Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been heavily researching laptops for software developers.
Why I’m looking for a new laptop
When shopping for a developer laptop, I usually stick to powerful machines with a relatively large screen. My main operating system is OS X, so my last few laptops have all been MacBook Pros 15″.
My 2-year old MacBook Pro with an i7, 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD is still a fine machine. I’m not looking for a new laptop to replace it with. Nor am I looking for more power or more pixels, and I certainly don’t have an inherent desire to smudge my screen by touching it day in and day out.
The reason why I’m in the market for a new developer laptop is that my MacBook Pro is currently used primarily as a desktop machine. It is quasi-permanently hooked up to two large monitors (a Dell 34″ ultra wide, and a way too tall Benq 32″ in vertical mode), as well as a few other peripherals, disk drives, etc.
This is an arrangement that works well enough for me when at my desk, but is suboptimal when portability is taken into account.
It’s a pretty chunky laptop to carry around, unhooking is a pain, and I don’t find it to be comfortable when used on my actual lap. Sharp edges and heat are only two of the ergonomic issues that I’ve run into with it. (Interestingly, I found 13″ Macs to be less problematic from an ergonomic standpoint.)
So the real trouble with this laptop is that it forces me to sit at my desk. My comfort and productivity levels soar when I’m able to switch it up a little during the day. Standing here and there, moving to the couch (I work from home), working from a coffee shop on occasion, and so on.
Adding to the mix both work and personal trips, and it quickly becomes possible to rationalize wanting to buy a second laptop to be used as, well, an actual laptop! 🙂
A premium docking station that supports both monitors with their large resolutions could be an alternative, but it doesn’t solve the other issues I have with the MacBook Pro 15″ when used as a laptop.
Likewise, I have an iPad Air 2 which I like quite a bit as a media consumption device, but it’s lacking for all but the lightest of my productivity tasks.
Looking at MacBooks
Being an OS X user, I first looked at the obvious choices in the Apple lineup. Unfortunately, I don’t believe that Macs are a priority for Apple today.
Take a look at this lineup from the MacRumors buying guide.
All but the MacBook to the left were last updated a long time ago. 427 days ago for the Retina MacBook Pro 13“, 498 days ago for the not-even-HD MacBook Air 13”.
These are still good laptops, but I have a hard time paying full price for old models when new releases are coming soon. We just don’t know how soon yet, though. It could be a couple of months. It could be half a year from now.
So Apple puts me in a tough spot. If their prices were lowered to account for the new models coming up, justifying a purchase now would be much easier — and apparently I’m not the only one who feels this way, with sales of the Pro and Air models currently decreasing while people wait.
The new MacBook is nice, but I’m afraid that at 12″ it is really too small for my needs. I also find the butterfly keys with extremely limited travel to be quite unpleasant (though I hear people get used to it).
Ultrabooks for developers
I prefer OS X because it’s a good compromise. Decent UX as a user; decent UX as a developer.
But I still use Linux (which I prefer for development and deployment) and Windows, too. So I’ve been toying with the idea of getting an ultrabook, instead of a Mac, as my portable option.
As a technologist, I find it useful to remain in touch with all three main operating systems, even if I predominantly use one for day to day use. The idea of an ultrabook, from this perspective, is quite appealing.
I would probably use Ubuntu as my main OS on the laptop and occasionally switch to Windows 10 (chiefly to play with .NET and related technologies).
After doing quite a bit of research on the topic, the best laptop for developers in 2016 appear to be:
- Microsoft Surface Book
- Lenovo X1 Carbon
- Dell XPS 13
- Asus UX305 or the newly announced UX306.
The Surface Book one is essentially Microsoft’s version of a MacBook Pro, with the included bonus of also being an awesome 13.5″ Surface tablet. It is, understandably, not cheap.
The Lenovo has the best keyboard of the bunch and a larger screen (14″), while still remaining remarkably light.
The Dell has the best screen and a format that is much smaller than its 13.3“ screen size would indicate, thanks to it being almost bezel-less (as such, it’s the size of an average 11.5” laptop).
The Asus is decent all around and is priced right, so it becomes the best bang for your buck sort of choice.
There, I shortlisted them for you. 🙂 If you are in the same situation, I hope that this saves you some time.
