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Asahi is awesome! But this is also proves that laptops outside the MacBook realm really need to improve so much. I wish there were a Linux machine with the hard

Asahi is awesome! But this is also proves that laptops outside the MacBook realm really need to improve so much. I wish there were a Linux machine with the hardware quality of a MacBook

downrightmike 9mo ago
We almost had really nice arm laptops, but they got super greedy about it having AI and no one wanted them.
- bigyabai 9mo ago
  ARM is a capricious licensor. It's hardly surprising.
farmin 9mo ago
I am giving my MacBook Air M2 15” to my wife and bought a Lenovo E16 with 120hz screen to run Kubuntu last night. She needed a new laptop and I am had enough of macOS and just need some stuff to work that will be easier on an intel and Linux. Also I do bookwork online so bigger screen and dedicated numpad will be nice. It reviews well and seems like good value for money with current holiday sales but I don’t expect the same hardware quality or portability just a little more freedom. I hope I’m not too disappointed. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-E16-G3-Review-Affordable-office-laptop-is-even-better-with-a-120-Hz-display.1059930.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-E16-G3-Review-...
- 650REDHAIR 9mo ago
  I outfitted our 10 person team with the E16 g2 and it’s been great. Two minor issues- it’s HEAVY compared to T models. Because of the weight try not to walk around with the lid up and holding it from one of front corners. I’ve noticed one of them is kind of warped from walking around the office holding it that way.
  - farmin 9mo ago
    That’s great news thanks. I got the gen 3 so maybe some improvements. Weight is ok as I really just move it around the house. I buy used Panasonics for the workshop. Are you running windows?
  - lostlogin 9mo ago
    > I’ve noticed one of them is kind of warped from walking around the office holding it that way. That’s not at all reassuring.
- RamRodification 9mo ago
  Kubuntu is nice. Not sure why it's not more popular. Or maybe it's just a quieter user base?
  - farmin 9mo ago
    I agree. It feels like combination of peak windows UI with the ease of Ubuntu baked in. Then the little mobile app they have that gives you shared clipboard with iOS is cool.
  - arcade79 9mo ago
    Been a kubuntu user since .. 2006? 2007? Don't remember when kubuntu became a thing, but as soon as I tried Ubuntu, I went kubuntu. I believe it was 5.10 or 6.04 or something. :-) Am growing tired of Ubuntu though. Just not sure where I should turn. I want a .deb based system. Ubuntu is pushing snaps too heavily for my liking.
    - MrDrMcCoy 9mo ago
      Just use Debian and switch it to Testing. Works amazingly well and you'll always have relatively current and generally stable software.
    - import 9mo ago
      So, Debian? No snaps and that’s my main motivation
    - esseph 9mo ago
      I was a very long time debian user who got burned by Ubuntu and derivatives far too many times personally and professional. I moved to Fedora a few years back and it was a great decision. No regrets.
  - fylo 9mo ago
    I liked Ubuntu and variants back when it first came out and I was newer to Linux but it didn't take long for me to realise there always seemed to be a better option for me as a daily driver. To me its like an new Linux user OS where a lot of stuff is chosen for you to use basically as is. Even the name Kubuntu where the K is for KDE but on other distros you would just choose your DE when you install.
- kwanbix 9mo ago
  If I was you I will have gone for the T or X series
  - farmin 9mo ago
    Why?
    - kwanbix 9mo ago
      E is more like a budget line of ThinkPads, at least compared to X and T.
- kombine 9mo ago
  I would recommend Fedora KDE Edition over Kubuntu, but I guess it's a personal choice.
  - farmin 9mo ago
    I’ve only ever used Ubuntu flavours but maybe I should give it a try. Thanks
    - bluecalm 9mo ago
      Fedora also has ThinkPad compability program and a nice way to install/update Lenovo drivers. The problem with Ubuntu, as other mentioned, is that you get ancient version of some packages. Fedora is nicely up to date.
      - wobfan 9mo ago
        Is this actually such a big point? I feel like (subjectively) on Ubuntu everything gets updated just as fast, and even if not, there's a new full release every 6 months. Or is this actually rather slow in comparison to Feroda? I've also only used Debian based stuff my whole life and even moving from apt to dnf or whatever it was causes too much friction for me haha, though it's not that bad obviously, if I really would see the positives.
        bluecalm 9mo ago
