It’s a long long time I’m looking for an inexpensive small laptop with long battery life and keyboard. So I can carry it everywhere to write notes, do ssh, or fix small bugs.
The experience I have with me 7" ebook reader says that under 10" is too small to work comfortably with text. Above 12" will be too big to carry. I think even 12" is too big.
I want it to run an open source OS like BSD or Linux. Unfortunately, age of netbooks are over. So I wonder what options I’ve got. As far as I have researched:
- Pinebook. The advantage is that it is open source and I can repair it easily meself. The disadvantage is that I think 11.6" is a lil big. Not sure as I never had a laptop at this size to tell for sure. But it seems these devices are not available in Pine64 store anymore. Only Pinebook pro which is 14".
- A chromebook. I am not very much sure about these. It seems I can install Linux at least on some of them. The advantages are that I can easily find one for cheap. The disadvantage seems to be that I won’t be able to repair them easily. I guess the important part is the eMMC and its failure means bye bye? If I could put them from uSD, this shouldn’t be a problem. The chromebooks with SSD seem too expensive.
- Reboot an old netbook. Advantage is that I can easily find one. Probably I could make changes to the laptop to make it more modern and usable. Mainly, replace the original lithium battery with a new custom one, possibly lighter and longer lasting. I could also replace the charging circuit and port with a modern type C. However, I’m not sure if one of these will last long enough given that they are second hand.
- A Windows tablet. I could get one of these with keyboard and install Linux on them. Haven’t researched much about them.
I also have found Chuwi minibooks. But their support said they are discontinued.
Thoughts? Suggestions?
macbook air 11 2015 8gb version. just this one and no other, no 13, no 2013, no 4 gb versions, etc.
very linux friendly (once you sort out broadcom wifi drivers), sips power, tolerates undervolt. it’s useless to the apple crowd as it don’t got support for latest OS so it can be had for cheap, even more so if you wanna buy busted units and frankenstein together a new one. also, wide cross-gen parts compatibility. aliexpress got $5 USB-C to Magsafe2 adapter so you don’t gotta haul the charger around.
don’t get the 12" ones, unless they’re close to free. spectacular screen, but the keyboard is atrocious and prone to die, with no option of replacing it, SSD is integrated so can’t get the data off it if something dies, fragile display connection, it’s a shit-show.
You will not like this answer:
An old 11” macbook air or the 12” macbook circa ‘17.
They’re everywhere, last forever, parts are cheap, they’re durable, there is good Linux support, the screens are good and they don’t stick out when you’re using them in public.
I used to have 11” as my hard upper limit of diagonal size years ago but since then I realized it’s no big deal to carry a 13” diagonal computer now that they’re all incredibly thin and light.
I have one of these running NixOS and I love it: https://www.chuwi.com/product/items/chuwi-minibook-x-n150.html
Can flip it over into a tablet too, but you’ll need to search the web for the tools people have built that I grabbed to disable keyboard and enter tablet mode when it detects that
Yeah I have the same on fedora. Wish I could stretch the battery a little more but other than that it’s great.
What’s the battery life like?
Regarding the tablet, doing terminal-based stuff on a virtual keyboard turns out to be a real pain if it’s anything more than a quick task. And I haven’t found a tablet keyboard cover that isn’t clunky and disappointing in real use. Admittedly, I haven’t used a Surface tablet.
Also, the user experience on Linux tablets has left something to be desired. The best support I’ve found so far has been with Gnome and it’s not consistent at all.
My experience would steer you towards a real laptop with a keyboard.
A surface tablet can be booted with Linux.
However I really don’t think a laptop is a bad decision. I myself run a 14" Lenovo ThinkPad: https://amzn.eu/d/09sY8lt1
It’s honestly small and I use it as a “on call” machine when I leave the house. Thing is light so I barely notice it in my bag
