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Comment by Lunatic666 | Hacker News Reader

I'm currently using a System76 laptop, but it's for sure my last one. The build quality is pretty poor and the touchpad is so annoying that I disabled it. When the fan broke and had to be replaced I had to take over the shipping costs and replace it myself. While I don't matter replacing parts, I don't see why I have to pay for the shipping during the warranty. Now this article on top, I'll see if I can get rid of it quickly, I went back using my old Lenovo X230 again anyway.

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I bought a lemur in 2012 and had consistent issues with overheating that caused the laptop to shut off. Bought an external fan, but that helped very little.

Ended up buying a Macbook Pro.

I did use a gazelle at one of my jobs, and had fewer issues with that. In general though, I'd be extremely chary of buying system76 in the future. They're basically just rebranding generic Clevo laptops with very little value added imho. If I absolutely needed a Linux laptop I'd preferring dual-booting a Mac using rEFIt, buying a Dell XPS, or virtualizing.

I have two laptops for work, one of which is a System76 and both are currently running POP! OS (made by System76). I have had a few hiccups with the OS but nothing major.

I would say that I am very satisfied with S76. The 2 times I have had to contact them during the last 16 months or so have been good experiences, as well.

I got a work laptop 5+ years ago, system76 and it was Rock solid and still works. Bought a home PC sys76 in 2016 also solid. Bought a new laptop 2 months ago, Onynx and doing great minus an issue with dual mini display port inputs on login (the displays shutoff on desktop dislpay and I have to open/close the laptop lid to redetect all attached displays...)

I've had 1 or 2 minor help request issues and they've always come through promptly.

Similar story here.

Got mine since 2010 or 2011. It's my only machine, is used daily and regularly, and works without issues.

That touchpad though; it does acquire sentience sometimes :) [I don't care, tbh; it's something I can easily tolerate from a small retailer doing Linux-only work, versus e.g. Dell, HP, Lenovo, etc.]

My S76 laptop that I use for work has been solid in terms of functionality and reliability. I can't complain about those things. The overall build quality of the laptop is terrible. The touchpad is terrible and has poor fit and finish. The keyboard is terrible. The display is pretty decent, no complaints there. Thing is this machine cost around $1600, which is not cheap and puts it in a category where flaws like these are not acceptable. I like literally everything else about the company, and would want to support them on my next purchase, but they need to produce higher quality products at the price point.

Touchpads and linux is a very sad story in general. It would be great to see hardware, firmware and kernel driver deliver the same feel like Apple. However the current situation is Apple clearly being the market leader when it comes to trackpad quality.

Fun fact: my precision 3800 trackpad works way better on Fedora 27 than on windows 10. However, that is no match at all compared to a macbook pro.

Just curious, what laptop do you have? I'm always open to hearing constructive criticism like this, and it's something we've been more aggressively addressing with recent products. But I'd love to know which product it is so I can share that feedback with our team.

It's a gazelle, 4 core, 16GB, purchased just short of two years ago. Since you asked for feedback I'll be more specific: the touchpad plastic cover curls up at the front and has a sharp edge, the buttons are very thin, don't sit evenly, and have a very mushy feel. The keyboard is also mushy and has very poor feel. The joinery on the case is poor with unfinished sharp edges. The case/chassis itself is not stiff, flexes slightly and creaks when you pick it up one-handed for example. I use the laptop over vnc these days from another machine with monitors/keyboard/mouse so the issues don't affect me much, and performance wise I'm rather happy with it. Fwiw.

When I sent my ThinkPad X220 to Lenovo for service under warranty, they sent UPS to my house to pick it and sent it back to me via UPS. All for free.

For my ThinkPad x1 they came to the restaurant I was fixed it in like 3 minutes (had to replace the CPU fan), like a ninja. But I still cannot update the BIOS from Linux with the fwup, and fingerprint reader doesn't work. I had XPS 15 and if it wasn't because of the horrid coil whine I would have kept it. Their linux support is very good.

They still haven't fixed the coil whine? I've heard complaints about that since the first Dell XPS. Their forums were filled with them. Most reviews mentioned it. They used to even do motherboard replacements to fix it. Youd think their number one priority for their next-model power supply would be to eliminate that. No other manufacturer seems to have this issue.

It's a matter of luck.

We use XPS at work for all technical employees and only one laptop had coil wine issues, and we got it replaced.

Argh, I should've gotten mine fixed before the warranty expired.

Just got a new XPS 15 yesterday.

First, all the Linux installers I tried couldn't see the SSD, like, at all. I had to disable RAID support in the BIOS (I still don't understand WTF is RAID doing there provided there's only one disk). Then, no matter how I tried, it just refused to boot from UEFI. Then, when I enabled legacy boot in the BIOS and finally managed to make it boot into the system, it hung up when switching to graphics mode, screaming that "watchdog detected a hard/soft lockup on CPU". When I finally managed to have X running, it's apparently running on the CPU, and xdriinfo says there's no direct rendering support. It took me nearly 2 days to get kind-of-but-not-really usable system. I still can't adjust screen brightness (other than in BIOS...)

The last time I had this much trouble with installing Linux was back in the nineties. But hey, the HiDPI display is indeed beautiful.

The RAID thing is a Intel hack, iirc.

If you buy a T-series Thinkpad (probably also the X1), they will even send out technicians to your workplace or home with replacement parts - at least in Germany and I suppose a lot of other countries.

I love my x220 I use it everyday.

I've had my System76 Lemur for a couple years now and have had absolutely no problems with it.

I had the same experience with a fan in my System76 laptop, though I was a week or so out of warranty so I had to pay $40 and install it as well. That combined with an internal standoff in the corner breaking within the first month, causing the laptop to flex open like a book, really killed any confidence I had in their build quality.

Librem 13 is pretty good so far.

I just moved from my x230 (FHD mod, coreboot, and x220 keyboard) and the only thing I miss is the trackpoint so far.

Comparing it to galago pro 13", Librem 13 seems to be $200-$400 more expensive with half the memory. Is there something extra you get with Librem that you wouldn't get with a galago? Is it about the company, the hardware, the software, something else?

Asking out of actual curiosity. I'm not familiar with puri.sm

Not affiliated with system76 but I do own one of their laptops.

Yep, came here to recommend the Librem laptops. The hardware's not quite as high-spec, but their security + libre focus more than makes up for it.

That sounds like an awesome setup. Why'd you move? And are you selling your old x230? I'd be interested.

I also bought a lemur several years ago, paying ~$150 for customs for Canadian shipment (obviously not S76's fault).

Thought it was worth it because I was supporting a Linux-friendly company.

The laptop had constant fan noise issues and the touchpad stopped working after a year.

Now I use a fanless desktop mini pc that I found on AliExpress that has Ubuntu pre-installed. Life is much better now.

Where do you live? I'm pretty sure that is illegal in the EU

I think he lives in Singapore. Consumer protection rules there weren't great from what I remember, although I only tended to buy a few things for the office from Sim Lim square

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