        I guess it depends. I find it annoying when I read about some feature and then it turns out the package is several versions behind the newest one and I can't try it without jumping hoops to install it from some alternative source. That happened with GCC and ImageMagick to me on Ubuntu and I swiftly uninstalled it :)
- heavyset_go 9mo ago
  If you're running desktop Linux, you will have a better experience with a rolling release than being stuck with whatever state the software that was frozen in Debian/Ubuntu is in, especially when it comes to multimedia, graphics, screen sharing, etc. Modern desktop Linux relies on software that's being fixed and improving at a high velocity, and ironically, can be more stable than relying on a distro's fixed release cycles. KDE Plasma, Wayland support, Pipewire, etc all have had recent fixes and improvements that you will not get to enjoy for another X months/years until Canonical pulls in those changes and freezes them for release. Similarly, newer kernels are a must when using relatively recent hardware. Fixes and support for new hardware lands in new kernels, LTS releases might not have the best support for your newer hardware.
  - akdev1l 9mo ago
    > can be more stable than relying on a distro's fixed release cycles Stability for a distro means “doesn’t change” not “doesn’t crash”. Debian/ubuntu are stable because they freeze versions so you can even create scripts to work around bugs and stuff and be sure that it will keep working throughout that entire release. Arch Linux is not stable because you get updates every day or whatever. Maybe you had some script or patch to work around a bug and tomorrow it won’t work anymore. This does not say _anything_ about crashing or bugs, except that if you find a bug/crash on a stable system then it is likely you can rely on this behaviour.
    - raffraffraff 9mo ago
      Agree. If you use a rolling release you definitely need a strategy for stability. I turn off automatic updates and schedule planned full updates that I can easily roll back from. I've had two breakages over the years that required snapper rollback. (Rolling back from a major distro upgrade isn't that easy) It's a tradeoff that I'm happy with. I get to have a very up to date system.
  - farmin 9mo ago
    That’s interesting comment. I didn’t think about that. I’ve only ever used Ubuntu flavours so I’ll search through what the popular rolling releases are out of interest.
dllu 9mo ago
Agreed. On the computer hardware side: * x86 chips can surpass the M series cpus in multithreaded performance, but are still lagging in singlethreaded performance and power efficiency * Qualcomm kinda fumbled the Snapdragon X Elite launch with nonexistent Linux support and shoddy Windows stability, but here's to hoping that they "turn over a new leaf" with the X2. Actually, some Snapdragon X Elite laptops do run Linux now, but performance is not great as there were some weird regressions and anyway newer chips have caught up [1]. On the build quality side, basically all the PCs are still lagging behind Apple, e.g. yesterday's rant post about the Framework laptop [2] touched on a lot of important points. Of course, there are the Thinkpads, which are still built decently but are quite expensive. Some of the Chinese laptops like the Honor MagicBooks could be attractive and some reddit threads confirm getting Linux working on them, but they are hard to get in the US. That said, at least many non-Apple laptops have decent trackpads and really nice screens nowadays. [1] https://www.phoronix.com/review/snapdragon-x-elite-linux-eoy2025 https://www.phoronix.com/review/snapdragon-x-elite-linux-eoy... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375174 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375174
- valianteffort 9mo ago
  I bought a refurb gen 4 thinkpad on amazon for like $350 and it arrived almost brand new. Installed arch, setup some commands to underclock the processor on login and easily boost it when I'm compiling. Battery life is great but I'm not running a GUI either. Good machine for when I want to avoid distractions and just code.
  - dllu 9mo ago
    Old Thinkpads are great! I used to have a Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon Gen 6 with Intel Core i7 8640U, 16 GB of RAM, and 1 TB SSD. I installed Arch Linux on it with Sway.
  - blks 9mo ago
    My personal beef with Thinkpads is the screen. Most of the thinkpads I’ve encountered in my life (usually pretty expensive corporate ones) had shitty FHD screens. I got too spoiled by retina screens, and I can’t comfortably use anything with lower DPI.
shmerl 9mo ago
Never used MacBooks, but Lenovo Thinkpad laptops with Linux are really good in my experience. Get anything recent with AMD.
- cromka 9mo ago
