Dell releases powerful, well-supported Linux Ultrabook

This works perfectly for me on a 2012, 13" MacBook Air running Xubuntu 12.10. You can have your nice Mac hardware and run Linux too :)

I don't understand the reason for doing this, the main reason to buy the apple hardware is the ability to run OSX, which is just a much more polished unix distro than Xubuntu. If, all you need is to run Linux then you can use one of the plethora of other great machines and save money. I know this is what LT does, so maybe doing this is some form of hero worship/copy. He at least has a good reason for it.

Personally I have an Air with OSX and I shell into Linux for work. I can use vmware for a local copy if I wanted but I prefer to use my servers that Linode manages. That way when I loose my Air or it gets stolen or whatever, my work stays in good standing. Maybe I just never got past the old days, for me the laptop is something for running ssh, chrome and photoshop.

Maybe OSX is the main reason to you, but for most other people the build quality, weight, battery life, screen and design matter just as much. You can run OSX on other hardware or a VM too.

“If, all you need is to run Linux then you can use one of the plethora of other great machines and save money.”

I didn't find that to be the case. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon was the only Ultrabook that compared at all favorably to the Air in reviews, and it costs something like $1450 versus $1140 for the Air. Thought about it. Couldn't justify the higher price. (Edit: Price has apparently dropped, see below)

Another contender was Asus' Zenbook Prime, which got mostly good reviews and is cheaper than the Air. But it's only slightly cheaper ($1080) and the Ubuntu wiki mentioned a bunch of ugly issues I didn't want to deal with: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AsusZenbookPrime

Xubuntu (Ubuntu with the Xfce desktop) is my favorite operating system. I'm not settling for less by using it. I set out to run Xubuntu on a great, lightweight laptop with an SSD, and the Air was the most compelling option. Simple as that.

My main reason for buying MacBooks these days is actually build quality. The solid aluminum design is just insanely rugged, especially with the light weight of the Air. You could run an 11" inch Air through the tumble cycle of a dryer and it would probably be just fine--albeit a bit dinged up. My Thinkpads were always trashed within a couple years.

I also don't think you can objectively say OSX is the most "polished" Unix. Especially in the area of package management, which, as a developer, takes up a huge part of my week, OSX is sort of half-assedly catching up. And that's only with third party tools like Homebrew and MacPorts.

Other areas OSX is more polished. But as a UNIX it's not a clear winner.

> The ThinkPad X1 Carbon was the only Ultrabook that compared at all favorably to the Air in reviews, and it costs something like $1450 versus $1140 for the Air. Thought about it. Couldn't justify the higher price.

This is not true. Lenovo (like pretty much every company except Apple) has regular discounts. You can easily get the ThinkPad X1 Carbon for a price comparable to the Air. Also, I would say that the X1 Carbon is better than the Air in many ways. You get a bigger screen, higher resolution, better keyboard, the TrackPoint, and a 3G SIM card slot.

I see that now: $1120 “after coupon”. https://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/web/LenovoP...

At the time, I was definitely not seeing it under $1400. It may have been before the X1 Carbon was officially released, or while they were experiencing manufacturing delays in September.

I agree with you: if I were buying today and had that information, I'd go with the X1 Carbon, mainly for the higher resolution.

I will second that on the MacBook Air. I take mine all over the world with me, and out into the field. My 2010 MacBook Air 13" has been beaten up like you wouldn't believe - I've dropped it (twice ) from a height of 5' onto concrete, onto it's corner - it bent quite a bit, but still performs flawlessly. It's with me in my backpack 100% of the time, and is treated very, very roughly. The only downside of the MBAir is how slippery it is (which is why it came out of my unzipped backpack).

My Dell Latitude 510 (and then 620) - both never made it past year 2 before suffering structural failure.

I wish this were true because I'm dying for a new laptop, but I haven't seen a single one other than the Air that can compare in specs.

Does the X1 Carbon come with 8GB of RAM, a Core i7, and a battery that lasts 6+ hours? Do you know of a single laptop other than a MacBook (and the Samsung Series 9 15" which is too huge for 1600x900 resolution) that carries those specs? If you do, I'll buy it immediately.

