KDE Slimbook: Linux Laptop with Ryzen 4000

https://kde.slimbook.es/

by ekianjo • 6 years ago

449 296 6 years ago

kde.slimbook.es

flerchin• 6 years ago

Looks nice. I would prefer a 4K display like my Precision 5530.

cyrksoft• 6 years ago

Do you find 4K in a 15 inch screen worth it? I’m in the verge of buying a 4K one, but I’m not sure if it’s worth the battery consumption in such a small screen.

crowbahr• 6 years ago

The closer you are to the screen, the more resolution matters.

smcleod2• 6 years ago

I find it absolutely worth it, whenever I see a 1080p laptop screen I find myself continuously noticing how blurring the fonts are and how little I can fit on the display, high resolution monitor screens have meant that I find myself needing an external monitor far less often.

paulie_a• 6 years ago

I have it on my xps 13 and I'd say it's worth it. Everything looks amazing. There are two factors though, not all software plays nicely (im looking at you adobe) and it depebds in the additional cost.

It's an adjustment going back to a 1080p screen for a bit.

blitmap5• 6 years ago

I want too much. I need a 4k oled display and I'd buy AMD so fast.

leetrout• 6 years ago

Do you use 4K currently with Linux? If so what screen resolution / scaling and what WM / desktop?

I’m using pop_os and I desperately want scaling to work and it doesn’t.

smcleod2• 6 years ago

I haven't had any issues with display scaling using Fedora for quite some time.

hedora• 6 years ago

Not the person you asked, but I use a lightweight window manager and set the screen DPI correctly using xrandr, and/or set the font in each app I care about.

I’ve found this works well across high and low DPI machines.

rathboma• 6 years ago

If you're not doing fractional scaling it works well. But fractional scaling is still rough - in particular all electron apps are blurry

blitmap5• 6 years ago

I am odd. On Windows I use 2x scaling on a 4k screen. On Linux I go unscaled and just bump up the text size in editors and GTK/Qt apps.

Karliss• 6 years ago

Currently on Gnome+Wayland in a multi display setup that have different fractional scaling factors for each monitor. Usually 1:1:1.5 but I also tried 1:1.25:1.75 for the 1080p,1440p and 4K.

Gnome programs work perfectly. Qt looks good when wayland backend is force enabled but it causes crashes in certain situations so it's choice between slightly blurry text and occasional crash. Firefox works well, it used to require an environment variable not sure if it still does. Chrome support still not there, scale is correct but text is blurry.

djsumdog3• 6 years ago

I had a few 4k laptops and .. eh .. they're excessive. I have a 4k monitor I do my photo editing on and it makes a difference, but a 13-15" laptop screen is really too small for me to care.

blitmap5• 6 years ago

I'm often working out of a hotel and my laptop screen is my only screen. I can use the hotel TV but it's painful looking up-down-up-down. I can carry a portable external monitor but that becomes unmanageable when I need to pack light.

I usually prefer 2x scaling on a 4k screen, and then pictures and text are unscaled. I like being able to put a 1080p movie in the upper left corner and a reference webpage below that, then a big text editor to the right and 'work'.

lhl9• 6 years ago

Schenker and Tuxedo will have one w/ a 100% DCI-P3 Samsung 4K OLED available in September https://www.reddit.com/r/XMG_gg/comments/hjxm80/launch_schen...

blitmap5• 6 years ago

That is the best news I've heard all month! Thank you!

toastal6• 6 years ago

I'd prefer 1440p over 4k but I don't think OLED panels come in that size

monksy2• 6 years ago

Might want to pester Sager to put it on the AMD version: https://www.sagernotebook.com/15-Inch-to-16-Inch-Gaming-Lapt...

grezql• 6 years ago

Not meant to offend but im about to ditch my macbook 2014, can this machine run windows10?

throwaway743• 6 years ago

You could get a laptop with windows and a dual boot linux. Did that with mine a few months ago using Ubuntu and it's been great.

lysp• 6 years ago

Or run windows on its own disk / partition.

Then create a windows VM in linux with direct disk access.

ben-schaaf2• 6 years ago

Considering you can buy the laptop from other brands that ship with Windows you can probably get it to work.

charsi• 6 years ago

Still no good 13 inch options with ryzen 4000. Waiting for the thinkpad.

kilburn• 6 years ago

The thinkpads (t14 & t14s) are already out on most countries ;)

threentaway2• 6 years ago

Lenovo X13?

lliamander• 6 years ago

That thing with AMD is actually faster than an X1 Extreme (in CPU performance). I'm pretty happy with my E495, but that X13 is tempting.

lvturner3• 6 years ago

Yep, still get access denied via Cloudflare on this and can't access it.

A bit frustrating that there is no way to report that you might be seeing this message in error.

EDIT: Especially frustrating as I'm actively looking for a good Linux laptop to replace my MacBook - specifically I'm worried about compatibility with my thunderbolt docks

bubblethink6• 6 years ago

no thunderbolt with amd laptops at the moment

lvturner3• 6 years ago

Do you know of any intel based machines that work well with thunderbolt docks and are worth considering?

jeppesen-io2• 6 years ago

True, but often you can use type c support.

I'm using a type c plug to run my monitor, USB hub and charge my amd laptop right now

Asus g14

leephillips• 6 years ago

It thinks I'm a terrorist or something. My access is denied with

    This website is using a security service to protect 
    itself from online attacks.

exikyut4• 6 years ago

(I replied to the parent comment at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23924503.)

exikyut4• 6 years ago

Hmm. This comment and the reply got me thinking... I wonder how many people are erroneously being blocked by CF at any one moment?

It sadly seems impossible to eliminate all the maliciousness without also impacting legitimate users, but it's obviously a low enough number that the various little uproars never really gain momentum.