  The best recent experience is arguably with current Intel chips, actually, because of the battery usage that can reach 20 hours, easily matching Macbooks: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-empire-strikes-back-with-21-hrs-of-battery-life-Lenovo-ThinkPad-T14s-Gen-6-laptop-review.1008078.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-empire-strikes-back-with... Performance is still very high so if they don't need the current top tier AMD horsepower, Intel is the way to go. It's also quieter, cooler and doesn't throttle. Not to mention the ability to use SRIOV GPU for running Windows software in a VM. Also, Lenovo tends to limit HiDPI displays to Intel CPUs, for some ekhm unknown reason.
  - shmerl 9mo ago
    With current situation in Intel (lot's of Linux developers leaving), I'd stick to AMD anyway.
    - cromka 9mo ago
      That's fair, actually. Didn't consider that.
    - cromka 9mo ago
      ... but then again: https://www.phoronix.com/news/Intel-Panther-Lake-NPU-Firmware https://www.phoronix.com/news/Intel-Panther-Lake-NPU-Firmwar...
      - shmerl 9mo ago
        They aren't completely backing out, but I suspect their support levels will get worse.
TacticalCoder 9mo ago
> I wish there were a Linux machine with the hardware quality of a MacBook It really depends what you mean by "quality". To me first and foremost quality I look for in a laptop is for it to not break. As I'm a heavy desktop user, my laptop is typically with me on the couch or on vacation. Enter my MacBook Air M1: after 13 months, and sadly no extended warranty, the screen broke for no reason overnight. I literally closed it before going to bed and when I opened the lid the next day: screen broken. Some refer to that phenomenon as the "bendgate". And every time I see a Mac laptop I can't help but think "slick and good looking but brittle". There's a feeling of brittleness with Mac laptops that you don't have with, say, a Thinkpad. My absolute best laptop is a MIL-SPEC (I know, I know, there are many different types of military specs) LG Gram. Lighter than a MacBook too. And every single time I demo it to people I take the screen, I bent it left and right. This thing is rock solid. I happen to have this laptop (not my vid) and look at 34 seconds in the vid: https://youtu.be/herYV5TJ_m8 https://youtu.be/herYV5TJ_m8 The guy literally throws my laptop (well, the same) down concrete stairs and the thing still just works fine. The friend who sold it to me (I bought it used) one day stepped on it when he woke up. No problemo. To me that is quality: something you can buy used and that is rock solid. Where are the vids of someone throwing a MacBook Air down the stairs and the thing keeps working? I'm trading a retina display any day for a display that doesn't break when it accidentally falls on the ground. Now I love the look and the incredible speed of the MacBook Air laptops (I still have my M1 but has its screen broke, I turned it into a desktop) but I really wish they were not desk queens: we've got desktops for that. I don't want a laptop that require exceptional care and mad packaging skills when putting it inside a backpack (and which then requires the backpack to be manipulated with extreme care). So: bring me the raw power and why not the nice look of a MacBook Air, but make it sturdy (really the most important for me) and have it support Linux. That I'd buy.
- zdragnar 9mo ago
  I've owned two LG gram laptops. Neither were milspec, but both were really nice. Sure, the screen quality isn't going to win any awards, nor will the speakers, but the light weight, fantastic battery life and snappy performance always get a recommendation from me.
- ricardobeat 9mo ago
virtualwhys 9mo ago
Looking at a Thinkpad 16" P1 Gen 8 with 2X 1TB SSD, 64GB RAM, QHD+ screen, centered keyboard like MBP (i.e. no numpad), integrated Intel GPU, lightweight (4 lbs) for a little under $2.5K USD. Closest I've found to an MBP 16" replacement. Have been running Dell Precision laptops for many years on Linux, not sure about Lenovo build quality and battery life, but hoping it will be decent enough. Would run Asahi if it supported M4 but looks it's a long ways away...
- kristianpaul 9mo ago
  How is battery life? I still use MacBooks only because of that
- manaskarekar 9mo ago
  Does lid close to sleep and open to wake work as expected?
  - colordrops 9mo ago
    I've got a relatively new p16s with a hybrid Nvidia/Intel GPU, and a p14s gen 5 with an AMD GPU, and I was able to get both of them to suspend by closing the lid. Not sure if the issue you speak of is unique to the P1 or not, but all my ThinkPads have been decent with Linux.
    - manaskarekar 9mo ago
      Thanks. I’ve had issues with T14s for a couple of gens where the machine wakes up during the closed lid and runs the battery down. I’ve tried the usual troubleshooting. This has been a non issue on Dell machines for almost 20 years.
      - colordrops 9mo ago
