I’m not that desperate, I don’t need another dongle sticking out of my laptop. This is OK for stationary use, but not to move between various rooms, tables, hammock in the garden ;)…
I have some workaround, another wifi network that is closer to the garden with smaller speeds but better signal in that area. It’s not ideal, because the old laptop worked so much better on the weaker, but still 5G direct network, However, it is what it is. I could even think about buying a better router for this garden router.
M2 slot would not fit for NVMe, there is not enough room and the screw placement is dedicated to small, wifi cards. Basically, other SSD card stands in the way, unless I would somehow place it over it and glued it ;).
It seems to be a much older card without Wifi6, Bluetooth 5.1 and max speed 1.73 Gbps, while newer ones have 2.4 Gbps, but that may be counted for wifi 6, so the 5 may have similar value.
Besides, what I learned today, many Intel cards work with Intel CPUs only. Because most laptops come with Intel CPU, then no wonder those Intel cards will work. Having AMD CPU, I must pick up only those “AMD certified” models. Alas, there is no info about that so-called certification. They should have listed it in specs, but why help the competition? On that note, AMD should list of compatible hardware instead, because it benefits them. Maybe they just did that, but we-laymen, don’t know it?
Maybe I’ll post TUXEDO Sirius 16 Gen1 review, but from the perspective of a long Alienware 17 R3 user.
Still, I think it is fair to give it a month or more till I give my judgement. I’m still ironing out quirks with my old Manjaro install (8,5 years old install) and the tuxedo software and drivers don’t fully support Sirius yet, so some things don’t work.
So for now only shortly and much later with details:
Cons:
bad wifi card (only in my model, the rest comes with AX210 which should be fine)
very silent sound and without bases, which, as I heard, is standard for laptops, but the previous one had better sound, which I always considered bad, so I couldn’t imagine it could be worse… so good headphones or JBLs are a must
still fresh hardware that is not fully supported yet (Tuxedo Control Center with limited functionality and keyboard - lack of FN shortcuts)
very loud fans, probably standard in those form factor, still, I am not used to it as Alienware had no fan control, so fans were rarely working, so it was very quiet… additionally Alienware was a heavy brick, so it did have a lot of place to disperse the heat,
the battery is just standard, typical for gaming laptops, nothing has changed in 10 years… realistically 3-3,5 hours of office work, could go to 4 with some battery saving settings, 5 when basically idle
Pros:
great, sturdy aluminum chassis
great keyboard, nice to type
very nice keyboard RGB lights
great touchpad
great screen with high resolution and refresh rate
not so bulky form, small screen bezels, laptop is thinner than many typical gaming laptops, weights less, so it’s much nicer to work with when keeping on your knees,
great gaming performance, comparable to Nvidia 4070
AMD dGPU, just works, without tinkering in hybrid mode, at least for Vulkan/Proton games
dGPU turns off when not used
stereo sound that you can actually hear, meaning you hear the stereo clearly, but sound is still too quiet
I got the replay from TUXEDO and from the newer cards they tested only AX210, and it’s the only one they can recommend at this time.
So if I want something better, I have to pay attention to the info if it works on AMD, and risk it.
The price change from 160MHz Wifi 6 cards to 320MHz Wifi 7 ones is just 15 EUR (my current one has lousy 80MHz and that feels). If I were sure the newer card would work, I would not hesitate. Some better cards, not from Intel but also BE200, are said to be working with AMD, are available from the USA online stores with a good price, and they ship to Europe. But in case of issues, I’m at lost. Locally the choice is really small. I will keep looking for a while, but most probably will buy AX210 for now.
