What laptops are made as much in Europe as possible?

9 months ago by birdwing to c/buyeuropean

See title. I'm curious if there's one independent from the US, and if possible also from China.

Or well, at least as independent from Big US spy tech as possible. While Apple is nice, it's proprietary and I don't trust them in the long term.

hellfire103 18 points 9 months ago

StarLabs, Tuxedo, and Slimbook come to mind. There's also MNT, but their laptops are quite chunky.

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Nilz 13 points 9 months ago

Aren't these all Clevo rebrands? I know at least Tuxedos are. Clevo is a Taiwanese company.

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Ilumar 14 points 9 months ago

Tuxedo (based in Germany) are Clevos. Slimbook (based in Spain) sells Clevo and maybe Tongfang, not sure.

StarLabs assembles their own laptops in the UK, but I think their parts are still Chinese/Taiwanese because where else are you going to buy laptop parts?

Personally I would not rule out buying Tuxedo/Slimbook just because the manufacturing is in Asia. Ultimately the components for any laptop will be sourced from there anyway and at least you get support from a European company.

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corsicanguppy 8 points 9 months ago

Ah. If you can't get "perfect", always try for "better" and hope to drive evolution.

(But see also USA election failure 2024)

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birdwing 2 points 9 months ago

Slimbook looks interesting. If the parts are from Asia, I hope it's Taiwan -- this looks promising. They sadly advertise with an "AI" part, which, ew. But they seem good other than that.

Starlabs is also very interesting, they got a few privacy features. They're UK-based, though.

Tuxedo seems like it's good but mostly focused on people who just want a laptop that works.

Out of all options mentioned in this thread so far, those three seem like the best options - they offer Linux and are more European. I think I will go for the Starlabs one, the customisation is clear and easy, and they do have privacy features.

I think to everyone I'd tell:

Want a laptop that just works? Tuxedo.
Want to support open-source devs? Slimbook.
Privacy? Starlabs.

Dumb question, but are all of these laptops customisable in terms of OS? Like custom boots, etc? And what regarding their security?

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Ilumar 1 point 9 months ago

They sadly advertise with an “AI” part, which, ew. But they seem good other than that.

That's just what AMD calls their latest laptop CPU line. I don't like the name either, but performance-wise they look really good from what I've seen.

are all of these laptops customisable in terms of OS?

I haven't bought any of these laptops so far, I just looked into them because I was considering it. That said, all of them offer various Linux distros, Windows, or no OS at all. I don't see why you wouldn't be able to install whatever you want on them.

As for security I'm really not the person to ask. The way I see it, a computer is as secure as you make it. StarLabs shipping with coreboot out of the box does seem interesting though, if you want to go full tinfoil hat :)

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PCurd 12 points 9 months ago

Lots of laptops are actually made by Clevo - they are Taiwanese at least. ASUS and MSI are also Taiwanese.

Some manufacturers like CyberPowerPC are at least assembled in Europe - same with Chillblast. Likely a Clevo or Tongfang (Chinese) laptop underneath though.

Otherwise Nokia in Finland, Medion, SHIFT, Tuxedo, or Wortmann all from Germany spring to mind.

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tomiant 4 points 9 months ago

I will never forgive ASUS for the 2005-2008 restructuring. They used to make great computers. Then came the fucking MBAs and ruined the brand.

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RyanDownyJr 2 points 9 months ago

I'm too young to know what ASUS was like before my first computer I built in 2013. I will say that I have always had quality from them. I think one time I had something DOA and they replaced it with expedited shipping. I've always bought ASUS where I could and when I haven't I went elsewhere and got let down. MSI and Acer monitors broke within two years for instance.

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birdwing 1 point 9 months ago

I actually looked at the Nokia ones! But they don't sell it on their site, and say they're not the manufacturers nor retailers... However, another search explained to me that they use Windows. Yeah, no thanks.

Tuxedo seems interesting, but ugh, the chips are AMD or Intel, and those are both American... we really need European digital stuff makers. But other than that, they seem good, using Linux. As long as the Intel Management Engine can be disabled, I guess.

Medion seems to partner with Amazon, so no thanks.

SHIFT seems to have HP (American) and Lenovo (Chinese), so I'll rule that out.

Wortmann is involved with Microsoft, so also a no-go for me.

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porter70000 2 points 9 months ago

I don’t know if the product is built in Europe but it’s a Dutch company. https://frame.work/

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