Is there really only a single USB-C port, and is that port also needed for charging? Does that port support DisplayPort?

Thanks!

The USB-C port is Thunderbolt 4. I think that means it should support DP too, but don't take my word for it. USB-C/Thunderbolt confuse me.

HDMI version: 2.0

USB-C Interface: DisplayPort (DP Alt Mode)

USB-C version: Thunderbolt 4 (up to 40 Gbps) [Intel only]

USB-A version: 3.2 Gen 1 (up to 5 Gbps)

Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to two displays with 4096x2304 resolution at 60Hz

I was on an Intel MBP previously and everything I was using it for is supported just fine on M1. Some things require Rosetta but most big apps have updated support for M1 directly at this point.

Our docker development environment was based on x64 but it was pretty trivial to add support for ARM to it.

Gaming can be a challenge (when hasn't it been with Mac though), particularly GamePass games (through Parallels Windows 11) seems to be a hit-or-miss. Games through Steam, even virtualized through Parallels, have been fine though. On my M1 Max w/ 64GB memory I can play everything I've tried at ultra settings.

A couple of examples I've run into that weren't trivial: Chrome on Linux doesn't support ARM (Chromium does), nor does Microsoft's SQL Server Docker image (though their Azure version of SQL Server does, and for most, it's no real difference)

Contrary to other comments later, I have no niche needs. Well… I’m predominantly a Perl coder, so that’s niche but nothing to do with architecture. I spend most of my days with just iTerm, a couple of browsers, Slack. Not much else. I’ve been an edit-over-ssh developer for 20 years.

My M1 was also my first experience of Big Sur, so I was never sure whether my issue was hardware or software. But issues I had:

• frequently it would stop all ipv4 networking, going ipv6 only (which in practical terms meant I went offline)

• I would often - multiple times a week - lose all sound devices. Suddenly things would go silent, and all inputs/outputs (including the built in speakers/mic) would disappear from preferences. For a while only a reboot would fix it, until I learned to `killall coreaudiod`

• chrome would often say “you don’t have a camera”, which I could only fix by a reboot (we use Google Meet, and safari was always terrible with it. But I just prefer chrome anyway)

I had a variety of other problems but can’t recall them clearly enough to list them, especially from this temporal distance.

[EDITED to add: I did go through hardware checks and company IT checks, but nothing ever came up as faulty]

I did love that it was silent and permanently cool, but that was about it. Since it too was always plugged in, any difference in trackpad or keyboard or battery life made zero odds to me, and that’s why those things don’t matter to me about the Starbook either.

When Monterey came out I upgraded and actually things got mostly (but not entirely) better. But by that time I’d ordered the Starbook, and the desktop Linux experience has been so good - not to mention just a refreshing change - that I don’t regret it one bit. And if I do, well, the work MBP is sat in the corner and I can resurrect it…

The only downside I've seen is that I can't seem to tax it, which has made me lazy -- I now have hundreds of chrome tabs open over dozens of windows and it hasn't skipped a beat.

Macbook Pro eliminated this limitation, but it almost feels like it's using the same technology, as it often loses window locations.

Early on software support was limited, but for many apps, that's been resolved. (Even "unsupported" apps can still run, though I typically don't jump through many hoops, especially when I run into Docker images that don't support ARM)