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Comment by Goosee | Hacker News Reader

I use to have the same thought process as you: instantly sold on devices with native hdmi, usb a & usb c. By that metric xps beats macbook.

Recently I tried to convert to a windows laptop from my 16 inch mbp. Upon switching I was constantly annoyed by the fan noise & using my pinkie to press the 'control' key opposed to macbook thumb on 'command' key.

The point is, I realized native port selection was not a metric to consider when purchasing a laptop. I am fine bringing an adapter to the meeting room.

I guess it comes down to what you value. I am just trying to play 'devil's advocate' with my anecdotal experience compared to your experience.

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I found the fan noise to be horrific on the 13in i5 macbook I was using. The thing was overheating constantly and since I use linux and windows at home, having the cmd key different only while working was a huge annoyance for me. On my dell xps 15 I almost never hear the fans at all and there is usually only a quick burst of fan noise when running a webpack compile or something compared to non stop 80% fans on the mbp.

There are far more things that made the dell xps a better choice and ports was just one of them but still a very important one. USB-C adapters are pretty cheap but USB-C hubs are $100+ and have been a constant source of frustration when they keep failing unless you buy the most expensive ones.

The M1's are dead silent, cold to the touch under all circumstances and dramatically faster. That was Intel, as it turns out, so if that was a big decision driver, I'd take another look!

Use Karabiner Elements on macOS to switch the command key to what you want. And actually, I'm pretty sure it's possible in the built-in macOS settings, but I've always used that app for complex programmatic mappings.

Aren't all good hubs quite costly though? I just use a shitty little USB-C adapter + usb cable, and my monitor acts as the hub. I agree about the fan noise.

I recently upgraded/switched my dev machine from a desktop (Intel NUC Hades Canyon) to a Lenovo Legion 5-15 ARH "gaming" laptop with 32GB, 2xM.2 and Ryzen 4800H (more mobile, more pandemic friendly).

It's a big laptop by XPS13 standards sure, but one that's appropriately cooled. I hadn't been aware, up to that point, how much the fans bothered me. This thing is quick but at the same time real quiet. After some time I turned the NUC on for some reason, the funs launched into overdrive and I suddenly got annoyed.

The thing with "windows" laptops is that you can install and run Linux seamlessly out of the box, even distros that Mimic the look of OSX, and remap the keys to your hearts content.

> even distros that Mimic the look of OSX, and remap the keys to your hearts content

Sadly, they mimic the macOS UI very poorly, and it remains not-possible in Linux to universally remap keyboard shortcuts to match macOS built-in sanity.

https://github.com/rbreaves/kinto is pretty good on the keyboard front

> to match macOS built-in sanity.

Yeah, I really wish I could map Alt+Down to open files in Nautilus so that I can then use the Enter key to rename them like any sane person

You should really take a look at https://ubuntubudgie.org.. it does not mimic the UI poorly at all.. the welcome app easily gets you to a dark mojave looking theme and then you can change the layout to cupertino for the global menu. Also open up budgie-settings to set the overall system theme to dark and that is literally all you have to do..

Also use waterfox instead of firefox if you want the browser to give you a proper global menu, or use chrome.

The XPS line in particular has had Developer Editions with pre-installed Ubuntu, and IIUC significant effort by Dell to provide good Linux drivers, for years.

What people in the OSS land don't seem to understand is that the button shapes and control colors are not the killer feature of MacOS.

I can get a "looks like OSX" theme for KDE easily, but KDE will still be weirdly unstable, and have tons of impedance mismatch between it's components. You can't make a Ferrari out of a Ford by painting it the right shade of red.

I dunno if you have never used modern linux, but the current state of it is that you can install Pop OS on a laptop and hand it to your parents and they will figure out how to use it, without ever touching the terminal.

I also don't understand how people say Macs are stable. I get the spinny thing that locks up the entire system about once a week.

Yeah, also USB-C is pretty obviously the future: having a single connector for all my external devices makes it hard to go back to packing multiple connectors. And, instead of dongle adapters, I just buy cables with the appropriate connector pair: e.g. HDMI/USB-C for my TV

> Recently I tried to convert to a windows laptop from my 16 inch mbp. Upon switching I was constantly annoyed by the fan noise

Jesus, how loud was the Windows laptop? I just sold my 16" MBP for an M1 Air almost entirely because the fan noise on the 16" was unbearable.

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