But thinking about how technical users severely impacted by the situation gives me an idea: a Chrome/FF extension could trivially the various CF block/captcha page HTML, and fire off a ping to a server somewhere with some statistics about ISP, (very) coarse location (eg, capital city resolution), time of day, optionally the website in question... hmm, and maybe the server could have an account/distinction system, so it could let users who cannot access XYZ website they don't want to disclose, how many other users in their area are also unable to access the site...

Hmm. Thinking this through was useful. There are a lot of tricky privacy balances this would need to upset in order to be most practical. And then on top of that the malicious users would probably figure out a way to ruin such a service :/

Wait. Maybe use an invite system with a user tree?

</thinking_out_loud>

exikyut4• 6 years ago

(NB: A small footnote that I usually do not /dev/keyboard this badly; I certainly _was_ tired this morning. "Affected by the situation might react"; "could trivially parse"; "disclose, know how many".

divingdragon• 6 years ago

It's blocking me too. I have no issues with other Cloudflare sites however. I wonder what site-specific firewall filters has been triggered.

dx034• 6 years ago

Could be site individual rules set by the site owner. Maybe they blocked whole countries or regions.

hardwaresofton4• 6 years ago

So this looks like the walmart MOTILE laptop[0][1], but rebranded?

Is this basically a System76[2]-like effort?

[EDIT] - I own an System76 Oryx Pro and love it -- this laptop being a rebranded effort is not a bad thing in my mind, if anything it gives me more faith in the initial build quality. If the KDE org gets it just as right as System76 (open source drivers galore, fantastic system tooling and support), then this is going to be a boon for open source everywhere, more money in KDE's pockets, more linux-first machines out there.

[0] https://www.walmart.com/ip/MOTILE-14-Performance-Laptop-FHD-...

[1] https://the-gadgeteer.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Motile-...

[2] https://system76.com/laptops

djsumdog3• 6 years ago

Are you sure? The keyboards look really different for a rebrand.

hardwaresofton4• 6 years ago

The keyboards look the same -- there are two slightly different models, check out the bottom right of this picture:

https://kde.slimbook.es/assets/img/IMG_0778_e.jpg

wmf2• 6 years ago

It's made by Tongfeng and rebranded by Mechrevo, Schenker, Tuxedo, etc.

hardwaresofton4• 6 years ago

Thanks for this insight, did not know of Tongfang (tongfeng lead to the wrong company in some quick googling)

voltagex_• 6 years ago

Replying here in the hopes someone knows if anyone resells these in Australia. Last I looked it was all Clevo.

monoideism2• 6 years ago

Definitely not just a rebrand. For one, this has dual channel RAM, the MOTILE has single-channel.

Also, not sure the MOTILE is even available with Ryzen 4 (only Ryzen 3 or Ryzen 5).

Possibly uses a similar chassis, but not even sure about that. Possibly same manufacturer.

lhl9• 6 years ago

It's a refresh of the last gen model. Technically, the 14" Motile M142 was the "rebrand" (OEM) of the TongFang (ODM) PF4PU1F (P for Picasso) and the new one is the TongFang PF4NU1F (N for Renoir). It's been available for about a month now in China as the Mechrevo S2 Air (you can find it on JD.com or see mostly Chinese reviews on YouTube) and is also on sale in Korea by Hansung/Monsterlabs.

It's using the exact same chassis, but as you mentioned this generation is a significant internal improvement - not just dual-channel RAM, but also significantly upgraded TDP (54W vs 22W) with new dual-fan, dual-heat pipe cooling, plus USB-C PD.

The 15" refresh the PF5NU1G was also launched at the same time initially as the Mechrevo Code 01. I've posted earlier in this thread linking to all the details about it for those that are interested, since I have one.

XorNot• 6 years ago

Oh my god...is that a 15" laptop without a number pad being crammed onto the side of the keyboard, thus not forcing all my typing to be awkwardly offset and uncomfortable?

Scene_Cast2• 6 years ago

The ThinkPad X1 Extreme (Gen 3 has just been released) is another nice one.

bubblethink6• 6 years ago

They ruined that by adding nvidia. All 15" ones usually do. Precision 7550 is the rare 15" laptop that lets you configure it to your heart's content without nvidia, but it has the numpad.

toastal6• 6 years ago

While a personally agree with you thoroughly, this weekend I learned that Thai people love number pads because the language has too many characters and it's own numerals, yet most of the time people use/prefer Arabic numerals, so with a number pad they have access to the numbers without having to swap keyboard layouts to English just for numerals.

cycomanic• 6 years ago

It's the same with the French, every French person I know is using the number pad a lot when typing on a French layout. The reason being that in the usual top row you have the accented characters and for numbers you have to press shift, so it's easier to use the number pad. As a side note the French keyboard layout is one of the worst to use if you are not French. Typing your password at an Internet cafe can be a real pain.

bjcy2• 6 years ago

THIS. Is so ลำบาก[^1]. I tend to use my iPhone/iPad to type certain kinds of stuff because of the dedicated "123" modifier.

[^1]: Completely off topic, but I love when there are words that capture a feeling in one language for which there isn't a suitable analogue in another. For non-Thai speakers, this word means burdensome, but depending on context covers the whole span of "inconvenient" to "distressing". In general, though, I find English has more individual words that express an entire concept vs. Thai which has to use compound words to explain its meaning.

tomrod• 6 years ago

This is my beef with laptops. I bought a huge laptop just so I could have a numberpad.

But I've been amazed at how many programmers don't like to have them. Why?

bschwindHN• 6 years ago

I don't feel a need for one, I type code all day, not lots of numbers. I want my hands centered on the device, not offset to the left.

cschep• 6 years ago

There are a row of numbers at the top of the keyboard, don't need two sets.

pmontra• 6 years ago

I think I pressed a key (any key) on my number pad less than ten times in 6 years. I don't have any use case for a numberpad. Maybe if I still played Nethack.

scintill76• 6 years ago

Do you use it for the numbers, or the navigation keys?

nxpnsv• 6 years ago

My hands cover the two sides of my keyboard perfectly. The numpad just breaks that.

krzyk7• 6 years ago

Why would I use numpad?