My ideal configuration is still i7 / 16GB / 512GB SSD, but since this is not going to be my main development machine, I’d settle for an i5 / 8GB / 256 GB.[1]
What works for you?
I haven’t made up my mind yet.
Part of me wants to wait for the new 13″ MacBook Air/Pro.[2] I have come to rely on the Apple ecosystem quite a bit after all, and use some apps that are not available on Linux (e.g., 1Password) and in some cases, not even on Windows (e.g., OmniFocus, MarsEdit).
Part of me feels like it might be worth “stopping the suffering”[3] and getting a portable solution now. An ultrabook might even force me to rely less on the Apple ecosystem, leading me to search for cross-platform alternatives. (A good thing.)
I’ll let you know what I decide in the end. For the time being, feel free to influence my decision by sharing what works for you. 😉
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Thank you Antonio as that is very useful and timely for me. I have been waiting a long time for the new Macbook Pro to come out and it looks like it will be quite a bit longer wait. I agree where you say “Unfortunately, I don’t believe that Macs are a priority for Apple today”. Certainly here in New Zealand their pricing for older models just keeps going up (even relative to the US dollar pricing).
I hear you, Norman. In Canada we don’t get the best deals either, but it’s not as brutal as in Australia and Europe.
Two other possible candidates that are worth mentioning are:
* System76
* Purism
I recommend getting a refurbished Mac laptop so you don’t pay full price. Tanga.com generally has the best prices, though not the widest selection. Probably the best deal on a MacBook Air when they’re in stock. Though upping the RAM on one of those to 8 GB will be pricey. Adding disk space, though, seems possibly reasonable via a NiftyDisk (or a TarDisk, if you absolutely require the space to appear all as one volume).
Thank you for the suggestions, Al. I actually bought my previous MBP as refurbished + IBM employee discount, so it saved me quite a bit. Of the laptops I mentioned above, I’d get a discount on the Apple and the Lenovo ones.
A good substitute for the X1 Carbon is the Lenovo Yoga 460 (I wouldn’t buy Apple notebooks, I’m not a fan).
I bought the same config you as you mentioned (8GB RAM, i5 6th generation CPU) but the main reason over the X1 was that I was *replacing* my notebook and not buying new one, and the Yoga 460 has a replaceable, 2.5″, 7 mm HDD or SSD so I could bring over my already used 1TB SATA SSD.
Their Yoga line is indeed a nice alternative. When researching it, I particularly looked at the Yoga 900 series.
I have taken the Yoga 900 into consideration but it is very much designed for the home user and I needed something that works well in an office environment.
The 900 has too few USB slots, no docking port, no ethernet port, but looks nice 🙂 same as a MacBook Air.
The Yoga 460 is from the business line of Lenovo’s, it has 3 USB 3.0, full size HDMI, a DisplayPort and a OneLink dock port on the notebook (but no ethernet either). The dock is great, it has 7 USB, audio, 2 HDMI ports, RJ-45 and an old VGA connector.
Being new, they needed some firmware updates to fix minor problems but so far this is a fairly good setup.
Hi Antonio,
What did you end up with ?
I came up on your blog post because I am, too, in research of my new dev laptop. 3 months ago, I bought a refurbished Macbook Air early 2015, basic processor, 8Gb RAM, 128Go SSD. I’m not happy at all with it and I’m gonna sell it. I thought third-party SSD would come up but there is nothing worthy. Then, I am very disappointed with OS-X for developpers. I mean, you can’t do any serious job with Docker on OS X. And even with virtual machine, there are lots of issues because of the proprietary filesystem and general non-standard issues with OS X.
My main machine is under Linux since 15 years. Time to switch to a generic PC laptop with Linux. I’m considering Dell XPS 13 and some Lenovos, I’d prefer a lightweight machine. But I want it to be fully upgradable and standard. I want to be able to change the RAM, the SSD and I would very much like to have 2 SSD slots.
Greatings from my quest for my perfect pro laptop 🙂
I went an odd route and got myself a Chromebook. However, I lost it in a house fire. If I had to buy a machine today, it’d be a Mac. If I couldn’t have a Mac, a Dell XPS, though I’m not fond of the company after my experience with my wife’s laptop which had full coverage but apparently not for fire.
Hi,
Any idea about dell inspiron 13 7000 ?
As far as I know, it’s pretty okay for an inexpensive machine.