[bachmeier]

I've considered buying a System 76 laptop for years, but it's really hard to find satisfied customers. I'd be concerned if the reviews were largely positive but included a few from people with bad experiences - I don't want to be one of the unlucky few. That's not the case at all. There's almost unanimous agreement that these are poor quality machines.

[AndrewUnmuted]

I am a satisfied customer of System76. I own a Lemur laptop which I basically maxed out. I've had it since December, and am very pleased with the build quality, the keyboard, and the battery life.

My suspicion is that a lot of people don't know how to configure a Linux OS for optimal laptop use. I imagine that even if one were to keep the Ubuntu installation that comes with the unit there are many further optimizations that can be performed to improve battery life.

[cwyers]

Why on Earth would you want to buy a laptop from a specialty Linux laptop vendor (at more expense for the same specs than a standard Windows OEM laptop) if you just need to optimize the installed Linux to get good battery life? Isn't that supposed to be the value-add of buying from a vendor that specializes in Linux laptops?

[dajohnson89]

I'm a satisfied Meerkat owner. I've had it for almost two years now, and not a single hitch. Only minor complaint I have, is that I wish the price were lower. That would've enabled me to buy a more powerful machine. Now, I'm hurting for an upgrade and the only real economical way to get the specs that I need with hardware that's Linux-supported is building my own rig.

[bytecodes]

I used a System76 Gazelle for work and getting a master's degree in CS. Wonderful machine for those purposes. Ubuntu on a laptop, with actual supported drivers, made working in python, java, and scala quick and easy (apt is still better than brew) and it was portable. I've been tempted to buy another since Apple seems stuck at 16GB. However, the webcam did stop working after 1 year.

[imperialWicket]

I've got a 5 year old Leopard and a 1.5 year old Wild Dog that are perfectly satisfactory. I have a month old Oryx, and my sentiment follows the general comments - I'd probably spend just a little more to go Dell/Lenovo for the next laptop. The rebranded Clevo machines just aren't the same build quality and on a laptop (for many users) that's a meaningful issue.

[greydius]

I bought a Gazelle 3 years ago and also have a 2015 MBP that my work got for me. I'll admit that the MBP is built very well and the retina screen is fantastic, but I prefer using the Gazelle. I like the keyboard better and Ubuntu (in my opinion, of course) is superior to Mac OS in every way. Also, I haven't had any problems like others have reported.