Even on normal keyboards I don't use it, and they are annoying because they make the mouse position awkwardly more to the right than it should be healthy for the arm (I really envy left handed people, they don't have to deal with this).

And it is next to impossible to get a keyboard without the numpad, fortunately I found two such keyboards and I have one at work and one at home (Logitech K310 and Microsoft Sculpt).

And I haven't seen in live any person that uses numpad, I always thought it is used by accountants only (and those that don't want to use two hands to enter numbers).

ajuc3• 6 years ago

Becuase duplicated keys waste space. So they make the keys smaller and more clumped just to fit some keys TWICE.

BTW don't get me started on Ctrl/Fn confusion. Every other laptop I have switches these keys around.

GordonS• 6 years ago

I'm also a numpad fan, and wouldn't have a keyboard without one.

Aside from making it much faster to enter numbers, I also really like it for gaming - instead of using WASD, I use the numpad 4,8,6,2). This means a whole bunch of other keys are right there for use by the same hand, e.g. 7/9 for jump, "/" for throw, 1 for crouch, 3 for prone etc. I realise this is controversial tho!

alias_neo4• 6 years ago

I'm left handed.

reportgunner2• 6 years ago

I can use the number row to touch type numbers and don't have to move my hands.

Edit: people who say numbers without shift: do you realize you can switch the keyboard layout using Alt+Shift ?

mnm1• 6 years ago

The offset typing causes repetitive stress injuries which are very painful and can end a career. For people that use mice, one handed trackballs, a one handed touch pad, doubly so on external keyboards because it forces the mouse hand abnormally out and away from the body. All that for a bunch of keys I haven't used in years because they are useless as a programmer.

Laptop manufactures who don't offer keyboards without numpads, to me, care so little about their customers that their laptops aren't worth shit. I'm looking specifically are all laptops > 14" from system 76. If they want to be taken seriously as a manufacturer, they should consider a line of 15" or 16" laptops that aren't going to leave people in pain, considering changing careers. Of course, I only use the internal keyboard when absolutely necessary and can't use an external with an external display, and it still makes that big of a difference.

Ergonomics matter.

ben-schaaf2• 6 years ago

It's funny, because they advertise blender as a use-case for this laptop but I bought a laptop with a numpad exclusively for use in blender.

VWWHFSfQ• 6 years ago

every linux vendor advertises blender because it's one of the only good serious creative apps available on the platform

qayxc• 6 years ago

Weird - not just the lack of a numpad, but also the lack of dedicated graphics wouldn't make me think of Blender as a prime use-case for this.

sp332• 6 years ago

In the 15-inch range, ones labelled "15.4" inches usually don't have a keypad, while "15.6" generally do.

PaywallBuster• 6 years ago

How many laptopts use the high powered range of Ryzen cpus?

e.g. 4xxxH like this laptop

Most laptopts I see use the 15W versions, very rare to find anything competitive with Macbook.

djsumdog3• 6 years ago

For a while it was only the ROG Zephyrus. I think there have been others in Linus or Dave2Ds videos. A bunch were due to come up earlier this year but it all got pushed back.

wmf2• 6 years ago

All 15" or larger laptops should use H-class processors; there are just very few Ryzen 15" out so far.

monksy2• 6 years ago

Sagers have a few that use the desktop versions. https://www.sagernotebook.com/15-Inch-to-16-Inch-Gaming-Lapt...

lhl9• 6 years ago

There are only a handful of AMD options worth mentioning and availability for models is very regional. Those without a dGPU are the Lenovo S540-13ARE (4800U but has dual-fan/dual-heatpipe cooling and runs at a sustained 38W), these TongFang PF4/PF5 models (a variety of OEMs like the Slimbook, Tuxedo), the 2020 Redmibooks, and the just announced Honor Magicbook Pro.

The rest are mostly gaming models. The Asus G14, TongFang's GK5/GK7 (like the Eluktronics RP-15/17), HP Omen 15, and the Lenovo Legion 5 are the best of the bunch. They all have Nvidia 1660Tis/2060s.

The 4800H performs on par with the 10875H at lower temps/power usage but I think competition w/ a Macbook is going to be subjective. None have anywhere close to the fit and finish of a MBP. Most are significantly cheaper. Most will have a better port selection and better upgradability (although some also have soldered RAM). Most will have better battery life. Only a few will be more portable. Only a few support USB-C PD. Only a few have >FHD screens and if you need >100% sRGB color gamut, there's literally only one AMD option (the 4K Schenker VIA 15 Pro), and that won't be available until September at the earliest. There are plenty of 10875H+ laptop options on the Intel side. Some like the new XPS's are specifically designed to compete head-to-head w/ MBPs.

Abishek_Muthian5• 6 years ago

When I saw 'Slimbook' I wished for a small pocketable Linux netbook even though I knew Ryzen 4000's thermal profile wouldn't suit such a design.

I would really like AMD to release CPUs which can compete with intel's core M3, which can be used in SBCs or pocketable netbooks like these[1][2]. I feel there is a need gap in this space for a reputed manufacturer or a trusted enthusiast brand to get in.

Why would you want a pocketable Linux pc? one may ask; I'm tired of this always tracking smartphone cellular-apps cluster-X mess. My phone-call usage lifestyle is anyways on-demand(little to no incoming calls), so why not just use a USB GSM module on a pocket Linux pc when needed.

P.S. I'm aware of upcoming pure Linux smartphones, some with cellular-kill switch, I'm a vocal support of these platforms, but it's not available in my country and as I understand they are not ready for a daily driver.

[1]https://www.1netbook.com/product/

[2]https://www.gpd.hk/gpdpocket2

derefr• 6 years ago

Why would you want a pocketable Linux pc? one may ask; I'm tired of this always tracking smartphone cellular-apps cluster-X mess. My phone-call usage lifestyle is anyways on-demand(little to no incoming calls), so why not just use a USB GSM module on a pocket Linux pc when needed.

