Table of contents

• • 1. The Darter Pro: My Reliable Daily Driver
  • 2. The Meerkat: My Linux Desktop
  • 3. The Serval WS: A Beast, but ultimately not for me
• The System76 Difference: Exceptional Machines and Support
  • Conclusion: Why I Keep Choosing System76

1. The Darter Pro: My Reliable Daily Driver

I bought my first System76 laptop in February of 2020. I'm still typing this blog post out on it.

It has been my reliable daily driver for 4 years through two startups and near daily hacking on my own projects, tons of technical writing, home organizational work, consulting and freelancing...

Here's the specs I bought:

• 15" Matte FHD 1080p Matte FHD Display
• Intel® UHD Graphics
• Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (64-bit) (since upgraded)
• 4.2 GHz i5-10210U (1.6 up to 4.2 GHz - 6 MB Cache - 4 Cores - 8 Threads)
• 32 GB Dual Channel DDR4 at 2666MHz (2× 16GB)
• United States Keyboard
• 1 TB NVMe Seq Read: 3,500 MB/s, Seq Write: 3,300 MB/s
• WiFi up to 867 Mbps + Bluetooth 5
• 65 W Extra Charger
• 3 Year Limited Parts and Labor Warranty
• 3 Day Rush Assembly Service

The final price was $1888.00.

I've upgraded Ubuntu twice, migrated this website from Next.js pages router to app router, built a full e-commerce integration, interactive visualizations, distributed systems on AWS that were heavy on Docker builds, and the rest. I've had zero issues with the machine.

I've customized it to my liking (Neovim, Tmux, various command line tools), and, more recently Cursor.sh for AI-assisted development. I have never run Pop OS, System76's open-source operating system, but I've run Ubuntu on all my machines and had a great experience.

I order my System76 builds with Ubuntu pre-installed, but the first thing I do when I receive it is re-install Ubuntu from my own flashed drive so that I can configure full disk encryption and set a root password. This has worked very well for all the computers I've bought from System76.

Two weeks ago, I opened the case to lift up the keyboard so I could thoroughly clean the keyboard and underneath it. It has required no other maintenance in the time I've owned it.

The most common criticms I see leveraged at System76 machines is that the cases are thin and weak.

I agree with this criticism, particularly with the version of the Darter Pro that I got, but nevertheless this machine has transited the globe with me with no issues. I keep it in a soft case and I don't throw it against walls even when I really want to.

My understanding is that newer versions of the Darter Pro got a metal case upgrade.

2. The Meerkat: My Linux Desktop

My Darter Pro is ideal for moving around and coding or writing (it's actually weakest for conferencing + video calls in my experience), but I needed a stable desktop setup that I could specialize in:

• Video calls / conferencing / pair-coding
• Video recording
• Video editing
• Livestreaming
• DevOps work (Docker builds, AWS deployments, CLI development, CI/CD jobs)

I bought a Meerkat in April 2021 and quickly set it up to be my primary desktop computer.

Again, I've had essentially zero issues with this machine since buying it. It has successfully handled everything I've thrown at it:

• OBS Studio and heavy video editing workflows
• Steam link chicanery
• Multiple simultaneous video inputs
• Livestreaming via OBS Studio WHILE performing Steam link chicanery and handling Xbox 360 controller seamlessly
• Streamdeck integration to control my lights, run scripts, CLIs, etc

I've written more in depth about the how and why of this setup here.

Here's the specs I bought:

• Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (64-bit)
• 4.7 GHz i7-10710U (1.1 up to 4.7 GHz - 12 MB Cache - 6 Cores - 12 Threads)
• 64 GB Dual Channel DDR4 at 2666 MHz (2x 32GB)
• 500 GB NVMe Seq. Read: 3500/s, Write: 3200MB/s
• No Additional Storage
• 1 Year Limited Parts & Labor Warranty
• Rush Assembly - Ships the following business day from assembly
• System76 Meerkat Packaging
• Meerkat painted lid

The final price was $1,431.00.

It's not even loud!

3. The Serval WS: A Beast, but ultimately not for me

In May 2023, I purchased a Serval WS, because I was pivoting into a role at Pinecone, so I wanted a machine with a powerful GPU so that I could screw around with machine learning tasks locally to learn.

Here's the specs I bought:

• Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
• 5.4 GHz (i9-13900HX - up to 5.4 GHz - 36MB Cache - 8 P-cores and 16 E-cores)
• 64 GB Dual Channel DDR5 up to 4800 MHz (2x 32GB)
• 2 TB PCIe Gen4 Up to Seq Read: 7,000 MB/s, Seq Write: 5,100 MB/s
• No Additional Storage
• United States QWERTY Keyboard
• WiFi 6E + Bluetooth 5
• 280 Watt Extra Charger
• 2 Year Limited Parts and Labor Warranty
• 8 GB GeForce RTX 4070 with 4608 CUDA Cores
• 17.3" Matte Ultra HD 4K (144 Hz)

The final price was $3,485.00.

Ultimately, I did not keep this machine, but my only issue with it was that I opted for too large of a screen (17") which resulted in the keyboard dimensions being skewed far enough outside of what my muscle memory has adapted to over the years.

The System76 Difference: Exceptional Machines and Support

Throughout my purchase, build and shipping phase, I was in touch with the always stellar System76 support team, who are reliably:

• Responsive
• Friendly
• Actually helpful
• Willing to go above and beyond

Every single experience I've ever had with System76 support has been outstanding.

Conclusion: Why I Keep Choosing System76

System76 builds excellent machines with zero bullshit on them, and they provide excellent support.

This is why I am always happy to whole-heartedly recommend them.

This is not a sponsored post and nobody from System76 ever asked me to share my experiences.