+1 for this. I have last year's edition - it's fast and cool enough for the games I play (though admittedly I don't play too many graphics-heavy ones) and lightweight (1.6Kg) enough to lug around wherever you want.
+1, good combination of lightweight (for travel) and high performance (for game or for work) but can get quite hot sometimes. Plus for OS would recommend Pop OS with dual boot. no issues with Nvidia in 20.04 and works out of the box.
I suppose it depends a lot on what the game is, but I've found the new MBP has amazing performance and battery life. Nothing seems to really stress it out thus far, I can sit and compile stuff, browser videos and so on without thinking too much about running out of juice. By comparison I also have a maxed out 2019 and that will huff and puff with similar loads, and run out of juice before the day is up.
Is any Mac hardware actually up for the task of gaming, especially the new M1 ones? One would think that you'd have to run a virtualized environment to even get it started, and performance will most likely be very bad. Even Linux seems like a better choice than Apple for gaming today, even if it also uses virtualization.
The Verge review [1] went into some detail on this. It runs them fine, because it is ridiculously powerful, but it doesn‘t blow it out of the park like it does in other tasks.
I've got the G7 15 7590 running Windows. I'll second that I'm very satisfied with power and form factor, and it's mostly a solid laptop that I'm very happy with. The biggest problem I've had is incredibly poor thermals even when playing mid range games, but this may be model specific (the 7590 was especially bad I believe) and is something you can try to address by repasting. The built-in speakers were pretty poor as well, but most people are probably using headphones.
Avoid Razer because they’re unreliabe garbage. They look nice, but they die on their own. Mine died after ~2 years of infrequent use.
My “does it all” machine is a Thinkpad X220T with Linux. I can do programming on it, and drawing with the Wacom digitizer. It can’t play most modern AAA games, but I personally have never enjoyed gaming on laptops anyways.
travel do you mean using the computer in a coffee shop ? or setting up a desk at where-ever you travel to ?
I move around with my 27" inch monitor to whichever city I'm going. plus xbox in tow - too heavy. can replace it with a mini itx pc that will hookup to monitor.
Whatever you do, avoid anything new from Dell. The keyboards are incredibly bad, and quality is just lacking. Source: I am the unhappy owner of a several-month old XPS 13.
Best is going to very person to person.
Do you care about weight? Screen size? You need to at least give some pointers or you'll just get random answers.
I use a ThinkPad T14s after my X1 Carbon fell apart. The thicker chassis makes it more reliable for travel, and the Ryzen CPU can play most Xbox games pass games fine. If you don't need Linux then the new Macs seem pretty amazing though.
My all time favourite laptop is the X220 though, lasted 10 years or more. Only got rid of it because I messed up replacing the screen.
Thinkpads are great, miss mine, next one will be a ThinkPad again. I think the thicker chassis is nice; better cooling, more comfortable, allows for nice keyboards.
I haven't heard of any spyware or anything being embedded in the hardware or BIOS. Seems like all pretty standard components. All I heard is that there's some Lenovo software/crapware in the Windows installation (don't all vendors do that though?). Haven't heard of any concerns running Linux on Thinkpads, could be wrong though.
Definitely. They compromise too much for "thin and light" like reducing the key travel, removing ports, reducing reliability and power, and the Carbon price is insane now. I'm happy I switched to the T series.
If you are traveling internationally, don't forget about the warranty. Some laptop manufacturers will only service your laptop in the country of purchase. Or they'll claim you have international service, but the service is so bad you basically don't have a warranty.
The greatest laptop in the world is useless if it's broken and you can't repair it.
Do you like Macs? Probably MacBook Pro then. Linux fan? ThinkPad (I like the chunkier ones, so T or P series) IMO. Although any high end offering from Acer, HP or Dell is nice too and all have decent reviews WRT Linux. Windows fan? Probably same. Biggest question though is what kind of gaming? Need discrete card or nah?
Yeah would probably just get an Acer gaming machine, ThinkPad P series or Dell XPS with discrete graphics. All work well with Linux, all have a decent amount of options, nice screens, etc...