You could probably run Linux on one of the GPD Win devices. (e.g. https://www.reddit.com/r/gpdwin/comments/glpokv/gpd_win_max_...)

Also, as an aside: rather than using a GSM module with a real SIM card that you'd have to pay monthly for, you could just subscribe to a VoIP service (I use https://voip.ms) and then connect to it with a softphone app to place and receive calls.

I pay $1/mo for a number, and $0.005/min for calling, and that's it. I have softphone apps for my PC, phone, and tablets, that are all connected to its same number, so I can answer calls "directly" through any of them, without one device having to route through another. (Also, as a side-benefit, I've set it up with has voicemail-to-MP3s-in-my-email, like Google Voice does. And configured it so that if people outside my whitelist call, they go directly to voicemail.)

Works especially well when combined with a phone that you set up as a "tablet" with a data-only plan. (This plan costs me $10/mo, in Canada, which is quite a feat if you know the Canadian cellular ISP market.)

Oh, and I've also written a SMS<->Slack bridge bot (https://github.com/tsutsu/smsforwarder), that I run as a Heroku free-tier app wired with webhooks to voip.ms's SMS API. SMSes to my VoIP number pop up in a Slack channel named after the peer's number in a special private Slack team I created; and messages I write into that channel are sent back to the peer number as SMSes. So all the same devices that have the softphone app, have Slack, and so can also interact with my SMSes in a shared manner as well.

addajones• 6 years ago

I would really love to know your complete setup for this. I’m impressed and would like to attempt something like that!

Abishek_Muthian5• 6 years ago

You could probably run Linux on one of the GPD Win devices.

I had mentioned it in my parent comment. I cannot get these devices inside my country for the same reason I cannot get a PinePhone due to China-India tensions; even before the blockade I have heard horror stories from people who imported computers from Aliexpress in India having to pay 2-3x the price as import taxes!

Furthermore, I would like a brand which is available to greater Linux audience in western countries, so that it's been vetted properly.

Also, as an aside: rather than using a GSM module with a real SIM card that you'd have to pay monthly for, you could just subscribe to a VoIP service

I do use VoIP services, but without a GSM module how do you connect to the Internet(4G/LTE) on the move in a PC? i.e. considering you are not carrying a smartphone. Places where WiFi hotspots are available are not an issue(If you don't consider them to be a security risk or being stationery), but say you have to book a Uber on the move then a GSM Module for Internet + Anbox for Uber app seems necessary.

smsforwarder looks cool, I will check it out. Thank you.

asveikau2• 6 years ago

That form factor is interesting, I had seen another like this before from somebody who had been travelling. Also interesting is that there seems to be demand for it in some countries and not others.

Abishek_Muthian5• 6 years ago

I think that's because, even hardcore smartphone with physical keyboard users have accustomed to touch screen, it's just few outliers and security conscious people are using the setup being discussed here.

That said, I see a resurgence of smartphones with physical keyboards and once people get used to them, they may seek better screen/keyboard/performance with a pocketable laptop but the GSM integration is a major limiter for many. It's not like people are going to throw away their smartphones for a portable computer anytime soon.

lhl9• 6 years ago

For those interested in this or the Tuxedo Pulse 15 or Schenker VIA 15 Pro (all based off of the same barebones TongFang PF5NU1G), I have one and I’ve been doing a pretty thorough review here: https://www.notion.so/lhl/Mechrevo-Code-01-TongFang-PF5NU1G-...

dman2• 6 years ago

Thank you!

igravious• 6 years ago

And Eluktronics to the best of my knowledge? The new 15" https://www.eluktronics.com/RP-15/ and 17" https://www.eluktronics.com/RP-17/

lhl9• 6 years ago

The Eluktronics is a GK5/GK7 TongFang - same ODM but a totally different chassis (for use w/ gaming dGPUs). Eluktronics mentioned a while back they might be selling their own version of the PF5 but I haven't heard an update recently.

boudewijnrempt2• 6 years ago

How did you manage to break the page-up/page-down/home/end keys on that page?

pmlnr3• 6 years ago

From an engineering perspective, it's a crappy, rendered-from-js-exclusively page.

(That has nothing to do with the detailed, and very nice content.)

chrismorgan2• 6 years ago

Notion pages are so bad in those ways. Space/Shift+Space don’t work either, arrows do very much the wrong thing, they wrap all the text blocks with contenteditable (why!? it’s not even like I can edit the page!) which mangles at least Firefox’s link handling (it makes it not show the href in the status bar on hover) and Tab-based keyboard focus (it makes each block focusable, despite that being useless, and stops inline links from being focusable), …

It’s just awful. An accessibility disaster, and I don’t say such things lightly (normally I might just say it has serious problems).

If I come across much more usage of Notion, I’ll need to craft a user script to unbreak as much as I can. document.querySelectorAll('[contenteditable]').forEach(e => e.contentEditable = false) is a good start, fixing the focus issues. Unfortunately all their event handlers are on the root element, so you can’t just clobber them with document.body.outerHTML = document.body.outerHTML or similar but must figure out some other way of deregistering or breaking their event handlers.

toastal6• 6 years ago

Given we have the technology, I don't think it's wise to advertise this machine as ready for serious digital painting and video editing with only 100% sRGB gamut. Color accuracy can be recalibrated, but the gamut can't be expanded. Video editing really should be done in the wider gamut like 94-100% DCI-P3. The same thing applies to photo editing and digital painting in DCI-P3 or Adobe RGB. Many high-end phones have these specs and many monitor as well as the HDR screens on TV and projectors. However, all of the laptop with panels in the appropriate ranges for digital content creation (XPS series, ZenBook Pro Duo, ConceptD, etc.) are all running Intel chips -- so I'm still waiting.

yxhuvud• 6 years ago

Yes, and it boggles my mind that Apple is still the one building laptops with high resolutions.