        Oh some kernel params and other settings can help with that. These are mine, and it's been working great: Kernel params ## Seems to be needed for suspend to S0 (s2idle) without hanging (only needed on p16s) acpi_osi="Windows 2022" # Prevent spurious wakeups from a firmware bug where the EC or SMU generates spurious "heartbeat" interrupts during sleep acpi.ec_no_wakeup=1 # Prevents dock from waking up laptop right after suspend usbcore.autosuspend=-1 Other settings (executed with a systemd service) (also only needed on p16s, not on my p14s) # Disable Thunderbolt PCIe root port wakeup (RP09) echo disabled > /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.0/power/wakeup || true # Disable USB XHCI controller wakeup echo disabled > /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:14.0/power/wakeup || true # Disable ACPI wakeup for XHCI and RP09 (toggle if enabled) grep -q "XHCI.*enabled" /proc/acpi/wakeup && echo XHCI > /proc/acpi/wakeup || true grep -q "RP09.*enabled" /proc/acpi/wakeup && echo RP09 > /proc/acpi/wakeup || true
mgaunard 9mo ago
I never understood why people claim the Macbook is so good. Bad keyboard, bad aluminium body, soldered ram... Is it just the Apple Silicon that somehow makes it worth it? It's ARM, most software is still written and optimized for x86.
- inatreecrown2 9mo ago
  the screen is very good, the trackpad is very good, the screen does not wobble or bend - it is sturdy. and it is quiet!
- mithrilskeleton 9mo ago
  Excellent power efficiency in apple silicon - good battery life and good performance at the same time. The aluminum body is also very rigid and premium feeling, unlike so many creaky bendy pc laptops. Good screen, good speakers.
  - sagarm 9mo ago
    Aluminum and magnesium non-Apple laptops are just as stiff. There's just a wider spectrum of options, including $200 plastic ARM Chromebooks available.
    - ricardobeat 9mo ago
      Do you have any examples? The top-of-the-line Surface laptops are still comparatively flimsy, same for Samsung and Vaio. What’s better?
- brokencode 9mo ago
  I’ve never heard someone describe the aluminum body as bad.. what do you not like about it? The number one benefit is the Apple Silicon processors, which are incredibly efficient. Then it’s the trackpad, keyboard and overall build quality for me. Windows laptops often just feel cheap by comparison. Or they’ll have perplexing design problems, like whatever is going on with Dell laptops these days with the capacitive function row and borderless trackpad.
backscratches 9mo ago
Starlabs are good quality Linux laptops, designed in house. Love my starbook
heavyset_go 9mo ago
Check out Ubuntu Certified hardware[1]. I've moved completely to EliteBooks and am very happy with my decision. The build quality is superb, they're upgradeable, everything is replaceable and there's an excellent market and after market for parts, and HP has codepaths in their firmware for Linux support, meaning even Modern Standby works well. Price points for refurb and used hardware are great, too. [1] https://ubuntu.com/certified https://ubuntu.com/certified
- Quothling 9mo ago
  The key qualities of something like a macbook air are: It has no fans. It's temperature never changes unless you really push it. I've never used any other laptop where I could feel at least some warmth when it was turned on. My m1 air still has enough battery to run for a full day of usage, here several years after I bought it. Basically never loses power while the lid is closed either, but that is less of an issue.
  - bigyabai 9mo ago
    > unless you really push it This is indeed a problem. My Macbook Pro (with active cooling!) would commonly come within 5c of junction temp when compiling, mdworker_shared was running, or Docker was working. It was an issue with the Intel Macs too, just much more readily apparent since they throttled faster. I wish Apple backed down from this hill, for the sake of my damned gonads.
    - Quothling 9mo ago
      My m1 air with 8gb of ram has been doing docker and all my golang, C/Zig and Python work without issues so far. If I were to sell it, I'd probably grade the keyboard and mousepad (the clicking) 5/10 now. Not sure if it's because I've been a little rough with it (I have small children who sometimes kick the keyboard etc) or if the quality is lower than it was back when I had my 201(5 or 6) macbook pro which was frankly in a condition as good as new when I switched to this one. It throttes and stuff, but it still outperforms the t14 i7 with 32gb ram I've got from my company. Granted, that one has a lot of enterprice stuff running, but still... I do hope someone will make a pc that is as close to an air as possible though. I like Apple, but I'm not a fan of being bound to an US tech company these days. I'm not important enough to be targeted personally, but what if the US government decides to ban all Danes from US tech in the war for Greenland? Or the more likely scenario, what if Apple decides to go full Microsoft with AI and what not?

