I'm sure there are plenty of people out there looking for a replacement to their current laptop.
For those of you who want to know if this is a good laptop, the answer is, in short, yes.
For those of you who are music junkies, the speakers here could use a little improvement in volume and quality, but you're unlikely to get good speakers from a laptop to begin with.
For those of you who want the whole story, keep reading.
First Impressions
When I first took this laptop out of the box, I was stunned. A laptop NOT made by Apple that looks REALLY good. Everything has been carefully designed-I can tell just from looking at the ports.
If I hadn't looked on the website, I would've never guessed it was hiding an Ethernet port. I thought having lots of ports meant you had to sacrifice style. I was wrong.
The USB 3.0 ports have blue markings, which is nice, as I hate accidentally putting the USB 2.0 devices in the 3.0 ports (it keeps me from taking full advantage of the ports). I don't have any USB 3.0 devices yet, but I plan on changing that soon.
It has both VGA and HDMI, which is great, as I plan on buying a second monitor soon. Looks like I am going to see what HD is all about (I don't have an HD TV, if you're wondering-I've never seen true HD quality graphics).
The SD card reader is hidden very well-I'm not going to give the location away. Try to find it on the pictures on the System76 website. It's nice to know I can transfer pictures and videos from my camera without using a USB port (sometimes I'm all filled up).
The front is slick-there aren't a bunch of media buttons taking up space where I could accidentally hit them when I just want to rest my hands. I love being able to relax my hands after a long session of typing.
The CD/DVD drive is practically useless in this day and age, but for gamers, going without one is not an option. I find it amazing that software is still distributed on CDs with the invention of USB drives and the Internet.
On the back, there are no ports. I'm a person who likes having some ports on the back for stationary devices like printers, but I can easily do without it, as my new printer is a network compatible one (and it doesn't give me trouble when I print over the network). The only thing on the back is a battery. Nice to know I can easily swap them out if one stops working altogether or just runs out of juice. It is obvious there has been a lot of thought put into this.
Under the Hood
Ergonomics are arguably the most important thing in a laptop. If you have an uncomfortable or poorly designed trackpad, it can inhibit your ability to move the cursor with ease. If you have a bad keyboard, that one is fairly obvious. I would be making tons of spelling mistakes and grammatical errors. Fortunately, the Lemur Ultra doesn't suffer from these problems. The trackpad is hardly noticeable-both a good and bad thing. I love how it blends in, but it is so shallow, it is easy to accidentally move my hand onto the trackpad without realizing it until I see the cursor move. But, I'm sure I'll get used to it soon. It's a good thing the buttons aren't virtual, or else I couldn't stand the laptop-virtual buttons throw me off more than anything else.
You got to hand it to System76 for making such a nice, spacious keyboard. Tight keyboards are the reason I dislike netbooks-you get no room to press your fingers. The keys go down naturally, and the Fn keys actually work (many laptops I have used don't have functioning function keys). I love being able to control my music from whatever window I'm in. I also love the ability to adjust the brightness and control my wireless antenna without having to go through several menus. The only downside is on the Super key-I can tell the Ubuntu logo is just a sticker. It isn't painted on there by any means, as there is another thing painted on that it only partially covers. However, I am going to give them credit for at least trying to cover it up. I would've never noticed, had it not been for someone else seeing that on their laptop.
Now, onto the stickers. None. That's right-no stickers. I got an Intel SSD sticker, but it wasn't already on the laptop, and I think it took up too much space anyway (think 4 or 5 Windows sticker logos placed side by side). I love how they actually gave you Powered by Ubuntu stickers, but they don't actually put them on there. I like being able to choose things like this. The only reason they put stickers on there, besides for quick reference as to the CPU and OS type (Desktop, Server, etc.), was to make the laptop sound better than it really is. But, it gets ridiculous, as I've seen a laptop with a Windows 7 Ultimate, Intel i7 CPU, NVidia GPU, and some drive encryption sticker all on the same laptop. About half the space between the edge of the laptop and the trackpad was taken up. That is the reason I dislike them-they just clutter things up and make them ugly. Plus, if you don't peel them off right after you buy it, the stickers will leave behind glue and other residue if you decide to remove them later (at least in my experience, it has). So, not having any stickers on there by default is a breath of fresh air. They include 2 Powered by Ubuntu stickers-and you get to decide exactly where they go, whether it be in the middle of the screen or on top of your forehead (also-free stickers from System76 can be ordered at https://www.system76.com/community/stickers/ ).
First Boot
I have heard SSDs were fast, but I had no idea they could boot Ubuntu in 21.53 seconds (and Ubuntu is already faster than Windows, I might add). Everything is snappy. It can shutdown in 5.82 seconds, a huge plus if I'm in a hurry.
Setup was as simple as the Ubuntu setup ever was. I entered my location, username and password, WiFi details, and was ready to go. The only problem I noticed was that the Unity launcher wasn't displaying the open window arrows, but that was solved after I rebooted it.
I then got to work turning this laptop into exactly what I needed. It has all the programs I want at the moment, just the default ones plus essentials like MyAgenda, MyUnity, Menu Editor, Unity QLE Editor, TeamViewer, and Chrome.
The only freeze I have received was when I was using MyUnity, and everything locked up, and the fan got loud. But, nothing was lost or damaged, so I'm happy.
My current complaint is that the speakers are quiet and low quality, but laptop speakers are naturally softer, and aren't really known for being high quality to begin with (I'm not a music junkie, so it isn't a problem to me). But, headphones fix the quality, and having to set it to a high volume isn't a problem, as long as it's consistent (which it is).
Conclusion
This laptop is the best laptop I have ever bought. It has 8 GB of RAM (4 GB is the default, and Ubuntu just requires 0.5 GB), a 60 GB SSD (a 500 GB HDD is the default, and Ubuntu requires just 5 GB), a 3rd Generation Intel i5 CPU (i5 is the default, and you can get a 3rd gen i7 upgrade), Intel 802.11 A/G/B/N (the G/B/N is default-I got the upgrade so I could connect to my A network or my N network), an extra 6-cell battery (optional, but I like being able to take my laptop away from the desk for long periods of time), and a 1 year warranty (1 year is default, but most repairs are done in the first year).
All this for $914.00. Talk about bang for your buck. I looked all around, and didn't find any laptop that came close in either value or specs alone.
The base price is $689. They are going to refresh the Lemur Ultra soon for a more expensive (but more modern) version, so if you want a cheap laptop with good specs and compatibility with Ubuntu guaranteed, I recommend buying this laptop. One thing is for sure-this is a nice laptop. I am going to treat it as if it was a Mac, it is that nice (and it seems that they underpriced it, if you ask me).
One last thing-this is one quiet laptop. Part of it has to be given to the SSD (no moving parts means less heat is generated), but it is really a noticeable difference. My typing alone can knock out the quiet hum of the fan. I can also feel very little heat exiting the laptop. My old laptop heated up to the point where it felt like an oven baking cookies at 350 until I got an external fan, which helped. I doubt this laptop will ever require one of those.
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Originally Posted by blackbird34
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