). Bought a MacBook Air to replace it and couldn't be happier with my choice... it's a bit slower but so much quieter, better hardware in every way, and MacOS is actually very polished compared to Ubuntu and KDE.

eertami 6y ago
> MacOS is actually very polished Anecdotal I know, but my experience differs. I'm fixing problems more frequently on OSX than Linux. I started using OSX in 2015 and honestly I now consciously fear the "System update available" notifications. I can't speak to your plug issues, as both the Macbook and XPS (2021) I have are USB-C and appear to function identically. Sounds annoying though for sure. I don't notice any difference in the trackpads, but admittedly I use them infrequently. Sorry to hear about the QC issues. I suppose my opinion will sour if I run into them later down the line, but for now it's certainly the preferred option. Slightly smaller and lighter with a better (but still terrible) keyboard, and feels much more comfortable for my palms vs the MBP. And native Linux is very well supported so I don't need to deal with Docker for Mac or virtual machines to do day to day development work.

alias_neo 6y ago

The author is speaking authoritatively while coming from a very narrow, specific perspective, which seems pretty common on hacker news with Apple users who write about "my platform is better than yours" to the point of being disingenuous. This type of thing pops up pretty often on HN from Apple users and it's almost always the same, I don't every see Linux users posting this sort of thing, different mentalities I guess. Full disclosure, I didn't finish reading because it quickly devolved into fanboyish propaganda. It showed the typical fanboyism we should all be grown up enough to get over by now and not just "use my platform, it's better for everyone because it suits me better than yours does". I (and my entire team; backend development) have been running Linux on our XPS 15's for the best part of a decade now. The Android development team at my place all run Linux too. The iOS Devs run on Apple devices, and the Windows Devs run on Windows, operations team all run Linux but they're using Latitudes (I think? The chunkier ones which still have ports and ethernet), management run a mix of Windows and Mac. I have been exclusively running Linux on my personal XPS 13 for 2-3 years (since buying it), and on my MSI gaming laptop 5-6 years before then. I also run it on my gaming Desktop and have no major issues on any of those. I have been running 4K displays (which has gotten better in the past couple of years, particular with Gnome), and using Thunderbolt docks. My laptops and desktop sleep and wake just fine, CPU scaling works, I run a mixture of AMD Ryzen, and Intel Core CPUs and I've never had to touch a driver (Nvidia on work XPS is disabled at the moment). My desktop upgrades the Nvidia driver as part of its normal routine. Let's be clear, the email apps aren't great on Linux, but I'm a backend software engineer, I don't care about email, it's just a thing I need to use occasionally to reply to my colleagues and sometimes our clients. I don't need HTML emails, in fact, it's almost always junk if it is HTML, calender I use but don't need anything advanced, just to know when meetings etc are. Keyboard? My XPS 13 (2019) has much nicer keys than my work XPS 15 (2017) so they're improving for sure, however, I write code for a living, I have hundreds £££s worth of keyboards to type on, so the built in keyboard is a minor point. Use the tool for the job and all. What I'm not blind to is that gaming would be easier/more reliable if I ran Windows, you won't catch me telling everyone to switch to gaming on Linux, I have my reasons for doing it, but it can be done if you really want to, you'll have to accept some compromises. If you design/content create, Mac, I'm told is the best platform, you won't find me telling people to do that on Linux, but if you _really_ want, you can. Guess what, if you write server software targeting Linux, use Linux, it has the best tools for the job. The build quality of the XPSs is excellent. Unless I wanted to spend a lot more money on a specced thinkpad-carbon, I'd always buy an XPS over any other brand, they're super thin, very strong, great battery life, and DELL isn't hostile to you repairing them, you can buy a battery and change it yourself, the service manual is even on the website.