I recently came to the realization that gaming is just not important to me any longer and sold off my 5700xt and Ryzen 7 2700x for a nice little profit.
I want to go full Laptop mode with dock at home. My work PC is already running this way.
I’m now looking at a new ThinkPad and for some reason, a Xeon Portable Workstation sounds cool. Definitely overkill, but within the budget at this point thanks to company discounts.
In your opinion, what benefits does a Xeon Laptop have over an i7 or Ryzen?
I don’t compile code. I’m in finance, but have a work machine. I write books and produce/host a podcast in my spare time.
Totally overkill. The value of Xeon is ECC memory, and on server/desktops extra PCIe lanes for high speed connectivity.
I would focus more on the quality of keyboard on the laptop since it sounds like that and the screen are going to be the most valuable parts. The rest will fall out from there.
I personally really like the keyboard on the Dell XPS series its great for a typeset, I would start my reviews there and then see if any competing laptops seem to have all the highlights you are looking for.
One note, right now AMD is winning on performance per watt so mobile Ryzen with a good keyboard and screen would be my go to.
Any workstation laptop will be a poor substitute for a thin/light with decent battery life and screen/trackpad/keyboard connecting back to a server or desktop.
For your use a Xeon will be massive, massive overkill and you could likely get by with a Chromebook/MacBook Air/etc.
I’d say things like keyboard quality, battery life, display quality and trackpad will be far more important/relevant to your experience than internal processor/gpu spec.
As above, if you can go test drive some laptop keyboards. A lot of machines that compete on hardware spec have totally garbage input devices and screens. For typing, etc. these things will be far more important.
Intel Xeons are more geared to stability [sustained use, slightly higher QA/QC], multiple peripherals [added PCIe lanes / typically a dGPU / etc.] and ECC Memory support. Those mobile workstations can be a bit power hungry, along with having size… Ryzen would have best wattage performance [4000 series +].
I’d keep tabs on keyboard / trackpad / screen [+ battery wrt the laptop size], as those be your most used elements, esp. if you’re entertaining long typing periods.
Multiple peripherals [additional PCIe lanes / often a dGPU / etc.] and ECC Memory support are more oriented to Intel Xeons. Those mobile workstations, in addition to being large, may be somewhat power demanding… The optimum wattage performance would be Ryzen [4000 series +].
I’d keep an eye on the keyboard, trackpad, and screen [plus battery based on laptop size], as those, will be your most-used components, especially if you’ll be typing for lengthy periods of time.