Filligree3• 6 years ago

The highest-end Zephyrus G14 comes with a high-res panel; windows defaults to 2x zoom. I've been very happy with it, not least since - well, thanks to the Vega chiplet there's no lag.

It also has an Nvidia for those times when you really need horsepower, but so far I've only needed it for ML.

komali22• 6 years ago

My x1 carbon isn't too bad. Sure it's not whatever retina is but iirc it's 1440p.

lanewinfield• 6 years ago

Always and forever with any linux laptop, the major question is: how is the trackpad?

lhl9• 6 years ago

The trackpad is decent. Roughly centered under the home keys. Plastic but pretty smooth (about 80% the size and 80% the smoothness of a late model MBP13). It's a physical clickpad that feels fine, and recognizes left, middle and right clicks. I haven't had a problem using the libinput defaults - gestures work, default sensitivity and acceleration is sane (although of course, fully adjustable).

jimmmyd• 6 years ago

I was switched from a 2015 macbook pro to a Ryzen APU laptop for 2 weeks, the trackpad experience on my machine was better than my expection (i've used a laptop few years ago and cannot stand it), imo, it's some level between win10 precision touchpad and macbook, more close to win10.

corndoge• 6 years ago

FHD on a 13 inch or larger just doesn't cut it these days. QHD is the minimum for people whose jobs are computers, imo.

michaelmrose• 6 years ago

Here's a ppi calculator https://www.sven.de/dpi/ to satify various hypotheticals.

Any 4K monitor 26" or greater is the same dpi as FHD at 13"

Various examples here https://www.newegg.com/p/pl?d=4k+monitor

A 24" 4K monitor is only 8% better in fact. I would venture to guess it would be basically indistinguishable to the naked eye.

QHD at 13" is 226 ppi is that really a reasonable minimum?

wtallis• 6 years ago

It's less about DPI than about raw pixel count. At 1080p, you simply lose too much usable screen space to menus, toolbars, task bars, and all the dumb shit that websites set "position: fixed" on. 2560x1440 (or better yet, 2560x1600) with appropriate magnification gives you a lot more flexibility in how you use screen space, instead of more or less forcing you to work with only one maximized/fullscreen window at a time.

I use a 13" MBP with no UI magnification, but most web pages scaled to around 200%. That keeps the UI nice and compact and leaves a lot of screen space for actual content (about 2170x1523 with my current browser layout). I do occasionally set it to a scaled resolution when someone else has to watch/use the machine as well.

teleforce• 6 years ago

Fully agreed, this year is 2020 guys at least provide QHD for laptops and PCs, and have mercy for your eyes.

The only main problem with QHD is that once you've got used to it, it is really hard to go back to anything less.

ekianjo2• 6 years ago

what does it change really? If you need more space there's no issue to connect to a real big screen to do more work.

Shengbo• 6 years ago

It makes it really uncomfortable to use when you're not connected to a larger screen. If I'm buying a laptop, I want a decent screen for when I'm not sitting at my desk. If I didn't care about that, I wouldn't be buying a laptop in the first place.

distances3• 6 years ago

I don't really get why anyone would use laptop screen or keyboard unless they're traveling. I'm using my laptop purely as a portable computer between home and office desks. I would be quite fine with a laptop without screen or keyboard, at least until someone wants me to present in a live meeting.

anentropic• 6 years ago

I did that for a while, with a Mac Mini.

It was lighter and more powerful than the Macbook Air I've been using the last few years.

(In the end there were times when I wanted an actual laptop with me, i.e. non-work trips away)

skocznymroczny2• 6 years ago

FHD is not an issue, but there's no mention of whether it's TN or IPS. If it's TN, then it's sad.

jonhohle• 6 years ago

Paint like a maestro with Krita

That pretty much sums up the care and thoughtfulness of the Linux desktop ecosystem.

dTal• 6 years ago

What do you mean?

mappu• 6 years ago

The Maestro is a musician, not a painter.

eadonmachine• 6 years ago

3200Hz memory??

threentaway2• 6 years ago

I'm not sure what your question is. It's shared with the integrated GPU, so faster is better even if it means that it costs a bit battery life.

ShinTakuya• 6 years ago

Memory speed is usually in MHz, not Hz. They're just making fun of the mistake.

exikyut4• 6 years ago

Wait. You're right. I did a double-take then doubted myself.

I can't find anything historical that used 3.2kHz memory access speeds, but I'm pretty sure there was something out there... from the 1960s.

cardinalfang• 6 years ago

That speed is slower than magnetic memory; it could be delay-line memory, which would be even earlier.

bfuclusion• 6 years ago

This is my favorite form factor for 15" notebooks. Center keyboard and touch pad and lots of ports. My only reservation is it's not 4K and my eyes really like the font smoothness now that I'm getting older.

kdamica• 6 years ago

Good star for having full size arrow keys!

olakease• 6 years ago

Does anyone know why Ryzen 4000 laptops don't come with screen resolutions higher than FHD?

einr• 6 years ago

Does it have a replaceable battery?

Roritharr4• 6 years ago

Why is it so hard to produce a 13" Notebook with a Ryzen 4800U, 32 GB Ram (or better just two Sockets) and two 4k/60hz Outputs?

Make one HDMI 2.0 and the other Displayport over Type-C and I'm fine.

I'd love to see a USB 3 Type-A Port aswell but that seems like too much to ask nowadays.

sz4kerto• 6 years ago

Lenovo X13 with Ryzen 4750U + 32 GB RAM + docking station is quite similar.

