HP ZBook G1a

Dell is the one that may break, but their service is great. Next business day on site repair. Maybe HP business stuff as well? HP are inconsistent, but some of their stuff is good. I've had an HP ZR24w screen with great picture quality that still works like new after 15 years and 30k hours. The ZBook G1a laptop ("mobile workstation in ultrabook form factor") also seems great so far, after a little under a year. Almost everything about it is very good, including the touchpad.

Does it run Linux well? That's the only reason not to get a MBP. Personally, I got a HP Zbook G1A, which is HP's take on an MBP based on (x86, but unified memory!) Strix Halo. Battery life could be better, but pretty happy otherwise. Local LLM perf is great and I get to run an OS that doesn't drive me crazy.

HP Zbook G1a (Ryzen AI max+ 395) is getting closer and has an M.2 SSD slot. But Macbooks undeniably have better battery life (touchpad, sound and display). I selected this over Macbook because I value linux and openness more. But it's true Apple managed to make some really good devices with apple silicon and the competition has a hard time catching up. Before apple silicon, I was making fun of apple fanboys as CPU specs were mostly bad and it didn't make sense for the price. Apple silicon changed that. And it doesn't look like it will change very soon, sadly. I would like to see more really viably alternatives.

And you can get Strix Halo in a Laptop that looks and feels like a Macbook Pro that can run Linux if you buy an HP ZBook G1A. Super happy with that thing, only real downside is battery life.

If anyone else wants the closest thing to a MBP running Linux without waiting for Asahi to fully work, I can highly recommend the HP ZBook G1A. * It has an all-aluminium chassis that feels a lot like a MBP. * Hardware all works - fingerprint reader, webcam, suspend etc etc. Takes a bit of work, but all works in the end. Helps that HP ships them with Ubuntu as official option. * Strix Halo chipset, which is basically AMD's attempt at an Apple Silicon type design. Single big chip, with unified LPDDR5X-8000 RAM (up to 128GB!) shared between CPU and GPU (which is surprisingly strong as well, 40 CU!). This thing is a beast for local LLMs! Only downside really is the battery life. I haven't played around with it too much, I think there's a bit more room with custom tuned profiles, but rn I get like maybe 6 hours on a good day?

I also have an Apple M4 MacBook Pro from Work and an HP ZBook G1a for my personal. I used to have an Asahi MacBook but switched over with the lack of M3/M4 support. Some extra compare/contrast: - The build quality of each are excellent. The touchpad on the G1a is probably the closest to a MacBook touchpad I've seen and it even manages to boast an OLED screen. On the other hand, the G1a is only available as a 14" option. - Strix Halo will still leave you wishing it were Apple Silicon in pretty much every case except "I need to run a x86 native app/VM". It's certainly the best alternative, but you definitely trade away to go to it. You can load large LLMs (I have the 128 GB version for non-AI reasons) but they only run ~3x faster than a laptop without a GPU would because 256 GB/s still ends up being a big bandwidth limit. If you do actually do this regularly, then prepare to hear the fans and look for your power adapter as it does get quite hot doing so. - Speaking of power adapter... you need either a 100 W or 140 W charger + USB C to be able to charge the G1a while you use it. If you want to use a lower wattage adapter you need to power off, or it seems to draw 0 W out of spite. - It's massively refreshing to have a normal UEFI bootup process, and as long as you have a current kernel the hardware support is indeed pretty great on the G1a. Between the two, the G1a has better supported than the M1 w/ Asahi - as one would expect for a corporation officially supporting Linux vs a…

If you want something a bit more like a Macbook Pro, consider the HP Zbook G1A. It's basically built like a Macbook in terms of case and screen quality, but it's based on an AMD Strix Halo chipset - mine is an AI Max Pro+ 395. The chip design is somewhat similar to Apple Silicon in that it's one big chip with unified memory - you can get them with up to 128GB of unified ram - that thing is a beast for running local LLMs. Since HP also sells them with Ubuntu preinstalled, Linux support is quite good, though it requires some bleeding edge packages for everything to be supported. In my case, I have suspend and hibernate working perfectly, fingerprint reader, webcam, etc all work.

I have used a ZBook G1a for the past few months because it is the only laptop with AMD's Ryzen 395+, and while not thinkpad or XPS/Precision tier, the laptop has been perfectly fine.

yes and no. i have macbook pro m4 and a zbook g1a (ai max 395+ ie strix halo) In day to day usage the strix halo is significantly faster, and especially when large context LLM and games are used - but also typical stuff like Lightroom (gpu heavy) etc. on the flip side the m4 battery life is significantly longer (but also the mpb is approx 1/4 heavier) for what its worth i also have a t14 with a snapdragon X elite and while its battery is closer to a mbp, its just kinda slow and clunky. so my best machine right now is the x86 actually!

Indeed. I have an AMD 9950X and an Asus X870E* motherboard. I can barely get the system to boot with one 32G DIMM let alone 2 or 4, and 48G DIMMS are even worse for some reason. I have tried 3 different "matched" sets. Sometimes I have to reset the system 3 times or more before it will boot; it hangs or crashes on DDR timing BIOS codes. I have given up and just use a single 32G despite how useless 32G is in a high end desktop today. Real joke. Huge waste of money. I will buy prebiilt systems in the future. In the meantime if I need a lot of RAM I use an Intel 14900K desktop or my new HP G1a Zbook. * ASUS X870E ROG CROSSHAIR HERO AMD AM5 ATX Motherboard

You can also get it in a laptop form factor that feels like a MBP with a nicer keyboard if you get an HP Zbook G1A! Huge fan of that thing, it's th e Linux MBP I've always wanted.