Asahi is awesome! But this is also proves that laptops outside the MacBook realm really need to improve so much. I wish there were a Linux machine with the hardware quality of a MacBook

downrightmike 9mo ago

We almost had really nice arm laptops, but they got super greedy about it having AI and no one wanted them.

bigyabai 9mo ago
ARM is a capricious licensor. It's hardly surprising.

farmin 9mo ago

I am giving my MacBook Air M2 15” to my wife and bought a Lenovo E16 with 120hz screen to run Kubuntu last night. She needed a new laptop and I am had enough of macOS and just need some stuff to work that will be easier on an intel and Linux. Also I do bookwork online so bigger screen and dedicated numpad will be nice. It reviews well and seems like good value for money with current holiday sales but I don’t expect the same hardware quality or portability just a little more freedom. I hope I’m not too disappointed. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-E16-G3-Review-Affordable-office-laptop-is-even-better-with-a-120-Hz-display.1059930.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-E16-G3-Review-...

650REDHAIR 9mo ago
I outfitted our 10 person team with the E16 g2 and it’s been great. Two minor issues- it’s HEAVY compared to T models. Because of the weight try not to walk around with the lid up and holding it from one of front corners. I’ve noticed one of them is kind of warped from walking around the office holding it that way.
- farmin 9mo ago
  That’s great news thanks. I got the gen 3 so maybe some improvements. Weight is ok as I really just move it around the house. I buy used Panasonics for the workshop. Are you running windows?
- lostlogin 9mo ago
  > I’ve noticed one of them is kind of warped from walking around the office holding it that way. That’s not at all reassuring.
RamRodification 9mo ago
Kubuntu is nice. Not sure why it's not more popular. Or maybe it's just a quieter user base?
- farmin 9mo ago
  I agree. It feels like combination of peak windows UI with the ease of Ubuntu baked in. Then the little mobile app they have that gives you shared clipboard with iOS is cool.
- arcade79 9mo ago
  Been a kubuntu user since .. 2006? 2007? Don't remember when kubuntu became a thing, but as soon as I tried Ubuntu, I went kubuntu. I believe it was 5.10 or 6.04 or something. :-) Am growing tired of Ubuntu though. Just not sure where I should turn. I want a .deb based system. Ubuntu is pushing snaps too heavily for my liking.
  - MrDrMcCoy 9mo ago
    Just use Debian and switch it to Testing. Works amazingly well and you'll always have relatively current and generally stable software.
  - import 9mo ago
    So, Debian? No snaps and that’s my main motivation
  - esseph 9mo ago
    I was a very long time debian user who got burned by Ubuntu and derivatives far too many times personally and professional. I moved to Fedora a few years back and it was a great decision. No regrets.
- fylo 9mo ago
  I liked Ubuntu and variants back when it first came out and I was newer to Linux but it didn't take long for me to realise there always seemed to be a better option for me as a daily driver. To me its like an new Linux user OS where a lot of stuff is chosen for you to use basically as is. Even the name Kubuntu where the K is for KDE but on other distros you would just choose your DE when you install.
kwanbix 9mo ago
If I was you I will have gone for the T or X series
- farmin 9mo ago
  Why?
  - kwanbix 9mo ago
    E is more like a budget line of ThinkPads, at least compared to X and T.
kombine 9mo ago
I would recommend Fedora KDE Edition over Kubuntu, but I guess it's a personal choice.
- farmin 9mo ago
  I’ve only ever used Ubuntu flavours but maybe I should give it a try. Thanks
  - bluecalm 9mo ago
    Fedora also has ThinkPad compability program and a nice way to install/update Lenovo drivers. The problem with Ubuntu, as other mentioned, is that you get ancient version of some packages. Fedora is nicely up to date.
    - wobfan 9mo ago
      Is this actually such a big point? I feel like (subjectively) on Ubuntu everything gets updated just as fast, and even if not, there's a new full release every 6 months. Or is this actually rather slow in comparison to Feroda? I've also only used Debian based stuff my whole life and even moving from apt to dnf or whatever it was causes too much friction for me haha, though it's not that bad obviously, if I really would see the positives.
      - bluecalm 9mo ago
        I guess it depends. I find it annoying when I read about some feature and then it turns out the package is several versions behind the newest one and I can't try it without jumping hoops to install it from some alternative source. That happened with GCC and ImageMagick to me on Ubuntu and I swiftly uninstalled it :)
heavyset_go 9mo ago
If you're running desktop Linux, you will have a better experience with a rolling release than being stuck with whatever state the software that was frozen in Debian/Ubuntu is in, especially when it comes to multimedia, graphics, screen sharing, etc. Modern desktop Linux relies on software that's being fixed and improving at a high velocity, and ironically, can be more stable than relying on a distro's fixed release cycles. KDE Plasma, Wayland support, Pipewire, etc all have had recent fixes and improvements that you will not get to enjoy for another X months/years until Canonical pulls in those changes and freezes them for release. Similarly, newer kernels are a must when using relatively recent hardware. Fixes and support for new hardware lands in new kernels, LTS releases might not have the best support for your newer hardware.
- akdev1l 9mo ago
  > can be more stable than relying on a distro's fixed release cycles Stability for a distro means “doesn’t change” not “doesn’t crash”. Debian/ubuntu are stable because they freeze versions so you can even create scripts to work around bugs and stuff and be sure that it will keep working throughout that entire release. Arch Linux is not stable because you get updates every day or whatever. Maybe you had some script or patch to work around a bug and tomorrow it won’t work anymore. This does not say _anything_ about crashing or bugs, except that if you find a bug/crash on a stable system then it is likely you can rely on this behaviour.
  - raffraffraff 9mo ago
    Agree. If you use a rolling release you definitely need a strategy for stability. I turn off automatic updates and schedule planned full updates that I can easily roll back from. I've had two breakages over the years that required snapper rollback. (Rolling back from a major distro upgrade isn't that easy) It's a tradeoff that I'm happy with. I get to have a very up to date system.
- farmin 9mo ago
  That’s interesting comment. I didn’t think about that. I’ve only ever used Ubuntu flavours so I’ll search through what the popular rolling releases are out of interest.