You’ll need something with a Nvidia 20 or 30 series GPU(or AMD equivalent). Anything with integrated graphics will barely be able to run RDR2 at 1440p 10FPS
I recently got Lenovo Yoga with Ryzen 4800u(8c/16t), 16GB 4266Mhz, 1TB PCIe, FHD for under 1000$.
It can run Dota 2 at 120fps in low settings and ultra at 58-62fps. Can run Warzone at 720p around 35fps. I can only assume CSGO works >60fps.
It has onboard video, battery is truly amazing(10-15h) and it charges via usbc.
Display is not so great, windows 11 ready, backlit keyboard and weighs around 1kg. It boots extremely fast too(~5s).
I'd say it's an extreme machine.
(you can also get the yoga pro with ryzen 5800h)
I have an asus g15 and I’m happy with it, and it has great graphics/gaming performance and doesn’t skimp on battery power at all. I would get a g16 w a webcam now though.
It is windows though, and I prefer not dealing w the file system differences when coding.
Acer Nitro's are cheapish, perform pretty well and are quite rugged with good resale value.
downside: enormous power supply, battery life. When I travel I take a smaller generic power supply and leave the fat one at my desk. Back when I was travelling it wasn't exactly convenient though. My old work used to supply HP Spectre laptops which are a bit rubbish for gaming but great work machines.
I'm not a _huge_ gamer, but I've been very happy with my MacBook Pro (I have the 16" Intel one) + GeForce Now for me ~1-2x per week gaming sessions. There are other similar cloud gaming services if GeForce Now doesn't have what you want.
Caveats: wifi can work okay if you're close, connect with 5GHz, etc., but an actual ethernet cable works way better. The latency is good enough for me, but again: I don't game that much and I'm certainly not good enough at e.g. Apex for the latency to be the primary factor in why I lose :)
I want to recommend ASUS ExpertBook B9400CEA-KC0116R Specifications: Intel i7-1165G7/16G/512G SSD/14" FHD IPS/Intel® Iris® Xe Graphics/NumberPad/Win10 I am a programmer, I make sites like this: https://www.legalfiles.com/ This laptop is enough for all tasks
Gaming excludes macOS. It's particularly bad with controllers, bunch of problems related to the os. I can't even think how you could use it now that it has a notch.
However it's great for everything else.
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[ 60.4 ms ] story [ 4502 ms ] thread[1] https://youtu.be/ftU1HzBKd5Y
A nice combination of power, form factor and battery life. I would prefer it to a MacBook or Blade any time.
If this is the case for you to, I don't know.
My “does it all” machine is a Thinkpad X220T with Linux. I can do programming on it, and drawing with the Wacom digitizer. It can’t play most modern AAA games, but I personally have never enjoyed gaming on laptops anyways.
I have been avoiding the brand like plague since then, and advised a lot of people to the same.
My all time favourite laptop is the X220 though, lasted 10 years or more. Only got rid of it because I messed up replacing the screen.
The greatest laptop in the world is useless if it's broken and you can't repair it.
So maybe dual boot a decently thin Windows laptop?
If you need a discreet GPU, then Zephyrus or TUF Gaming laptops.
If not, then Vivobooks are fine.
Asus is very reliable in a way that it never dies on you suddenly or gives you rampant problems.
I highly rate Asus laptops right now.
Note: Not in any way affiliated to Asus.
It is windows though, and I prefer not dealing w the file system differences when coding.
downside: enormous power supply, battery life. When I travel I take a smaller generic power supply and leave the fat one at my desk. Back when I was travelling it wasn't exactly convenient though. My old work used to supply HP Spectre laptops which are a bit rubbish for gaming but great work machines.
Caveats: wifi can work okay if you're close, connect with 5GHz, etc., but an actual ethernet cable works way better. The latency is good enough for me, but again: I don't game that much and I'm certainly not good enough at e.g. Apex for the latency to be the primary factor in why I lose :)