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Comment by synergy20 | Hacker News Reader

I was assigned a Macbook Pro at work and I asked for a non-Mac laptop, reason being I'm a Linux developer and Macbook did not work well for me(keyboard,etc).

I ended up with a XPS 15 that has 64GB DDR and 2TB PCIe NVMe SSD around $2750, comparing to 32GB+1TB of MacBook Pro it is about $800 less expensive.

I did not realize Precision 55xx series is even better built than XPS15 otherwise I will probably go that route. Time will tell how this goes(still waiting for XPS15, it's shipped).

Side note: My family had an xps13 and the hinge broke after 3 years, after opening it I found it's made with plastic, I was disappointed that XPS did not even use a metal hinge, which is probably just 25 cents more. so yes XPS does not use the best quality parts from my experience. Next time I will try Precision series.

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Only the XPS 13 from te XPS range is "Linux compatible". The rest are a crapshoot.

I had a little look at the Precision 7760. With Ubuntu there's only 1 version available in the UK and it's a beast with 64GB RAM and 4TB SSD. It cost £6,091.39[1].

Looking at Apple for a rough equivalent[2] I spec'd a 16" up with 64GB and 4TB and it's £4,599.00

I'm an XPS 13 Dev Ed owner myself. It's OK for the most part, I don't have many problems with it.

I'm not in the market for a 16"/17" laptop right now but when it's time to replace this it's going to be hard to look past what Apple are offering.

1. https://www.dell.com/en-uk/work/shop/laptop-computers-2-in-1...

2. https://www.apple.com/uk/shop/buy-mac/macbook-pro/16-inch-sp...

Change the RAM and SSD to the minimum and buy upgrades elsewhere.

> I was disappointed that XPS did not even use a metal hinge, which is probably just 25 cents more. so yes XPS does not use the best quality parts from my experience.

This is why it's $800 cheaper than a MacBook Pro.

I normally hate laptops but I had to buy one due to Covid and went with a Precision 7750. I didn't bother with a dedicated graphics card, and chose the minimum spec RAM and NVMe, but I did opt for the 4K display with WWAN for the 4G modem. I purchased 128GB RAM and a 2TB NVMe elsewhere and just put them in. Final cost was under £4k

It's actually quite decent. I'm not sure I can upgrade the modem to 5G though.

That's what I'm going to do: replace DDR and NVMe myself to save a bit.

I am also keen on something between a NUC and mini-tower, that is small enough to carry, powerful enough to build heavy code bases. You do need find a display with keyboard etc to use them, which works for home and office and lab settings well. Or, just use it as a build machine connected to the network, headlessly(no need keyboard,mouse and display)

> I did not realize Precision 55xx series is even better built than XPS15

Bought an XPS15 for an intern. I pulled the screen to open, and it remained stuck with the base, because they didn’t even tune the hinge. How can someone work with such a device, you can hear the fans and feel the heat through the keyboard: If XPS15 is in the top 3 money can buy after System76 and Precision 55xx, then Apple can double the prices and they would still have customers.

I'm pretty confident the Precision 55xx series are exactly the same, they just have different chipset features.

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