I’m trying to downsize from an aging gaming laptop to an ultrabook I can use for writing, web browsing, and JavaScript / Python web development. I understand an ultrabook will be a downgrade in the performance department, but I don’t need all the performance my current laptop offers.

I’ve been looking at ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 8 machines and they seem like a good sweet spot of price to recent parts/repair-ability. Anybody have other suggestions for Linux ultrabooks? Needs to be <$400 USD.

PS. For more intense tasks, such as training language models, I plan on renting cloud compute as I don’t have the space for a deep learning machine at home.

edit: meant under $400, I am a dumbass

  • nasa1531
    6·
    1 year ago

    Well, while I presume you meant to say less than 400$, if you really did mean more then I would highly recommend getting a Framework laptop. They are amazing fully repairable and upgradable ultrabooks, and they have mostly excellent Linux support (you can even buy them without windows preinstalled!). I’ve had one for several months now and it’s been great.

      • nasa1531
        2·
        1 year ago

        Yeah, Framework definitely needs to eventually make a less expensive device (right now they aren’t really price-competitive), but they are a small company with very limited resources, so it’s perfectly understandable that they haven’t yet. In any case, getting something like a used Thinkpad definitely still at least partially follows Framework’s vision while being less painfully expensive (I had some trouble justifying the purchase at first given the high price compared to the competition, although ultimately it was definitely nessisary to replace my aging Zenbook, and it will probably age better than the competition) and would probably work well for you (their reputation didn’t come from nowhere after all). Anyways, sorry for the long and somewhat rambling response (I need to work on cutting down all those parenthesis), and I wish you luck on your laptop-finding adventure!