dllu 9mo ago

Agreed. On the computer hardware side: * x86 chips can surpass the M series cpus in multithreaded performance, but are still lagging in singlethreaded performance and power efficiency * Qualcomm kinda fumbled the Snapdragon X Elite launch with nonexistent Linux support and shoddy Windows stability, but here's to hoping that they "turn over a new leaf" with the X2. Actually, some Snapdragon X Elite laptops do run Linux now, but performance is not great as there were some weird regressions and anyway newer chips have caught up [1]. On the build quality side, basically all the PCs are still lagging behind Apple, e.g. yesterday's rant post about the Framework laptop [2] touched on a lot of important points. Of course, there are the Thinkpads, which are still built decently but are quite expensive. Some of the Chinese laptops like the Honor MagicBooks could be attractive and some reddit threads confirm getting Linux working on them, but they are hard to get in the US. That said, at least many non-Apple laptops have decent trackpads and really nice screens nowadays. [1] https://www.phoronix.com/review/snapdragon-x-elite-linux-eoy2025 https://www.phoronix.com/review/snapdragon-x-elite-linux-eoy... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375174 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46375174

valianteffort 9mo ago
I bought a refurb gen 4 thinkpad on amazon for like $350 and it arrived almost brand new. Installed arch, setup some commands to underclock the processor on login and easily boost it when I'm compiling. Battery life is great but I'm not running a GUI either. Good machine for when I want to avoid distractions and just code.
- dllu 9mo ago
  Old Thinkpads are great! I used to have a Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon Gen 6 with Intel Core i7 8640U, 16 GB of RAM, and 1 TB SSD. I installed Arch Linux on it with Sway.
- blks 9mo ago
  My personal beef with Thinkpads is the screen. Most of the thinkpads I’ve encountered in my life (usually pretty expensive corporate ones) had shitty FHD screens. I got too spoiled by retina screens, and I can’t comfortably use anything with lower DPI.

shmerl 9mo ago

Never used MacBooks, but Lenovo Thinkpad laptops with Linux are really good in my experience. Get anything recent with AMD.

