Successors to the Verix 2.5 and the almost-a-desktop Chimera laptop: the Mir 730 and Verix 530.<p>Both available with up to i7-3920XM and 32GB RAM, and a price tag well under the new MBPs.
Think is exactly why macbooks are so popular. I think if a laptop manufacturer spent some (a-lot?) of effort on hardware design to compete with Apple then there would be huge demand from developers. As a developer now I have a laptop choice of<p>a) Horrible design with linux installed.<p>b) Beautiful design with a BSD like os installed.<p>It really is a no brainer.
Even Linus uses a MBA I wonder when hardware manufacturers will start to realise that people actually care about owning beautiful things.
I don't know about US, but in other countries there are so many laptops that come "Windows-free" (and save you ~$150). Unfortunately most of them come with the <i>completely useless</i> FreeDos instead of a usable Linux distro. I really don't get that at all. What's stopping them from using Linux instead of FreeDos?
These may be functional and fully Linux-compatible and whatever, but the key for me is this: does its trackpad compare to that of the MacBook Pro?<p>Oh, it doesn't? You mean I'll have to carry around an external mouse to compensate for the lackluster trackpad? You mean one of the two ways I interact with my computer is clunky at best and non-functional at worst compared to the best one on the market?<p>Sorry. No dice.
Their tag line is Linux Laptop that "just works". What does that imply about Linux? What's even sadder is that the implication is not even true. Linux these days not only "just works", but has more functionality out of the box than a stock Windows machine.
Seriously, is there a patent on centering the trackpad? Center the trackpad, center the keyboard, and do not put a numeric keypad on unless you have found a way for me to type while still looking straight at the display.
I don't know if it is just me or their laptops look mondo ugly - may be they just need a better website.<p>The world is moving towards polished aluminum etc. while we see these clunky models - I really hope they put more thought into making the laptops more aesthetic.
I was under impression that laptop without Windows/MacOS on it should cost less. Apparently it's not the case here. I don't really see any competitive advantage vs. Dell, HP, Toshiba, etc.
As successors to the Verix 2.5 and the damn-near-a-desktop Chimera, the Verix 530 and Mir 730 updates are both available with up to i7-3920XM (2.9Ghz) and can be configured with up to 32GB of RAM. They come in a lot cheaper than those new MBPs, too (but retina displays are nice).<p>I haven't used either, but I see good things about ZaReason, and I have been a little disappointed in my System76 Desktop (though I did heavily customize).
I have a Sony Vaio Core II Duo laptop. I bought it 2 or 3 years ago. The thing runs Linux great. I don't know why all the hardware works including suspend/resume. Maybe it's just old enough that the Linux community finally got around to supporting everything on it. It's a Sony too, so it has adequate design. Those Thinkpads are ugly.