MrUnderhill• 6 years ago

Looks like it's kicking ass in the benchmarks too: https://www.notebookcheck.net/First-benchmarks-AMD-Ryzen-400...

baybal22• 6 years ago

I wonder, would there be somebody brave enough to go for resolder.

boruto2• 6 years ago

You can get 32GB of RAM in a 15" form factor, just not in 13".
This is due to the well known engineering limitation that links LCD size to the density of RAM modules that can be supported by a motherboard.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21445497

I thought this comment 8 months back was correct. I dont know the limitation nor could find something related.

x87678r2• 6 years ago

I kinda feel if you really need a lot of resources you can use a cloud server or local physical box. There are lots of workstation laptops spec'd like you want but they're big, heavy and expensive.

jgilias• 6 years ago

Have people at AMD solved the issue(s) with Ryzen-equipped Linux laptops freezing randomly?

fraktl• 6 years ago

I've ASUS TUF A15 laptop (Ryzen 4800H with GeForce 2060) with Linux and haven't experienced a freeze yet. I own that laptop for 2 months now, so it's not impossible I won't experience it, however so far - no freezes. There are some annoyances with it, but overall I'm more than happy with 4800H and what you get for that kind of money.

thekyle2• 6 years ago

I really appreciate the 91Wh battery on the 15 inch. I was looking at buying a Dell XPS 15 but they shrunk the battery size this year.

pmlnr3• 6 years ago

Sigh.

The main points I look at a laptop by are keyboard, trackpoint, then display quality, then the rest. I couldn't care less about the Ryzen part; the keyboard looks abysmal.

CiTyBear• 6 years ago

I agree. What made me use macbook for years is their touchpad.

Do you have recommandation of linux compatible laptop with good keyboard and touchpad ?

pmlnr3• 6 years ago

Lenovo ThinkPads. The T495 looks nice: https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-T495-Review-bu...

Filligree3• 6 years ago

The keyboard is critically important for me as well, but you should care about the Ryzen.

Power usage is dramatically lower than the equivalent Intel chip, to the degree the latter exists. In addition to the CPU just being much faster overall, these also come with a Vega iGPU with half a gigabyte of dedicated memory.

It won't play Half-Life 4, but I've always noticed Intel chips being laggy and hot if hooked up to a screen with any sort of resolution, or if trying to run e.g. Factorio. Neither of those are a problem here.

sheinsheish• 6 years ago

Nice ! I would appreciate the category Music Making (=DAW) amongst the four on the top. Musicians struggle with Apple’s prices and monopoly.

komali22• 6 years ago

What DAW would you use on a Linux distro? I didn't think any of the main 3 would work (Ableton, flstudio, protools or whatever).

lhl9• 6 years ago

Ardour, Bitwig, and Reaper would probably be the top choices for full blown DAWs on Linux.

openfuture4• 6 years ago

I have a slimbook pro (the model before the silver keyboard) and sadly I am very unhappy with it, I got a fairly maxed out version and it's fans are always on full blast and I have found no way to keep the power management under control except throttling the CPU - so it is constantly overheated, suspend is not working properly and the chassis is not strong enough so the fans stall unless you have it on a flat surface. Note that I have some lenovo computer from work which is configured in the exact same way and there are no overheating or suspend issues.

I also got a pinebook pro and I managed to use it a sum total of 12 times (and only on flat surfaces with the power plugged in because otherwise the screen would flicker like a strobe light) before the screen completely gave up and now it's an expensive paperweight.

Still I will keep buying these things.. eventually someone will figure out how to make reliable laptops that align with the ethos of free software. I've researched system76, puri.sm and also lately the way too expensive MNT reform, but really the only laptop people seem to be happy with is thinkpad x220 / x230 which came out 12 years ago.... This makes me sad.

I would pay a lot for a super sturdy laptop which works (and aligns with the free software ethos).

bboygravity3• 6 years ago

I have a slimbook pro (the model before the silver keyboard) and sadly I am very unhappy with it, I got a fairly maxed out version and it's fans are always on full blast and I have found no way to keep the power management under control except throttling the CPU - so it is constantly overheated, suspend is not working properly and the chassis is not strong enough so the fans stall unless you have it on a flat surface. Note that I have some lenovo computer from work which is configured in the exact same way and there are no overheating or suspend issues.

One of the possible root causes for those symptoms might be dried up (or wrongly applied) cooling paste between the heatsinks and the CPU/GPU.

I highly recommend trying to replace the cooling paste, this may fix all your issues.

I recently did this on my 2 year old Asus laptop and it feels like I just bought a new machine. It went from unusable to I won't have to buy a new laptop for a couple more years. It cost me 10 EUR and maybe half an hour to get it done.

depressedpanda• 6 years ago

I would recommend a thermal pad as an alternative to paste (I bought this: https://www.innovationcooling.com/products/ic-graphite-therm... ).

You won't ever have an issue with dry paste, and from what I can tell the CPU/GPU only runs a degree or so hotter than when using premium thermal paste.

davidwparker• 6 years ago

Off topic- but are _the_ BBoy Gravity?

rbg2464• 6 years ago

Thanks for the tip, I have a x230 with Ubuntu mate (upgraded to 16gb of ram) which I'm super happy with- only complaint is the screen and so was looking with envy at that laptop just now - you snapped me back into reality

amiga-workbench3• 6 years ago

Have you considered Nitrocaster's fHD display mod? I used a LVDS to eDP board to upgrade my dads T420 to a fHD IPS panel and its a night and day difference. https://nitrocaster.me/store/x220-x230-fhd-mod-kit.html

maxerickson• 6 years ago

What if shambolic failure is, uh, yeah.

kavalg• 6 years ago

Excluding the crappy screen resolution, I am still happy running KDE on my x240 (i5, 8GB RAM) :).

angyrold3• 6 years ago

I think the T series is great. I have a T460 (bought off ebay for $140). I had an extra SSD, some old ram sticks I stuck in there and it works great. The dock off of Amazon cost me approximately 20 bucks. The CPU maxes and never goes above 55 C (idles 37-40) and runs almost all my dev tasks as needed. The laptop is approximately the size of my 13" 2015 Macbook Pro (my wife currently has taken that one). I have two headless machines with GPUs if I want to game (via Parsec or Steam streaming) or use GPU for Python notebooks etc.

