If you keep moving your own goalposts, you’ll never be happy, will you!
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This is why I’m a Buddhist.
Seriously, though, having a local code repo and the ability to check it in is what keeps me from using Android, ChromeOS, or iOS as a “real” computer.
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It is as bad as you imagine, if not worse. I’d rather type on an Atari 400 keyboard.
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Which kb is this?
Surface Pro 4. I’m not familiar with whatever variations exist but that’s what mine came with.
Meh. Windows.
The original Surface detachable keyboards were utterly horrible but the latest ones are pretty good. The keyboard on my Surface Book is one of the best laptop keyboards I’ve ever used. Microsoft has really been stepping up their hardware game lately.
This is coming from someone that is a keyboard snob.
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You’re a sick person.
I don’t know who thought membrane keyboards as a general input device would be a good idea but I’d love to give them a smack.
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I have to be ready to do computer support 24/7, so having a small computer that you can carry around all the time is essential. So I was exited about the Lenovo, which is very light and very cheap.
I played with the Lenovo for half an hour on the consumer electronics show in Berlin last year and came to the same conclusion. Awesome toy. The keyboard makes the device useless for anything that needs correct input. You can’t relieably write code on it. Every little typo can kill you and autocorrect can’t help. Also worth noting is that the virtual keyboard layout is fixed. I had expenced a variable layout.
I have not tried the latest Surface keyboards. My understanding is that they need a flat surface to place the keyboard on. Which makes the keyboard unusable in situations where there’s no space or no table (planes, trains, on the couch)
I ended up importing a Panasonic Let’s Note RZ5 from Japan. This less than 800g sub-notebook delivers what the Lenovo promised: A tiny computer that allows me to fully do everything a bigger laptop can do. With full size USB, Network, HDMI even VGA connectors (so you can do presentations no matter what outdated hardware you need to connect to)
There’s not a lot English language info about the RZ series, here’s a review of the previous model. http://akihabaranews.com/2014/10/02/article-en/panasonic-lets-note-rz4-745g-101-inch-notebook-pc-1672514068
If you’re interested in importing laptops from Japan, prepare yourself for an adventure. Finding a seller that will ship them is hard. You will have to do the full setup of Windows 10 in Japanese, including updates, until you get to the point where you can set the device to English. Basically this means you need a mobile phone/ipad with the google translate app that does a decent job of translating Japanese screen photos…
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I have one; and the pencil and keyboard cover. It does 90% of my mobile computing, and when my laptop had to go in for repair, it did 100% for two weeks. It’s great. Though if it could accept a mouse, it would be 5% better (YMMV).
I take all my notes on it; present from it; and do writing, WordPress, and documents. The only thing that’s not great is complex spreadsheets and photo editing - but I can usually save that til I get home.
I’d recommend considering the magic keyboard as an alternative to the smart keyboard though - cheaper, better typing experience and more flexible positioning. But another thing to carry and charge.
True. For whatever reasons all MS products sold in Japan are like this.
Does anyone have any opinions about using this specifically for art? I don’t really have a need for much actual typing,
so the criticisms of the keyboard don’t really matter to me, I mainly want to use the Windows version (so I can use the full versions of Artrage and others) and use it as a mobile sketchbook/art studio. The lure of having a mobile wacom pad
without having to plug in a wacom pad to a laptop is very attractive, and if the drawing pad works well and it can run some not-too-demanding graphics programs it would be just what I need…don’t care about watching movies, surfing the net or typing, just want to use the pen for painting and drawing…thanks for any insight
I’d stick with the Surface Pro if you want great pen support. Or great keyboard cover support.
Intel Atom is quite shit relative to even the slowest “real” Intel CPUs, because Intel intentionally cripples them.
On Geekbench 4, the Atom processor scores 1161 single-core and 3228 multi-core, as compared with 1601 and 3683 on a Snapdragon 820-powered device
Wow, even the lackluster Snapdragon 820 kicks the Atom’s ass. That’s just sad, man.
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I don’t know of any Lenovo-specific headaches; but pretty much all vaguely recent PCs have the option of ‘secure boot’ mode; and depending on the vendor and the product line(eg. enterprise products usually get more love) it may come only provisioned with MS keys; and while I think that all x86s(so, not those ARM oddities that shipped with Windows RT) have the option to turn it off; only some have the option to bless your own keys.
There may also be issues if the mass storage device is locked to NVMe and either quirky enough to not be supported; or you are trying to install an older kernel version without full NVMe support. AHCI mode is slower in those cases; but much more compatible.
Some of the Atom products, in particular, are a real PITA to get Linux on. I spent a lot of time fighting with an Asus tablet-thing that had a Z2760. Thing was a damn nightmare. Newer atoms are slightly less atrocious; but still comparatively ugly; and (especially serious on systems without CSMs) some Terrible, Terrible, Things have been done in the name of UEFI; and if you encounter them there is likely to be much weeping and gnashing of teeth.
None of this is Lenovo specific; though I tend to be pretty skeptical of the stuff that even they are too ashamed of to brand as ‘Thinkpad’.
Sure, they suck for any serious typing but they’re cheap to make and do a pretty good job of resisting that root beer that little Billy just spilled on it. At least as long as you wipe it up quickly. And why wouldn’t you.
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Really wanted this product to be a good digital notepad. Proprietary paper kind of sours me on it (sure, I could probably cut my own). I guess my issue is that it does more than I need it to but maybe not well enough to be worth it. I’ve given up on the idea of a full fledged tablet for note taking and started looking for something more specialized. That reMarkable E Ink tablet Rob posted about a while back seems to be exactly the thing I’m looking for but hell if I’m going to pay $450 sight unseen for a product where performance is so crucial.
I bought a Surface Book and a Yoga was the big competition. However, it just was way less powerful. The feature that I really loved was the size of the screen. I wanted to rip if off and throw it in my purse and just carry it around. But it turns out it didn’t really work like that.
The Surface Book, the screen does rip off but it’s too big to carry around in my purse, and if I have a purse large enough to carry the giant screen, might as well throw the keyboard in there. I do like being able to flip the screen around and hold it like a book, and tearing the screen off to create a tablet is useful when I’m showing things to someone else.
@ontopic The issue with the flat keyboard on the Surface tablets was also something I heard when I was out shopping an a reason I went with the Surface Book instead.
I do really love my Surface Book. I had a souped up Dell a few years back - very top of the line - that I absolutely detested. This computer feels very “me.” I wish there more accessories for it, like a cover that exactly fits the tablet part, and an alternate keyboard that takes less space.
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OK so I went with Dell. Needs to go back, it warps when the screen opens.
That’s bad. Really bad. Customer services is basically slowly validating my query. I’m in a mechanistic, cheap CS system.
Apple be like ‘bring it in and we’ll swap it if you need it like NOW!’
Dell Hell. Please don’t do this to me. It’s 10 years the Dell gap in my household because the last experience was that bad.
Have I erred? Is the ghost of Steve whipping me?? Sorry Steve, but those MBPs that you didn’t have a non-celestial hand in? Nope.
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