Along with the keyboard, easy access to the official hardware maintenance manuals are the best aspects of ThinkPads. Lenovo also has a part number lookup [1] tool you can use to find parts that could’ve been optioned with your machine, if you wanted to upgrade them in the future.<p>I recently replaced the 1080p display panel on my T490 with a 2560x1440 model with no issues whatsoever.<p>[1] <a href="https://support.lenovo.com/au/en/partslookup" rel="nofollow">https://support.lenovo.com/au/en/partslookup</a>
<i>I had hoped that after many years of laptops containing Intel/nVidia hybrid graphics, this setup would largely work, but was disappointed.</i><p><i>Both the proprietary nVidia driver and the nouveau driver would not work reliably for me. I ran into kernel error messages and hard-freezes, with even SSH sessions to the machine breaking.</i><p>Nvidia GPUs are still the number one problem. Buying anything with Nvidia in it is a waste of money. Closed source binary drivers that only work sometimes is acceptable for gamers but not if you want a reliable, controlled machine.
Choosing a dev laptop right now is very difficult.<p>On one hand, you have Apple silicon MacBooks redefining efficiency.<p>On the other hand, XPSs/Inspirons/Thinkpads have caught up a lot in what used to differentiate MacBooks: The linux emulation on Windows is suitable for unix-like development, desktop linux is better than it's ever been, AMD is selling laptop CPUs that have 8 physical cores (with hyperthreading), 4k displays are available on basically every model, large trackpads are everywhere, Lenovo has a model out with a haptic (read: mac-like) trackpad, it's all very competitive.
Feels like laptops are just crap these days. I'm on a Macbook Pro and hate it. The unergonomic keyboard sux, the software is broken and I am disempowered to fix it, and there is no way reliably get modern builds of open source projects I care about. In short it was a false economy. I had a Dell with Gentoo before this, recently reinvigorated under Ubuntu but despite only being a few years old the CMOS battery is so crap it loses BIOS config regularly and has to be tediously reconfigured to get boot functioning.<p>Does anyone feel it makes more sense to buy an embedded system and lug it around instead from now on? There are spare screens everywhere, they cost nothing, and it seems the laptop form factor is just overpriced, underpowered, unmaintainable/unupgradeable for the money. Should be trivial to build a decent keyboard, optional portable screen and power pack in to a backpack in lieu of a traditional case.
> Performance-wise, this machine can almost replace a proper workstation.<p>This guy has never seen a real workstation.<p>Real workstation (from vendors like Lenovo, HP and Dell) usually come with Xeon-class processors (multiple, often two of them) and a shitload of ram (sometimes terabytes). And multiple disks.<p>Example: the HP z-series workstation and the ThinkStation series from Lenovo.<p>An "enthusiast"-class gaming pc is <i>not</i> a workstation.
I've had 3 x1 extremes and I just can't do it anymore. A major drawback is declining build quality. When you couple that with Lenovo's 3 week turnaround on hardware repairs, it's painful. Don't get fooled by specs, they only tell half the story.
In my Gen 1, I found that the graphics processor and cpu couldn't sustain even a medium usage because of cooling. Diagnostics showed near constant throttling. Is this one any better?
> Unfortunately, while the keyboard is great, I can’t say the same about the touchpad.<p>I'm sure he has read <a href="https://bill.harding.blog/2018/01/07/linux-with-a-macbook-touchpad-feel-pt-2/" rel="nofollow">https://bill.harding.blog/2018/01/07/linux-with-a-macbook-to...</a>, although he provides a link to the newest approach by Bill to restructure some of the drivers... I think the 2018 config is already a big improvement.<p>> an annoyingly loud fan that spins up too frequently<p><a href="https://github.com/hirschmann/nbfc" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/hirschmann/nbfc</a> enables you to control your notebook fan. You can also create your own XML config.
I have one of these for work and I echo the issues with fan sound and battery life. I've also had some frustrating problems with sleep and hibernation (on Windows) that I'm not sure how to resolve, but they may be related to proprietary apps and so on that I can't go into details on.<p>Overall, it's a fine machine, it does what I need it to, but I would not buy one for myself.
Dual video with Optimus manager works quite well. You can't truly shut off the Nvidia card from what I understand but switching between Intel/hybrid/Nvidia still yields decent battery life and performance optimizations.<p>Although it requires the Nvidia drivers and blacklisting nouvea driver still. And I hate relying on Nvidia drivers for anything Linux personally.
When are they going to make one of these with a Ryzen?<p>It seems Ryzens are really rare among higher end developer laptops. Is there a technical reason or is it just Intel using their clout to block the major vendors/oems from using AMD?