cromka 9mo ago
The best recent experience is arguably with current Intel chips, actually, because of the battery usage that can reach 20 hours, easily matching Macbooks: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-empire-strikes-back-with-21-hrs-of-battery-life-Lenovo-ThinkPad-T14s-Gen-6-laptop-review.1008078.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-empire-strikes-back-with... Performance is still very high so if they don't need the current top tier AMD horsepower, Intel is the way to go. It's also quieter, cooler and doesn't throttle. Not to mention the ability to use SRIOV GPU for running Windows software in a VM. Also, Lenovo tends to limit HiDPI displays to Intel CPUs, for some ekhm unknown reason.
- shmerl 9mo ago
  With current situation in Intel (lot's of Linux developers leaving), I'd stick to AMD anyway.
  - cromka 9mo ago
    That's fair, actually. Didn't consider that.
  - cromka 9mo ago
    ... but then again: https://www.phoronix.com/news/Intel-Panther-Lake-NPU-Firmware https://www.phoronix.com/news/Intel-Panther-Lake-NPU-Firmwar...
    - shmerl 9mo ago
      They aren't completely backing out, but I suspect their support levels will get worse.

TacticalCoder 9mo ago

> I wish there were a Linux machine with the hardware quality of a MacBook It really depends what you mean by "quality". To me first and foremost quality I look for in a laptop is for it to not break. As I'm a heavy desktop user, my laptop is typically with me on the couch or on vacation. Enter my MacBook Air M1: after 13 months, and sadly no extended warranty, the screen broke for no reason overnight. I literally closed it before going to bed and when I opened the lid the next day: screen broken. Some refer to that phenomenon as the "bendgate". And every time I see a Mac laptop I can't help but think "slick and good looking but brittle". There's a feeling of brittleness with Mac laptops that you don't have with, say, a Thinkpad. My absolute best laptop is a MIL-SPEC (I know, I know, there are many different types of military specs) LG Gram. Lighter than a MacBook too. And every single time I demo it to people I take the screen, I bent it left and right. This thing is rock solid. I happen to have this laptop (not my vid) and look at 34 seconds in the vid: https://youtu.be/herYV5TJ_m8 https://youtu.be/herYV5TJ_m8 The guy literally throws my laptop (well, the same) down concrete stairs and the thing still just works fine. The friend who sold it to me (I bought it used) one day stepped on it when he woke up. No problemo. To me that is quality: something you can buy used and that is rock solid. Where are the vids of someone throwing a MacBook Air down the stairs and the thing keeps working? I'm trading a retina display any day for a display that doesn't break when it accidentally falls on the ground. Now I love the look and the incredible speed of the MacBook Air laptops (I still have my M1 but has its screen broke, I turned it into a desktop) but I really wish they were not desk queens: we've got desktops for that. I don't want a laptop that require exceptional care and mad packaging skills when putting it inside a backpack (and which then requires the backpack to be manipulated with extreme care). So: bring me the raw power and why not the nice look of a MacBook Air, but make it sturdy (really the most important for me) and have it support Linux. That I'd buy.

zdragnar 9mo ago
I've owned two LG gram laptops. Neither were milspec, but both were really nice. Sure, the screen quality isn't going to win any awards, nor will the speakers, but the light weight, fantastic battery life and snappy performance always get a recommendation from me.
ricardobeat 9mo ago

virtualwhys 9mo ago

Looking at a Thinkpad 16" P1 Gen 8 with 2X 1TB SSD, 64GB RAM, QHD+ screen, centered keyboard like MBP (i.e. no numpad), integrated Intel GPU, lightweight (4 lbs) for a little under $2.5K USD. Closest I've found to an MBP 16" replacement. Have been running Dell Precision laptops for many years on Linux, not sure about Lenovo build quality and battery life, but hoping it will be decent enough. Would run Asahi if it supported M4 but looks it's a long ways away...

kristianpaul 9mo ago
How is battery life? I still use MacBooks only because of that
manaskarekar 9mo ago
Does lid close to sleep and open to wake work as expected?
- colordrops 9mo ago
  I've got a relatively new p16s with a hybrid Nvidia/Intel GPU, and a p14s gen 5 with an AMD GPU, and I was able to get both of them to suspend by closing the lid. Not sure if the issue you speak of is unique to the P1 or not, but all my ThinkPads have been decent with Linux.
  - manaskarekar 9mo ago
    Thanks. I’ve had issues with T14s for a couple of gens where the machine wakes up during the closed lid and runs the battery down. I’ve tried the usual troubleshooting. This has been a non issue on Dell machines for almost 20 years.
    - colordrops 9mo ago
      Oh some kernel params and other settings can help with that. These are mine, and it's been working great: Kernel params ## Seems to be needed for suspend to S0 (s2idle) without hanging (only needed on p16s) acpi_osi="Windows 2022" # Prevent spurious wakeups from a firmware bug where the EC or SMU generates spurious "heartbeat" interrupts during sleep acpi.ec_no_wakeup=1 # Prevents dock from waking up laptop right after suspend usbcore.autosuspend=-1 Other settings (executed with a systemd service) (also only needed on p16s, not on my p14s) # Disable Thunderbolt PCIe root port wakeup (RP09) echo disabled > /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.0/power/wakeup || true # Disable USB XHCI controller wakeup echo disabled > /sys/devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:14.0/power/wakeup || true # Disable ACPI wakeup for XHCI and RP09 (toggle if enabled) grep -q "XHCI.*enabled" /proc/acpi/wakeup && echo XHCI > /proc/acpi/wakeup || true grep -q "RP09.*enabled" /proc/acpi/wakeup && echo RP09 > /proc/acpi/wakeup || true

