06-13-2021, 10:39 AM
I didn't buy this laptop because I expected it to replace my chromebook or main laptop. I bought it to experiment with new technology, but I wanted to test to see if I could use it in that way, and here are my findings. I used it exclusively for 2-3 days.
Things I loved.
Am I happy with my purchase as a tech enthusiast testing out a new product? Yes.
Would I buy this as a commercial product or recommend it to someone? No, the battery situation is not just bad its show stopping. You can't take half a day to recharge a battery that discharges before two movies are played in 2021. Its just not viable. I would pay $300 for a PBP with better charing/battery, but I wouldn't pay $200 for it in its current state if it were my main device.
Things I loved.
- For its price, the keyboard is very nice. Alot of travel. Plasticy feel isn't great but blows away other laptops in price range in my opinion. Keyboard is fairly clicky which I like but some may not.
- Love all the hardware switches to turn things off.
- Build Quality feels very good for price point. My other laptops are X1 Carbon & Apple M1 Macbook, so this is lower end at 10% the price, but it s5-6 itill feels good to use.
- Love the lack of branding on the top of the laptop.
- Some people complain about the trackpad but its perfectly usable. I like the precise click vs soft touch click of some laptops.
- I did not find the CPU/RAM limiting with my behavior of hanging out on discord, watching youtube videos, or checking gmail. I also SSHd into a server and did some development on it and was fine. These days, I do all my builds server side so my laptop is basically just an IDE/SSH session.
- Quiet & Cool Operation
- Battery life is realistically 3-4 hours. Feel like time travel back to the 90s. 5-6 hours really is table stakes. You need better battery life if you want to prove this chip is viable. Current battery life is not viable for a commercial product.
- Charging of Battery - by far the worst part of PBP. I feel like I get one use session out of it per day and then I put it on the charger overnight. I haven't even timed the charging because it takes so long. With the laptop on, it stays at 0% forever. If I turn it off, it does charge, but very slowly. The entire time I wrote this it was hooked up and never left 0%m charge.
- The charging cable is very short, which is not fun as I basically am using the laptop as a desktop given the low battery life and slow recharge.
Am I happy with my purchase as a tech enthusiast testing out a new product? Yes.
Would I buy this as a commercial product or recommend it to someone? No, the battery situation is not just bad its show stopping. You can't take half a day to recharge a battery that discharges before two movies are played in 2021. Its just not viable. I would pay $300 for a PBP with better charing/battery, but I wouldn't pay $200 for it in its current state if it were my main device.
