This might be the first Ryzen 6800U Linux laptop, which is cool, but it's a bit hard for me to get too excited about it...
* One of the biggest selling points of Ryzen 6000 is the chip's USB4 support, but looks like the Pangolin won't have it. It also only has 1 USB-C port, which is a bit of a headscratcher in 2023. Does it support PD even? (Not mentioned)
* 16:9 FHD display (no brightness specified) - high refresh is nice, but again, weird that it's not 16:10 in 2023 and IMO, QHD would be better for a 15-16" display.
* soldered memory (32GB at least)
* Numpad keyboard. This will be a positive for some, but I'm in the centered keyboard camp
* Only a 70Wh battery and still not so light (1.8kg)
While it's running an older chip, if you're not going to have USB4/TB4, and the points I listed are important, I think the Tuxedo Pulse 15 Gen2 is still a better 15" option atm (5700U chip, but lighter, bigger battery, better (still 16:9) display, Ethernet, SODIMM slots). There are some Ubuntu certified ThinkPads that are an option too (they have Ryzen 6000U chips but also no USB4), although almost all the models are w/ soldered RAM on ThinkPads now, which is a bummer.
If you want USB4 on AMD, the best (Linux friendly) options right now are probably the Asus G14 GA402 or a ThinkPad Z16. The HP EliteBook G9s are an option as well, although you need Linux 6.0+ to fix a broken HP BIOS update (HP support is also aggressively indifferent to Linux users) and I've seen lots of complaints about the fan curve and the SureView displays so I'm hesitant to recommend it...
I’m holding out hope on System76 designing truly custom hardware and we reach the fabled “MacBook of Linux” someday. As of now their Clevo rebadges don’t appeal to me, though their “custom” desktops do.
Star Labs is making what you're looking for with their StarFighter laptop, although you'll be paying MacBook Pro like pricing for it (and delivery would be in March at the earliest): https://us.starlabs.systems/pages/starfighter
starblabs look great. Great specs, coreboot, support for many linux distros....but I'm still waiting on my starbook mk VI since about last sping. It's frustrating, but I know they've had problems in the supply chain.
I'm happy to support a company like that obviously, but it's still frustrating.
The MBP is designed and manufactured by the richest company in the world. You'd expect their quality and polish to be better - and on the hardware side it is. On the flip side, the OS/software seems to get worse with each release, markup on storage and memory are absurd and you aren't able to upgrade or repair any components, and you trade any quality of life wins with ever-increasing anti-consumer lock-in/policies... So the trade-off is up to you.
That's 5 years of updates to the firmware. Not the OS. You configure it with something like Ubuntu LTS and you're good until 2032 with regards to OS security updates. And I wouldn't be surprised if the 32.04 LTS ran on it too whereas a comparable MBP will have been dropped by a couple years prior.
(Matt Hartley, the new Linux Support Lead was formerly providing technical support at System76)
I ended up going with a Framework last year as an upgrade since I liked the display (3:2 HiDPI 400nit+ 13.5") and form upgradability, but also because the official Framework forums was by far the best Linux laptop forum I've seen online. As long as you can deal w/ 5-6h of battery life, I can highly recommend it as one of the best Linux ultraportable laptops (although I'm really hoping that there's a Ryzen 7040 motherboard upgrade coming...). My review/notes on the 12th Gen Framework w/ Arch Linux: https://github.com/lhl/linuxlaptops/wiki/2022-Framework-Lapt...
I mean, it wouldn't even be hard for them to partner with someone like ASUS, Acer, etc to produce semi-custom hardware.
The strict Clevo-based hardware will always turn me away from buying from them when I can get multiple AMD 6000-based laptops from Asus that run Linux fine (after a wifi-card swap, the MediaTek's they use are useless); and have superior build qualities.
A word of warning for Asus laptops, while the asus-linux.org has being doing great work (and the G14s are known to work well), I was never able to get suspend working properly on a 2021 M16. And if anyone's trying to get a Ryzen 6000 ultralight like the Zenbook S 13 working, I think they're going to be in for a battle...
Most laptop brands work with/own various ODMs - instead of OEM brands like Asus, Acer, think ODMs like Pegatron, Wistron, Iventec, Compal, Quanta, Clevo, etc - these companies co-design/manufacture laptops for almost all the major OEMs, but most do exclusive designs and niche brands like System76 are probably too low volume to be able to get priority/afford custom design w/ most of the Tier 1 ODMs, hence the prevalence of "white label" friendly ODM designs.
The HP Dev One is what you're thinking of: https://hpdevone.com/ - it's a well reviewed developer laptop that comes w/ Pop!_OS preloaded and is very reasonably price - Ryzen 5850U (Zen3) - basically a rejiggered EliteBook 845 G8 w/ full Linux support (System76 has a repo w/ hardware support that can be used for fan speed and additional battery info: https://github.com/pop-os/hp-vendor). It's US-only and uses a SureView display (but has a 30-day return policy), so worth checking out for anyone in the market I think...
In fact, it has two USB C ports, and both of those are USB 4 and Thunderbolt 4 and having DisplayPort Alt Mode. They also have three USB A ports (3.2 Gen 1), a MicroSD slot, a 3.5mm jack port, and an HDMI port.
What's more, even the charger supports both USB C and DC jack cables interchangeably. You just chose either cable type in configuration, or you buy both cables.
