With seemingly no m3/m4 support in the near future, and worried about how long my m2 max will last, I bit the bullet and got an x86 laptop to test the viability of that. Best x86 laptop CPU supposedly, AMD Ryzen 9 HX 370, in an ASUS Proart P16.

So disappointed... Thermals so much worse than the m2 max, and the latter still handily beats it in performance. Panel a lot worse too. Touchpad actually decent, though still not quite as good.

Sticking with the M2 Max for now, ASUS returned.

Might I suggest checking out the X1 Carbon series? ThinkPads are rock solid in Linux. (Be cautious about the depth camera and cell modem, for which the latest versions are obnoxiously proprietary, but everything *else* works and the non-depth webcam works fine.)

@josh I need/want a 16" screen, that's why I went with the ASUS. Before the mac arm adventure, I did use thinkpads, had both an x1 and p1.

But I'm sure Intel is bribing Lenovo to only offer Intel CPUs, which to me look considerably worse than the AMD offering. And if the AMD is still so far behind Apple silicon, not super motivated to try and Intel CPU honestly 🙂

@axboe

I had m1 pro. Now I have Asus Zenbook 14 Oled Intel. Thermals certainly worse. Battery lasts longer on Asus. Screen is same quality. Both Linux.
Maybe mbp m1 had worse screen than your m2. Not sure.

@as400 At idle the x86 power consumption wasn't bad in my testing, but the efficiency being a LOT worse becomes clear when compiling code. And I do a lot of that... I actually get good battery life doing compiles and kvm testing on the m2 max, on the asus most certainly not. And I can barely keep it on my lap, and the fan is blowing a lot.

I think the m1/m2 series has the same display.

@axboe

Surely compiling code is better/faster on apple silicon. No doubt about that.

Although m1 pro was also hot big time when compiling. Probably not as much as Meteor Lake though.

@axboe Building arm64 Linux natively in macOS is also possible. Then kvm/hvf for testing/debugging.

@dagmcr Yeah, but I'm not interested in running their hot sw garbage, when I've got much better stuff available. Only interested in running linux on the bare metal on apple silicon, zero interest in osx in any shape or form.

@axboe @josh Lenovo Z16 is AMD. There are also P series that are AMD too.

@neal @josh They don't make the Z16 anymore, just tried to look at it. I did end up testing an ASUS proart p16 which is probably the same AMD CPU, and I was not impressed compared to a 5 year old Apple M2 Max...

@axboe @dagmcr I'm trying to run OSX for the first time and it's really surprising how horrible it is...

@palmer @dagmcr just no, I could never do it. Because I’m principled, but also because I don’t like it at all. But I also feel like I can never go back to x86 after being on apple silicon for years.

@axboe @dagmcr ya, I was principled for a long time but I'm sort of just tired these days...

That said, it's so bad it doesn't even matter ;)