If you need 32GB of RAM, then the ThinkPad T460 would qualify. And Lenovo claims it has 18 hours of battery life, which seems more than decent to me.

I switched from MacBook Pros to the ThinkPad T Series running GNU/Linux a few years ago and I have not been disappointed. My only caveat is that I like to run Debian stable, and that seems to work better on older ThinkPads, especially for things like video chats. In my experience, the newer ThinkPads work better with distros that use newer kernels (at least I think that is why), such as Ubuntu or Fedora.

I would have suggested the T460s, which is lighter, but that only goes up to 20GB of RAM.

I have an earlier version of the precision. You can easily extend the RAM in the precision line, but I am not entirely sure about the XPS.

That said, two things I wish I could have known earlier:

- Get the 1080p version. The intel GPU can not handle 4K (or atleast the one on mine did not).

- The default battery is not enough. Go for the 90WHr battery. I chose the 2 hard disks option, but the good thing is that the battery is replaceable. So I am hoping to get the higher capacity battery soon.

1. Dell precision 15 +IGZO screen, preloaded with ubuntu

2. Thinkpad T460p

There are few quirks, webcam light stays on after use, SD card slot not working but the whole Hackintosh community is great at solving problems.