mgaunard 9mo ago

I never understood why people claim the Macbook is so good. Bad keyboard, bad aluminium body, soldered ram... Is it just the Apple Silicon that somehow makes it worth it? It's ARM, most software is still written and optimized for x86.

inatreecrown2 9mo ago
the screen is very good, the trackpad is very good, the screen does not wobble or bend - it is sturdy. and it is quiet!
mithrilskeleton 9mo ago
Excellent power efficiency in apple silicon - good battery life and good performance at the same time. The aluminum body is also very rigid and premium feeling, unlike so many creaky bendy pc laptops. Good screen, good speakers.
- sagarm 9mo ago
  Aluminum and magnesium non-Apple laptops are just as stiff. There's just a wider spectrum of options, including $200 plastic ARM Chromebooks available.
  - ricardobeat 9mo ago
    Do you have any examples? The top-of-the-line Surface laptops are still comparatively flimsy, same for Samsung and Vaio. What’s better?
brokencode 9mo ago
I’ve never heard someone describe the aluminum body as bad.. what do you not like about it? The number one benefit is the Apple Silicon processors, which are incredibly efficient. Then it’s the trackpad, keyboard and overall build quality for me. Windows laptops often just feel cheap by comparison. Or they’ll have perplexing design problems, like whatever is going on with Dell laptops these days with the capacitive function row and borderless trackpad.

backscratches 9mo ago

Starlabs are good quality Linux laptops, designed in house. Love my starbook

heavyset_go 9mo ago

Check out Ubuntu Certified hardware[1]. I've moved completely to EliteBooks and am very happy with my decision. The build quality is superb, they're upgradeable, everything is replaceable and there's an excellent market and after market for parts, and HP has codepaths in their firmware for Linux support, meaning even Modern Standby works well. Price points for refurb and used hardware are great, too. [1] https://ubuntu.com/certified https://ubuntu.com/certified

Quothling 9mo ago
The key qualities of something like a macbook air are: It has no fans. It's temperature never changes unless you really push it. I've never used any other laptop where I could feel at least some warmth when it was turned on. My m1 air still has enough battery to run for a full day of usage, here several years after I bought it. Basically never loses power while the lid is closed either, but that is less of an issue.
- bigyabai 9mo ago
  > unless you really push it This is indeed a problem. My Macbook Pro (with active cooling!) would commonly come within 5c of junction temp when compiling, mdworker_shared was running, or Docker was working. It was an issue with the Intel Macs too, just much more readily apparent since they throttled faster. I wish Apple backed down from this hill, for the sake of my damned gonads.
  - Quothling 9mo ago
    My m1 air with 8gb of ram has been doing docker and all my golang, C/Zig and Python work without issues so far. If I were to sell it, I'd probably grade the keyboard and mousepad (the clicking) 5/10 now. Not sure if it's because I've been a little rough with it (I have small children who sometimes kick the keyboard etc) or if the quality is lower than it was back when I had my 201(5 or 6) macbook pro which was frankly in a condition as good as new when I switched to this one. It throttes and stuff, but it still outperforms the t14 i7 with 32gb ram I've got from my company. Granted, that one has a lot of enterprice stuff running, but still... I do hope someone will make a pc that is as close to an air as possible though. I like Apple, but I'm not a fan of being bound to an US tech company these days. I'm not important enough to be targeted personally, but what if the US government decides to ban all Danes from US tech in the war for Greenland? Or the more likely scenario, what if Apple decides to go full Microsoft with AI and what not?