Filip Ekberg

If I had gone with MacBook Pro Retina I would most likely have been just as happy as I am today with the laptop choice.

@Yakov Fain, My requirements weren't "wrong", they simply changed along the way. You say I didn't care about weight, but I do, I certainly didn't want something over 2KG. My old machine was about 4KG and I really avoided taking that with me anywhere.

@Ae Kernel, As I said before, the laptop is built by Clevo and branded/assembled by Metabox in Australia, it is not assembled by Metabox anywhere else. In Europe I think it goes by the same Sager.

@Ionel Condor, Just because there is new hardware coming out all the time doesn't mean it is less powerful 6 months from now..

What really made me decide to go for this laptop was"

• High-end fast CPU (i7-4900) with some extra instructions for virtualization
• 16GB RAM
• 1 SSD Slot and 2 mSATA Slots so I could increase this whenever I wanted
• Not too heavy, 2KG is still OK
• People have got it running for a little over 4 hours on battery which is OK, it's not the 10 hours that I had pursued from the start though
• Great screen, the 1080p screen is beautiful on this device. MacBook Pro Retina is probably better though
• Latest graphics card

I could have bought an AlienWare instead, I wen't and tried one out but man, we talk heavy stuff when it comes to AlienWare. I think the smallest one is still a little over 3KG and that is heavy.. I never really considered MacBook Pro Retina because I heard Windows 8 didn't handle the screen too well and it had the previous generation hardware. Even though in a couple of months I will have the previous generation hardware, I certainly avoid buying something that is old from the start.Also, I rarely work on the laptop but has it connected to a 27" screen with 2560x1440 resolution, over HDMI as both has HDMI 1.4a support. When I do work on the laptop screen though, it works really well I don't have a hard time reading the text or anything like that.There's lots of others extremely good laptops out there, I just fell in love with this one after hearing stories from co-workers that had the same machine. Doesn't mean it is perfect for anyone else.

How does it not make sense? I listened to a lot of friends advices, looked around for a long time for something that would suite my everyday needs and I gave the MacBook Air a fair chance.

I am starting to think that you think it is stupid just because I didn't like the MacBook, because everyone just gotta love them right? Well I didn't.

6GB RAM is way to little, at least for the work I am doing. And my job paid for the laptop since it is primarily used for work. But I don't have a secondary machine so I wanted something that would suite me all the time.

For me 6GB, or even 8GB is not enough specially not when running Windows, Visual Studio and maybe 1-2 Virtual Machines. Now if I were using Linux I might be able to work with 8GB, but still if I need a couple of Virtual Machine that will just not be enough.

Now 8GB and 2.8GHz turbo speed sounds decent, but I much prefer my 16GB and 3.8GHz turbo speeds. Going over 4 cores (8 with HT) doesn't really matter that much. When compiling/encoding you want fast clock speeds as most of the processing isn't divided over all cores. So in most cases for me, speed has a greater impact than scalability.

I considered Dell, I actually went out and tried the AlienWare since that was in the same performance area as I was looking to get. If I recall correctly they are a bit cheaper but way much heavier and heavy wasn't an option for me, I did want something that doesn't hurt my back when I need to have it in a backpack. Don't get me wrong though, AlienWare is a crazy solid and nice machine; just not perfect for me.

If you are on a budget, this is not the laptop for you. I say this is the perfect developer machine (for me) because I use it primarily for work and doing so I don't have to think about getting the cheaper ones because they will just get in my way when they're slow.

So again, I don't see how my story about finding the perfect developer laptop (for me) is either stupid or doesn't make sense? I made some bad decisions in the start, my requirements changed along the way and I ended up getting something completely different than I thought from the start and as it turns out this was a really good choice for me. Doesn't mean it would be the perfect choice for you.

How does it not make sense? I listened to a lot of friends advices, looked around for a long time for something that would suite my everyday needs and I gave the MacBook Air a fair chance.

I am starting to think that you think it is stupid just because I didn't like the MacBook, because everyone just gotta love them right? Well I didn't.

6GB RAM is way to little, at least for the work I am doing. And my job paid for the laptop since it is primarily used for work. But I don't have a secondary machine so I wanted something that would suite me all the time.

For me 6GB, or even 8GB is not enough specially not when running Windows, Visual Studio and maybe 1-2 Virtual Machines. Now if I were using Linux I might be able to work with 8GB, but still if I need a couple of Virtual Machine that will just not be enough.

Now 8GB and 2.8GHz turbo speed sounds decent, but I much prefer my 16GB and 3.8GHz turbo speeds. Going over 4 cores (8 with HT) doesn't really matter that much. When compiling/encoding you want fast clock speeds as most of the processing isn't divided over all cores. So in most cases for me, speed has a greater impact than scalability.

