[dkhenry]

When I was shopping for a new labtop I initially settled on the Series 9, but when the 2013 rMBP's came out they really trumped the Series 9 in the hardware department so I returned the Series 9 and got a rMBP. The good thing is that the Series 9 was just as good build quality, and had excellent battery life. Also it was priced well and I think its part of the reason the 2013 crop of Macbooks had to come down in price the way they did.

I think shortly we will see the monopoly that Apple has on high end well designed laptops will come to an end.

[MatthiasP]

I was in a similar situation a year ago and decided to go with the Series 9 with Full HD screen instead of a MBPr.

The weight advantage of the Series 9 and the screen are nice, but battery life, keyboard and trackpad are way behind Apple's quality. My next laptop will come from Apple and i don't see any competitor coming close any time soon. Samsung will drop out of the laptop market in 2015 alltogether btw.