Thanks Alberto but I wasn’t talking about HD=hard drive vs SSD! I dont’ even think that Dell XPS have that option about hard drives, it’s all SSDs I believe.
I was talking displays, HD=1920x1080 pixels, and I wondered if it was worth the upgrade to 4K resolution that from one side costs a lot, from the other gives apparently ampler color gamut (specs say “full AdobeRGB”) but then what’s the situation with Linux and hi-dpi displays, also I don’t really need a touch display etc.
Sorry for the confusion, I thought it was clear from the context but probably it wasn’t!
Gnome and KDE don’t do fractional scaling yet, so 4k might be slightly clunky. The extra resolution plus dedicated graphics will mean your batter life will be pretty poor. What’s the color space coverage of the regular HD screen?
@aadm have you physically come into contact with a Dell XPS15?
I ask because I have a Clevo W860CU, which gets rebranded and sold for a higher price as a Dell Alienware M15X, marketed in 2010 as the best gaming laptop one could buy. In retrospect, that was a bad purchase. I thought it would be nice to have a ferrari of a laptop which I could use to process photographs fast and yet be portable. It’s not portable. It weighs a lot and is not the kind of thing you would take anywhere with you because of its weight, because the battery lasts under 45m when new and dies within 3 months (I’ve been through a few, then gave up), because it’s too expensive to take with you anywhere, and it’s too noisy (CPU + GPU fans + disks) to use at night when others are trying to sleep, and even if you’re alone the noise can get too much without headphones. A desktop would have been way cheaper, far more upgradeable, quieter, and just as not-portable.
I’ve been using the ASUS ZenBook UX305 for something like 2 years now, it’s not fast for crunching numbers but its faster than my Clevo at anything else, the deskop manager (KDE) flies and using it is pure joy. Battery life is ~10 hours. I work on it (programming) and I process all of my photos on it. Processing a 24MP photo in RT takes on average 3-12 seconds. More info here: Choosing a laptop with photography in mind - #15 by Morgan_Hardwood
Consider this before investing in one of these ferrari (tractor?) laptops, you might be better off with a desktop.
The owls are not what they seem.
thanks for the comment @Morgan_Hardwood and no, I haven’t seen in real life the XPS15. But this is the “designer” line for Dell, to compete with Macs etc, so I think they also compete in terms of overall portability etc. I am used to my macbook pro 13" (1.6kg) and now to this clunkly Lenovo (1.6kg too), so the 2kg for the XPS15 with the advantages of a larger screen does not seem outrageous.
It’s also true that if I had to stay with the 1920x1080 display with the idea of connecting it to an external monitor then maybe the smaller XPS13 could also be an option?
But again I need to know for sure what are the details about this lower-res display and about the GPU which one is better supported under Linux (I am assuming that the GPU alone does make a difference in Darktable after activating OpenCL? I have found contrasting evidences on the net about this).
I just bought the Asus Zenbook UX430UA
8th gen Core i7, quad. With max turbo of 4ghz
16gb ddr3
500gb SSD (not the fastest SSD, so I will upgrading it in about 6 months)
Intel UHD625 GPU (not the fastest, but runs Lightroom really well!)
14" screen in a 13" case with 100%srgb, when profiled, full HD resolution. And it’s matte.
Good keyboard. Best trackpad I’ve had on a laptop.
about 1/2" thick. Any tiny power adapter. Total weight with adapter is about 3.3 pounds (great for travel)
10 hours of battery life when I’m on the web and doing web dev
Lightroom use nets me about 5 hours of continuous use.
I really like this laptop, and I needed the smaller size for the travel I have planed for this year. But, Asus just announced their 15.6" version in the Zen line. You can trick that out with a 6 core i9 (like 4.6ghz) or 6 core i7 and either comes with Nvidia 1050 (I believe). And it comes with the option for a UHD screen with 100%ARGB. If I was staying put, I would go for the i9 system!
They minimized the bezels around the screen. My former laptop had 1/2" bezels. This one is shy of 1/4" on either side. My fiance has the Toshiba Chromebook 2 (13") My case is nearly the same size as hers.
Well, with screen size, it is measured along the diagonal, not the horizontal. The extra space reclaimed by the smaller bezels allows for more screen real estate in the same size case.
Didn’t know that the case size of laptops is measured horizontally and still can’t believe that, but that’s clearly confusing costumers if that’s true. I always thought a laptops dimension would be announced based roughly on the diagonal of the screen
The case size itself is measured in the dimensions of WxLxH. When you look up a devices dimensions, the screen is given in it’s diagonal, and the case in it’s outside dimensions.
Here’s the product listing on Amazon for the Asus Zenbook 430