I considered Dell, I actually went out and tried the AlienWare since that was in the same performance area as I was looking to get. If I recall correctly they are a bit cheaper but way much heavier and heavy wasn't an option for me, I did want something that doesn't hurt my back when I need to have it in a backpack. Don't get me wrong though, AlienWare is a crazy solid and nice machine; just not perfect for me.

If you are on a budget, this is not the laptop for you. I say this is the perfect developer machine (for me) because I use it primarily for work and doing so I don't have to think about getting the cheaper ones because they will just get in my way when they're slow.

So again, I don't see how my story about finding the perfect developer laptop (for me) is either stupid or doesn't make sense? I made some bad decisions in the start, my requirements changed along the way and I ended up getting something completely different than I thought from the start and as it turns out this was a really good choice for me. Doesn't mean it would be the perfect choice for you.

How does it not make sense? I listened to a lot of friends advices, looked around for a long time for something that would suite my everyday needs and I gave the MacBook Air a fair chance.

I am starting to think that you think it is stupid just because I didn't like the MacBook, because everyone just gotta love them right? Well I didn't.

6GB RAM is way to little, at least for the work I am doing. And my job paid for the laptop since it is primarily used for work. But I don't have a secondary machine so I wanted something that would suite me all the time.

For me 6GB, or even 8GB is not enough specially not when running Windows, Visual Studio and maybe 1-2 Virtual Machines. Now if I were using Linux I might be able to work with 8GB, but still if I need a couple of Virtual Machine that will just not be enough.

Now 8GB and 2.8GHz turbo speed sounds decent, but I much prefer my 16GB and 3.8GHz turbo speeds. Going over 4 cores (8 with HT) doesn't really matter that much. When compiling/encoding you want fast clock speeds as most of the processing isn't divided over all cores. So in most cases for me, speed has a greater impact than scalability.

I considered Dell, I actually went out and tried the AlienWare since that was in the same performance area as I was looking to get. If I recall correctly they are a bit cheaper but way much heavier and heavy wasn't an option for me, I did want something that doesn't hurt my back when I need to have it in a backpack. Don't get me wrong though, AlienWare is a crazy solid and nice machine; just not perfect for me.

If you are on a budget, this is not the laptop for you. I say this is the perfect developer machine (for me) because I use it primarily for work and doing so I don't have to think about getting the cheaper ones because they will just get in my way when they're slow.

So again, I don't see how my story about finding the perfect developer laptop (for me) is either stupid or doesn't make sense? I made some bad decisions in the start, my requirements changed along the way and I ended up getting something completely different than I thought from the start and as it turns out this was a really good choice for me. Doesn't mean it would be the perfect choice for you.

How does it not make sense? I listened to a lot of friends advices, looked around for a long time for something that would suite my everyday needs and I gave the MacBook Air a fair chance.

I am starting to think that you think it is stupid just because I didn't like the MacBook, because everyone just gotta love them right? Well I didn't.

6GB RAM is way to little, at least for the work I am doing. And my job paid for the laptop since it is primarily used for work. But I don't have a secondary machine so I wanted something that would suite me all the time.

For me 6GB, or even 8GB is not enough specially not when running Windows, Visual Studio and maybe 1-2 Virtual Machines. Now if I were using Linux I might be able to work with 8GB, but still if I need a couple of Virtual Machine that will just not be enough.

Now 8GB and 2.8GHz turbo speed sounds decent, but I much prefer my 16GB and 3.8GHz turbo speeds. Going over 4 cores (8 with HT) doesn't really matter that much. When compiling/encoding you want fast clock speeds as most of the processing isn't divided over all cores. So in most cases for me, speed has a greater impact than scalability.

I considered Dell, I actually went out and tried the AlienWare since that was in the same performance area as I was looking to get. If I recall correctly they are a bit cheaper but way much heavier and heavy wasn't an option for me, I did want something that doesn't hurt my back when I need to have it in a backpack. Don't get me wrong though, AlienWare is a crazy solid and nice machine; just not perfect for me.

If you are on a budget, this is not the laptop for you. I say this is the perfect developer machine (for me) because I use it primarily for work and doing so I don't have to think about getting the cheaper ones because they will just get in my way when they're slow.

So again, I don't see how my story about finding the perfect developer laptop (for me) is either stupid or doesn't make sense? I made some bad decisions in the start, my requirements changed along the way and I ended up getting something completely different than I thought from the start and as it turns out this was a really good choice for me. Doesn't mean it would be the perfect choice for you.

How does it not make sense? I listened to a lot of friends advices, looked around for a long time for something that would suite my everyday needs and I gave the MacBook Air a fair chance.

I am starting to think that you think it is stupid just because I didn't like the MacBook, because everyone just gotta love them right? Well I didn't.

