Hacker News Reader

Comment by pjerem | Hacker News Reader

I was going to write exactly this.

I don’t know about Linux support since I have to use Windows on it but oh boy it is crap. The fans are always on whatever you do, the left part of the keyboard is frequently burning hot. Touchpad is mostly really good … when it works, because as soon as I wash my hands, it stops detecting anything. The audio part, at least on Windows, is pure random. USB docks randomly works and once a USB-C device is plugged in you are good for overheating near the connector.

For me it’s total garbage and I’m just waiting for it to die and my employer to change it for something better.

Our newest Dell laptops looks good but I’m never trusting this company again.

View on HN

I've been running Linux on a 5550 for about six months now, and the hardware is rock solid.

Everything works fine. I've experienced no overheating, network is stable, all the USB bits work, it docks and undocks without issue, the web cam works, audio works, it sleeps, hibernates and wakes up fine. Fans aren't very loud and I've only ever heard them spin up when compiling (I would say the full speed fans on the 5550 are about as loud as full speed fans on a 2016 Macbook Pro). The large touchpad works well enough. The 4k screen is OK, and matte, which I consider a bonus. The keyboard is average, certainly not the worst laptop keyboard I've ever used, but far from the best.

However, I wouldn't buy one for myself. Simply because of how flexible it is. It is nearly unusable when sat on anything but a hard flat surface. It's like the designers never even tested it as a LAPtop. Tiny, imperceptible flexes, or even just more pressure on one side than the other and the touchpad generates clicks.

Also, a USB-A port would have been way more useful than an SD-card slot.

This has been my experience with this hardware too. Agree 100% about the USB-A port, but Ethernet would have been nice too!

I use it as a portable workstation, so it is always on a desk with a keyboard and mouse. Definitely not suitable for lap use, but that's no problem for me.

Way nicer than the XPS13, that's for sure!

> I was going to write exactly this.

Same. I made the mistake of getting a Dell 2-in-1 without trying it first.

Whether on Windows or on Linux, it's a pain to use.

I found serious ACPI bugs (not just the kind that can be easily fixed with iasl) which made me conclude power management could not work reliably, whether on Windows or on Linux.

It's was usable at all on Windows 10 only thanks to Microsoft extremely careful approach: waking from suspend every now and then, checking the % of battery consumed, giving up on suspend and powering off should the hardware be caught lying about the power envelope while having been "sleeping".

No wonder why Dells risk catching fire if put in a backpack...

> No wonder why Dells risk catching fire if put in a backpack...

omg I also had this and forgot to add it to my rant ! One night I was going down to the kitchen to drink a glass of water and I heard a loud fan noise coming from somewhere. Sure enough it came from my backpack. I opened it and it was extremely hot inside. I wonder what could have happened if I had a good sleep that night.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com