In the area of "will this work with the god-damned printer" OSX is by far the most polished unix distro.

More than any usability feature or GUI design element, the aspect of "OSX UNIX" that stands apart is the ability to interact with plain old consumer hardware...

My X1 Carbon has 8 GB RAM, it has lasted for 5+ hours without the battery getting to a critically low level (I've only had it 2 days, so I haven't fully tested it), and it has a Core i5. The only issue is that the Core i7 option and 8 GB RAM option appear to be mutually exclusive, so I went with the Core i5, and I haven't regretted it so far.

Also keep in mind that there are also several advantages to the X1 Carbon over the MacBook Air, which I mentioned in my previous post. The biggest one is that despite being the same physical size as the 13" MacBook Air, you get a 14" screen.

I'm actually looking at Air now, and the build is what is making me look elsewhere. I understand the form factor is nice to use, but the non-replaceable battery and soldered-on SSD means it won't last long, and it's not that I can't afford new one every two years, it's that I hate to buy something with planned obsolesce.

If only they put better displays in thinkpads.

My main workstation is a two year old Air, with no problems so far. I expect it to last me another year, maybe more. My needs may be simpler than yours, though: mostly I just run emacs and web browsers. I rarely use memory-hungry IDEs, and never edit video.

I'm the kind of person who believes that Apple's hardware is much nicer than their software, especially when it comes to their Macbooks.

OSX is awesome for most people, but for me I could never get a hang of it. The lack of having a package manager has always been confusing to me. A package manager is very similar to an "App-store" why not have one to keep things simple for developers?

I would have weird Kernel panics with the newest generation Macbook Air, this was very odd, but I don't fault OSX for it.

This is purely a personal preference, but the window management was a very frustrating experience for me. The OSX dock seems so unintuitive for me. If an application is open there's a tiny blue dot to signify that it's open. I can't really explain it, I just don't like it. There were a lot of odd inconsistencies when managing windows in OSX that I can't really remember but would frustrate me.

I'm not really saying OSX is bad, just giving you a perspective from somebody who thought the Mac hardware is much, much better than their software.

If you wanted build quality you should've purchased a Panasonic, AINEC. If you want a "slightly nixy" whizbang OS but can compromise on package management you want a Macbook, but not for the build quality.

I prefer having military grade hardware (Panasonic), the best no compromises OS in the world (Linux), and the ability to virtualize Windows if need be. Just about had a heart attack when I saw your post. :)

I only wish I could easily virtualize OS/X. Come on, Apple.

GNU/Linux is Free Software, OSX is not.

It's very much not as cut and dried as you imply here whether OS X is better than linux. Anyone I know who knows enough to actually make an informed decision about both, thinks linux is better. Almost to the extent that I'd make the exact reverse observation you make, that it's completely obvious linux is better.

However, I know many people who just don't know linux very well who are happy sticking with OS X, so I don't think that's a valid observation to make either.

Actually... I have a lot more luck with Linux than OS X in actually working with printers. Even though Apple employs the CUPS maintainer.

> The solid aluminum design is just insanely rugged, especially with the light weight of the Air.

Uh... I dont recommend dropping your mac air.

Speaking as someone who spent multiple years with a thinkpad T60 and a 13in MBA, it's without a question the thinkpad is much more rugged. Be especially careful with the screen on the MBA. If you drop it even a short distance, the aluminum will be damaged, and it might break internal components such as the webcam, which can't be fixed without replacing the whole screen. I love my MBA, but certainly not because it's rugged.

I transitioned from Macs to Linux over the last decade and I can remember Mac OS X before they adopted CUPS, printing was pretty grim then, but then again so were many other things in the OS. But you could see the potential, even as people like John Gruber railed against every minor inconsistency. It's a similar story with Desktop Linux and Android.

For the printers I've tried OS X and Linux on, OS X have required digging through the manufacturers website for driver downloads, while Ubuntu recognised the printers immediately.

Download Quicksilver. Between it and Exposé/cmd-tab, I pretty much never look at/use my dock.