6GB RAM is way to little, at least for the work I am doing. And my job paid for the laptop since it is primarily used for work. But I don't have a secondary machine so I wanted something that would suite me all the time.

For me 6GB, or even 8GB is not enough specially not when running Windows, Visual Studio and maybe 1-2 Virtual Machines. Now if I were using Linux I might be able to work with 8GB, but still if I need a couple of Virtual Machine that will just not be enough.

Now 8GB and 2.8GHz turbo speed sounds decent, but I much prefer my 16GB and 3.8GHz turbo speeds. Going over 4 cores (8 with HT) doesn't really matter that much. When compiling/encoding you want fast clock speeds as most of the processing isn't divided over all cores. So in most cases for me, speed has a greater impact than scalability.

I considered Dell, I actually went out and tried the AlienWare since that was in the same performance area as I was looking to get. If I recall correctly they are a bit cheaper but way much heavier and heavy wasn't an option for me, I did want something that doesn't hurt my back when I need to have it in a backpack. Don't get me wrong though, AlienWare is a crazy solid and nice machine; just not perfect for me.

If you are on a budget, this is not the laptop for you. I say this is the perfect developer machine (for me) because I use it primarily for work and doing so I don't have to think about getting the cheaper ones because they will just get in my way when they're slow.

So again, I don't see how my story about finding the perfect developer laptop (for me) is either stupid or doesn't make sense? I made some bad decisions in the start, my requirements changed along the way and I ended up getting something completely different than I thought from the start and as it turns out this was a really good choice for me. Doesn't mean it would be the perfect choice for you.

How does it not make sense? I listened to a lot of friends advices, looked around for a long time for something that would suite my everyday needs and I gave the MacBook Air a fair chance.

I am starting to think that you think it is stupid just because I didn't like the MacBook, because everyone just gotta love them right? Well I didn't.

6GB RAM is way to little, at least for the work I am doing. And my job paid for the laptop since it is primarily used for work. But I don't have a secondary machine so I wanted something that would suite me all the time.

For me 6GB, or even 8GB is not enough specially not when running Windows, Visual Studio and maybe 1-2 Virtual Machines. Now if I were using Linux I might be able to work with 8GB, but still if I need a couple of Virtual Machine that will just not be enough.

Now 8GB and 2.8GHz turbo speed sounds decent, but I much prefer my 16GB and 3.8GHz turbo speeds. Going over 4 cores (8 with HT) doesn't really matter that much. When compiling/encoding you want fast clock speeds as most of the processing isn't divided over all cores. So in most cases for me, speed has a greater impact than scalability.

I considered Dell, I actually went out and tried the AlienWare since that was in the same performance area as I was looking to get. If I recall correctly they are a bit cheaper but way much heavier and heavy wasn't an option for me, I did want something that doesn't hurt my back when I need to have it in a backpack. Don't get me wrong though, AlienWare is a crazy solid and nice machine; just not perfect for me.

If you are on a budget, this is not the laptop for you. I say this is the perfect developer machine (for me) because I use it primarily for work and doing so I don't have to think about getting the cheaper ones because they will just get in my way when they're slow.

So again, I don't see how my story about finding the perfect developer laptop (for me) is either stupid or doesn't make sense? I made some bad decisions in the start, my requirements changed along the way and I ended up getting something completely different than I thought from the start and as it turns out this was a really good choice for me. Doesn't mean it would be the perfect choice for you.

Mike P, so you are saying the post is stupid because you don't agree or because you have another definition for "perfect"?

You can't really compare a machine for $600 with a machine for $2800, they don't even play in the same league. I was looking for something similar to your first pointsa, fast, no lag, full hd, not heavy but I didn't want price to come before quality and performance.

Clevo makes the laptop and Metabox assembles it and puts their logo on it. Clevo delivers this machine everywhere in the world to lots of different shops that puts it together. Did you even read the thing?

MacBooks are extremely common for developers using only Windows and Visual Studio, but the Air just didn't perform as well as I wanted. The fact that you couldn't remove the default OS partition and use the entire disk for another OS was just irritating so I didn't really see a point in trying the Retina instead. Also, as the post says I wanted Haswell and the MBP Retina didn't have that.

I had lots of different things that I wanted to perform good and most of them didn't on the MacBook Air. For instance, it took 15 minutes to render a 2 minute video in Camtasia while it takes me less than 30 seconds to do that on my Metabox. Again, the MBP Retina would most likely perform better than the Air, but again I wanted haswell and not buy last generation stuff.

This is the perfect developer laptop for me, doesn't mean that it is the perfect developer laptop for you.

