Quoted By:
My current laptop is a several years old chromebook running outdated ubuntu lts through depthboot on firmware meant for a different chromebook (long-ish story). As such, I'm tired of everything breaking, and now the storage is starting to fail, so I'm looking for a new (or used) laptop.
I'd appreciate any recommendations you could give.
Must-haves:
>16:9 aspect ratio screen
>At least (or ideally) 1080p
>Big trackpad with no buttons, just pressure sensitive
>Normal firmware (including coreboot if it works well)
>Relatively modern SSD
>Non-ancient i5 (or equivalent) or better.
>At least 8 GB RAM
>Backlit keyboard
>Good GNU/Linux support; sorry MS Surface laptops
>ANSI style EN-US QWERTY keyboard with short enter button
Ideally:
>Under $250, burgerland (new or used)
>Function keys, especially in chromebook style with back/forward/reload buttons. Bonus if volume, brightness, and keyboard backlight controls too.
>USB-C charging, especially with a port on either side, but especially the right side.
>Either all full-height arrow keys or all half-height arrow keys; not full-height left/right and half-height up/down; pgup/pgdn above left/right are acceptable, but ideally absent.
>SD card slot
>Looks nice/cool; not a plain black plastic; ideally a metal shell or (especially) something with a wood grain or otherwise patterned look like picrel
