System76’s Lemur Pro Debuts With Twitter Fanfare
The company touted the new laptop’s processors, battery life, and 180-degree hinge in a tweet:
The laptop sells on System76’s website for $1,149.00 and is marketed toward developers. Buyers have a choice of operating systems: the standard Ubuntu 22.04 LTS release or System76’s customized version, Pop!_OS. System76 naturally makes the latter the preferred option.
Lemur Pro Tech Specs
Prospective buyers can choose between an Intel Core i5-1235U or i7-1255U CPU. The 14.1-inch screen has a native resolution of 1920 x 1080. Both processors support up to 10 cores and the latter has a clock speed of up to 4.7 GHz. Up to 40 GB of RAM is available, with up to 4 TB of data across two SSDs for storage.
As with most modern devices, charging is done with USB-C. System76 promises up to 14 hours of battery life. The firmware is also open-source, based on Coreboot, with System76 touting the “right to repair.”
Lemur Pro’s “Linux Tax”
The System 76 Lemur Pro’s price is higher than many comparable Windows laptops. This trend is common across pre-installed Linux laptops, including those from Dell, HP, or Lenovo, despite the OS being free of charge. This is because they’re marketed toward programmers and data scientists. This specialized market may be just more willing to pay for a machine without Windows.
This seems ironic given that the cost of Windows licenses that Linux devotees didn’t use supposedly jacking up PC prices inspired the late ’90s publicity stunt, Windows Refund Day.
There’s nothing stopping Linux users from purchasing standard Windows laptops and installing Linux from them, but makers like System76 promise a more integrated experience and freedom from occasional Linux hardware hiccups. It’s a similar justification to the one that Apple users give for the prices they pay for their hardware.
System76 seems to have anticipated the criticism of a “Linux tax” by highlighting that financing is available for their machines from Klarna.
System 76 Lemur Pro Part of Growing Linux Hardware Market
System76’s new laptop is proof that the Linux hardware market continues to grow and teeters on the edge of becoming mainstream. Linux diehards considering a new machine might want to take a serious look at a computer with Linux pre-installed, despite ending up with a bigger hole in their wallets than with a Windows machine.