Oh and warranty repairs, as it turns out I was extremely unlucky. First I had a dead pixel and Metabox picked it up, flew it to the other side of the country and return it so I had it 2 days after I sent it. Then I actually had an issue with the mSATA controller so I might need to get that replaced to, they will do the same procedure again, and again if needed. They have much better warranty policies than what I've seen when buying other brands from stores.

It's not really a strong selling point that you can swap the CPU, it's just really cool that you could do so if you wanted and points to the fact that if you buy a MacBook you really can't change anything at all if you need to.

In regards of battery, I really thought that I would be using it without the power cord much, much more but the fact is that it's been plugged into the wall for weeks now with some rare occasions being moved, still not even one hour before I had it back to my desk. Point is that it turns out battery is not important for me so I can focus on having a great performing laptop instead.

And I can run my VMs with Linux/Windows/Unix whenever I need.

As I said, perfect for me, maybe not perfect for you.

Clevo makes the laptop and Metabox assembles it and puts their logo on it. Clevo delivers this machine everywhere in the world to lots of different shops that puts it together. Did you even read the thing?

MacBooks are extremely common for developers using only Windows and Visual Studio, but the Air just didn't perform as well as I wanted. The fact that you couldn't remove the default OS partition and use the entire disk for another OS was just irritating so I didn't really see a point in trying the Retina instead. Also, as the post says I wanted Haswell and the MBP Retina didn't have that.

I had lots of different things that I wanted to perform good and most of them didn't on the MacBook Air. For instance, it took 15 minutes to render a 2 minute video in Camtasia while it takes me less than 30 seconds to do that on my Metabox. Again, the MBP Retina would most likely perform better than the Air, but again I wanted haswell and not buy last generation stuff.

This is the perfect developer laptop for me, doesn't mean that it is the perfect developer laptop for you.

Oh and warranty repairs, as it turns out I was extremely unlucky. First I had a dead pixel and Metabox picked it up, flew it to the other side of the country and return it so I had it 2 days after I sent it. Then I actually had an issue with the mSATA controller so I might need to get that replaced to, they will do the same procedure again, and again if needed. They have much better warranty policies than what I've seen when buying other brands from stores.

It's not really a strong selling point that you can swap the CPU, it's just really cool that you could do so if you wanted and points to the fact that if you buy a MacBook you really can't change anything at all if you need to.

In regards of battery, I really thought that I would be using it without the power cord much, much more but the fact is that it's been plugged into the wall for weeks now with some rare occasions being moved, still not even one hour before I had it back to my desk. Point is that it turns out battery is not important for me so I can focus on having a great performing laptop instead.

And I can run my VMs with Linux/Windows/Unix whenever I need.

As I said, perfect for me, maybe not perfect for you.

Clevo makes the laptop and Metabox assembles it and puts their logo on it. Clevo delivers this machine everywhere in the world to lots of different shops that puts it together. Did you even read the thing?

MacBooks are extremely common for developers using only Windows and Visual Studio, but the Air just didn't perform as well as I wanted. The fact that you couldn't remove the default OS partition and use the entire disk for another OS was just irritating so I didn't really see a point in trying the Retina instead. Also, as the post says I wanted Haswell and the MBP Retina didn't have that.

I had lots of different things that I wanted to perform good and most of them didn't on the MacBook Air. For instance, it took 15 minutes to render a 2 minute video in Camtasia while it takes me less than 30 seconds to do that on my Metabox. Again, the MBP Retina would most likely perform better than the Air, but again I wanted haswell and not buy last generation stuff.

This is the perfect developer laptop for me, doesn't mean that it is the perfect developer laptop for you.

Oh and warranty repairs, as it turns out I was extremely unlucky. First I had a dead pixel and Metabox picked it up, flew it to the other side of the country and return it so I had it 2 days after I sent it. Then I actually had an issue with the mSATA controller so I might need to get that replaced to, they will do the same procedure again, and again if needed. They have much better warranty policies than what I've seen when buying other brands from stores.

It's not really a strong selling point that you can swap the CPU, it's just really cool that you could do so if you wanted and points to the fact that if you buy a MacBook you really can't change anything at all if you need to.

In regards of battery, I really thought that I would be using it without the power cord much, much more but the fact is that it's been plugged into the wall for weeks now with some rare occasions being moved, still not even one hour before I had it back to my desk. Point is that it turns out battery is not important for me so I can focus on having a great performing laptop instead.

And I can run my VMs with Linux/Windows/Unix whenever I need.

As I said, perfect for me, maybe not perfect for you.

I've published the winners on my blog now, check it out here: http://blog.filipekberg.se/2013/02/04/congratulations-to-the-winners-of-a-free-c-smorgasbord-copy/

Congratulations to those that won a free copy, I hope you enjoy the read.

For those that didn't win there's a 35% discount code available!

Enjoy the read