I've run Fedora and a custom Debian setup in the past (and currently am using Void Linux). Things mostly work with no real issues.

I think perhaps the mistake is paying premium with new and shiny things that haven't stood the test of time is the problem here? If you buy cheap (something that is a known quantity also), you're less likely to feel the b urn of walking away from the shiny / expensive new thing, right?

Note: I also have the X230 (bought off craigslist for ~$100, 2 years ago) and have given that to my dad who has used it happily for years now.

simlevesque• 6 years ago

We are in the future. We want Ryzen 4000.

i_am_proteus2• 6 years ago

A group (person) going by "51nb" out of Shenzhen, PRC, produces limited runs of motherboards that fit old ThinkPad chassis and accept modern processors. They also have access to NOS chassis and occasionally offer models such as the "X210," a completely unofficial X201 with a FHD IPS and current gen i7.

bluedino• 6 years ago

It's nice that laptops are in a spot where you could get a nice one for $150. This year because of Covid, those prices have doubled because of the increase in demand for used laptops.

orhmeh09• 6 years ago

I’ve had a T480 since summer 2018. It is the worst computer I have ever owned, less reliable and poorer build quality than a $250 Acer netbook from 2010. I had to install Windows because of an error to update one of several firmware issues that have arisen with this machine — this one relating to Thunderbolt without which it could not provide external output over any port but HDMI, and there only at 30 Hz for 4K. And I think the throttling issue is still not fixed. The ports on the board are extremely flimsy and I’m going to have to send my machine in to fix them a second time. At the very least they have massive issues in developing and deploying quality firmware.

omgwtfbyobbq• 6 years ago

My work laptop is a T460S, and it has the worst build quality/reliability I've seen in the past 5 years. The case is definitely light duty, to the point where one of the batteries swelling deformed it. The battery swelling also causes intermittent disconnection of that battery and of the screen, which is frustrating on a laptop.

z9e• 6 years ago

I wish I could say this about my T460p. It’s mobo died right after the warranty expired.

A friend of mine runs an IT help desk team that manages a fleet of T series laptops and they have a lot of problems. You got a good one. It’s so unfortunate that these have a lot of problems, they are almost perfect.

hyperman1• 6 years ago

As my x220 is quite literally falling apart right now, I'm looking for a replacer. I was hoping something like this would be it. So your comment is a bit of a cold shower.

I have a x220 i7 + SSD + 16GB ram and am mostly happy with it. But for the follow up, a better CPU would be nice (rust compiler mostly), and a bigger screen. I fear the compromise on the track pointer will be unavoidable.

Anybody has some inspiration?

vermaden• 6 years ago

Custom X210 or X62.

georgebcrawford2• 6 years ago

Have a look on reddit for /u/xueyao. He makes a couple of modded Thinkpads, including the "X330", which has the X220 keyboard, a 13.3" FHD screen, with plans for an 11th gen version early next year. There are mods aplenty apart from those ones. Internal USB instead of BT, a second MSATA connector, and the currently popular (and on my to-do list) USB-C charging mod.

amiga-workbench3• 6 years ago

I'm in a similar jam. I currently use an X201 Tablet, I refuse to move to a newer ThinkPad as the build quality really begins to suffer, and I'll be relegated to a 16:9 display.

I'm waiting for an announcement about the Raspberry Pi CM4, if they offer a model with 8GB of RAM, I'm very tempted to look into designing a carrier board that can replace my ThinkPad's motherboard. It will need an active DSI to LVDS converter to drive the display, and a small microcontroller to act as an embedded controller to read keyboard scancodes, trackpoint input and talk to the battery.

samoa42• 6 years ago

latitude e7470

afaik the last dell with a track point thingy (https://xkcd.com/243/).

gen 6 i7, 32gig ram, 1tb ssd, 14" fhd. dated but capable

fan is mostly idle with linux desktop work but constantly whirling under w10.

should be affordable in used condition...

jamesacklin• 6 years ago

I have a T480 I just upgraded with 32GB RAM; I highly recommend it. Not as light as the x220 and doesn't have the nice keyboard, but the price was right at ~$500. Came from a liquidator with a 512GB SSD + NVME mod already in place. Handles most things nicely; still have a desktop with a GPU for heavier rendering tasks.

Abishek_Muthian5• 6 years ago

I also got a pinebook pro and I managed to use it a sum total of 12 times (and only on flat surfaces with the power plugged in because otherwise the screen would flicker like a strobe light) before the screen completely gave up and now it's an expensive paperweight.

Was it something like a braveheart edition? Did you get in touch with them? I presume the display is easily replaceable. Community members over reddit say, Pinebook is now reliable and they have ironed out several issues but obviously it wouldn't be as powerful as other laptops being discussed here.

openfuture4• 6 years ago

No I got it at the latter part of the covid drama (or you know the latter part of the first wave in Europe)

fian• 6 years ago

I'm running Kubuntu on an i7 series Dell XPS. Can't recall much tweaking needed to get things working, including audio, wifi and GPU.

Every now and then the fans wind up but that is usually down to browser tab going rogue.

wink• 6 years ago

small nitpick, the x220 came out in mid/late 2011 and x230 in mid/late 2012, that's not 12 years ago.

And if you rightfully say "but 9 years is bad enough".. yes, but my x230 is only a little slower than my T460p and if I ignore the mobile Ryzens I don't see how a 2020 Lenovo T would be meaningfully better/faster than my 4 year old T460p.

openfuture4• 6 years ago

Sorry for not fact checking I just repeated what someone said to me recently as I was debating this choice.

amiga_500• 6 years ago

I have an old dell that runs linux fine. Before that I had another laptop that I installed linux on with no big issues. I've never had a laptop that wasn't useable with Linux.

branon• 6 years ago

There was a batch of Pinebook Pro computers that went out which was badly-QA'd and had issues with the display. You may have gotten one of those. I believe the issue was pretty localized, and if you get in touch with Pine64 they'll send you some replacement parts.