There will never be a MacBook of Linux or Windows unless the OS is optimized as much as MacOS is to the underlying hardware. Windows is optimized to a high degree and still cannot match the standby/resume times or battery life of MacOS, and thats without M1.
Linux is not even in the same ballpark. System76 apply some tweaks but its still Ubuntu and as a desktop OS its lacking in many areas.
It might seem like nitpicking but I'm actually on your side here, as a consumer.
It's been a struggle to find a 1440 AMD laptop, I have one that I'm happy with for travel. (Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 Carbon Gen 6)
I also don't want it to be too big, for travel, so numpad is out for me.
The Slim 7 feels like a toy, but it's actually just very, very light, and made of plastic. It creeks, yes, but it's very, very light. This is more important to me when it's on my back, than being out of metal.
It is a gaming laptop, but you don't have to use it for games - I rarely do. In my experience, though, gaming laptops have the best build quality after business ones like ThinkPads (which were above my budget). They used to be very heavy and unwieldy, but that's changed now.
Tuxedo Computers sells the Pulse 15 with a centered keyboard, 1440p 165Hz screen, and AMD CPU+iGPU. Pretty nice laptop, except the integrated microphone is a bit shit.
The Pulse 15 Gen 2 is actually a refresh of the Tong Fang (not Clevo) PF5NU1G (that fixes most of the major complaints I had with the original version (multi-monitor support, better & brighter display, dual M.2 slots). I was quite happy with mine, as were almost all the user reviews I read (Here's mine: https://github.com/lhl/linuxlaptops/wiki/2020-MECHREVO-Code-...).
Agreed on preferring a bright 16:10 display. It might seem minor but that was on of the factors that pushed me over the edge to buy a ThinkPad X1 Nano instead of a Lemur Pro a couple of years ago.
I'm also not into numpads on laptops. Not that they aren't useful sometimes, but the they push the alpha cluster and trackpad off-center which is uncomfortable to type on which is hard to justify with how little I personally need one — a standalone numpad that I pull out of a drawer during tax season or whenever makes a lot more sense. Ultimately I think 15"+ laptops should offer keyboard options with and without numpads.
Personally I'm super happy to see FHD@15" make a return. I have pretty ok eyesight, but QHD@15" is unreadable without fractional scaling (which will probably be usable… right around the same time as Wayland and fusion energy).
I rock a 55" curved 4k TV (16x9) on my home desktop. To watch TV I move the desk chair and sit on my couch on the opposite wall. I can't explain how efficient this setup is in a small apartment.
The extra vertical space is better for reading stuff, and looking at code. It also allows for smaller laptops with the same usable screen space - they don't need to be as wide.
I think you have that backwards. Wider screen formats allow for a proper size keyboard (and speakers) without having to have a massive palm rest and very tall screen.
I have a 14” QHD laptop (framework) and it’s really awkward without fractional scaling. I don’t know that 20-25% more screen space would really fix that.
16:10? That's a dead format. It was seeing some popularity around ~2006 but quickly died out as 16:9 took over.
21:9 is the popular ultra-widescreen option. 16:9 is the popular regular option. Acting like 16:10 is the direction the industry is going is just bizarre.
I'll give a good faith reply to this, many laptops in recent years have moved to a 16:10 aspect ratio. MacBooks have used it (infamously) since the late 2000s, while brands like Dell have recently shifted (some of) their XPS laptops to 16:10 displays. My understanding is it's become very popular across "macbook like" ultraportables in all the major brands for its greater vertical resolution.
Thank you for the response. I mostly stick to the desktop space, and haven't seen it for over a decade, nor did I see it when shopping for laptops recently. But that's interesting if they are.
I prefer 16:10 to 16:9 by far. While the difference might feel small, the usability improvement from seeing more lines of code is very noticeable for me.
There has been a very recent (last year or two) mild resurgence in 16:10 in some segments of the market. For example, while the Thinkpad T14 is still 16:9, the T14s, X1 Carbon, some of the P line are 16:10. The most recent XPS 13 and 15 are also 16:10.
* One of the biggest selling points of Ryzen 6000 is the chip's USB4 support, but looks like the Pangolin won't have it. It also only has 1 USB-C port, which is a bit of a headscratcher in 2023. Does it support PD even? (Not mentioned)
* 16:9 FHD display (no brightness specified) - high refresh is nice, but again, weird that it's not 16:10 in 2023 and IMO, QHD would be better for a 15-16" display.
* soldered memory (32GB at least)
* Numpad keyboard. This will be a positive for some, but I'm in the centered keyboard camp
* Only a 70Wh battery and still not so light (1.8kg)
While it's running an older chip, if you're not going to have USB4/TB4, and the points I listed are important, I think the Tuxedo Pulse 15 Gen2 is still a better 15" option atm (5700U chip, but lighter, bigger battery, better (still 16:9) display, Ethernet, SODIMM slots). There are some Ubuntu certified ThinkPads that are an option too (they have Ryzen 6000U chips but also no USB4), although almost all the models are w/ soldered RAM on ThinkPads now, which is a bummer.
If you want USB4 on AMD, the best (Linux friendly) options right now are probably the Asus G14 GA402 or a ThinkPad Z16. The HP EliteBook G9s are an option as well, although you need Linux 6.0+ to fix a broken HP BIOS update (HP support is also aggressively indifferent to Linux users) and I've seen lots of complaints about the fan curve and the SureView displays so I'm hesitant to recommend it...