Disclaimer: I am a heavily biased Pinebook Pro user :)

openfuture4• 6 years ago

I heard something like this and sent them an email but got an automated response to make a ticket somewhere which was frustrating after spending time writing an email. Kind of figured they didn't want feedback since they seem really busy right now. Figured I'd just leave them alone it's just 200$ anyway and I may be able to use it headless some day.

1996• 6 years ago

really the only laptop people seem to be happy with is thinkpad x220 / x230 which came out 12 years ago.... This makes me sad.

I would pay for a motherboard replacement with an AMD mobile Ryzen CPU (renoir), like nb51 did with the X62

hardwaresofton4• 6 years ago

I run an Oryx Pro as my daily driver and am pretty happy with it -- it mostly sits on my desk though, and the fans are crazy loud, so I solved that by just... having another lighter laptop I carry around. The Oryx Pro was able to replace my old ITX-case desktop though so I'm thinking it's a win.

Thanks for your support to the cause -- I do agree with what others are saying though, seems like you can't go wrong with lenovo these days, but maybe give System76 a try with some of the cheaper models.

antb123• 6 years ago

Wanted usb-c and 1080p IPS screen - had a x270 (stolen) so now on a used t470s.

No Free bios but debian/ubuntu runs flawlessly. Go for a nvme drive and 12+gb ram and cheap - $600 with shipping and ram upgrade.

x220 died (motherboard), and have a x230 kicking around

hamilyon2• 6 years ago

It doesn't mention distro on the page, which is confusing.

I like the idea, though.

drewg1232• 6 years ago

TL;DR: Anybody know if Lenovo is locking-down NVME by PCI id, the same way they do wifi cards on their new Ryzen 4000 laptops?

I've been looking at Ryzen 4000 based laptops. I need a pointer stick / eraser stick (I hate touchpads), and Lenovo is the only choice I've seen with Ryzen 4000 and a pointer stick.

The Lenovo T14 is pretty compelling. However, I just can't stomach paying roughly 4x the market rate for NVME storage. They want $719 for a 1TB NVME drive (where I don't even know the vendor), when I can buy a 2TB drive from a vendor I trust for 1/2 of that. If I knew I could just open the thing up and replace the NVME drive, then I'd get it. But I"m afraid they've BIOS locked it to whatever OEM drive they ship.

earthscienceman• 6 years ago

I don't know about the T14 specifically but I just put a third party 2TB NVME into my T480s and had no problems, and I've not read about such a limitation on any of the forums.

risho2• 6 years ago

I bought an amd based t14s with the base 128gb NVME drive and replaced it with a 2tb samsung 970 evo plus and it works fine. If you are planning on using linux you are likely to have a sub optimal experience unless you are okay with using a bleeding edge rolling distro like arch due to needing newer kernels for the best levels of support.

drewg1232• 6 years ago

Awesome! Thank you so much! Would you mind putting up the output of lspci -vvv to pastebin or something similar and linking it here?

FWIW, my goal is to run FreeBSD-current on it.

numpad05• 6 years ago

I think the rationale for locking down WLAN/WWAN is adding random cards break promises around radio certifications. NVMe drives shouldn't so idk but the motivations are weaker.

t0astbread• 6 years ago

FYI (if anyone in charge of the website is reading this): I get blocked off by Cloudflare in an infinite reload loop if I try to access the site via Tor (even with JS & cookies enabled).

I'm not an expert in Cloudflare products but if I'm not mistaken, there should be a setting labelled something like "Onion Services" in your configuration console that makes the experience for Tor users a lot less painful.

daffy• 6 years ago

What's the potential-firmware-backdoor situation? Is there something equivalent to the Intel Management Engine?

numpad05• 6 years ago

The answer is sadly a yes there is. Current AMD processors contain Platform Security Processor based on ARM Cortex-A5.

winter_blue• 6 years ago

This is unjustifiably a lot more expensive than the similar HP Envy 13 or Envy 15.

You can get an Envy with a Ryzen 4700U (the 8-core 15W CPU), 16 GB of RAM, and a 512 GB PCIE NVM SSD -- for less than $900.

lhl9• 6 years ago

These are pretty different classes of machines. The 4800H performs 64% better at R20 (representative of rendering tasks), and 61% on Geekbench 5 (representative of general productivity). https://www.notebookcheck.net/R7-4700U-vs-R7-4800H_11683_116...

The Envy 13 is also limited to 16GB of soldered RAM while the Slimbook can be upgraded to 64GB. The 15" version has a huge battery advantage over the Envys.

It's also worth noting that the pricing listed includes a 21% VAT. The pricing is more competitive once you take that into account.

codewiz• 6 years ago

Nate Graham, coordinator of the KDE Usability & Productivity initiative, wrote a full review:

https://pointieststick.com/2020/07/23/the-superfast-ryzen-po...

twiclo• 6 years ago

You love to see a slim laptop that didn't use the thinness as an excuse to ditch the ethernet port

f6v• 6 years ago

From what I read about people running Linux on laptops I anticipate the following:

- Touchpad sucks

- Battery lasts 2 hours

- Sleep mode doesn’t work

andrepd2• 6 years ago

If this is all you have to say why comment at all. That's not remotely true, and you might be aware that there's no such thing as a "Linux laptop" per se, you can install Linux on any computer you wish.

gitowiec• 6 years ago

I think that is just a story of the past... Sure touchpad sucked on laptops from 2012 and earlier (gaming laptops), and the battery got drained by the Debian 6 and sleep mode flew away on to fast rotating fans... but as I said it is just the story of the past

andrepd2• 6 years ago

This is a Tongfang barebone, same as e.g. Schenker Via 15.

AtlasBarfed• 6 years ago

Why do they NEVER disclose the HDMI version? It is so important for 4k. Just maddening.

KDE Slimbook: Linux Laptop with Ryzen 4000

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