System76 Bringing Out "Pangolin" As An AMD Renoir Linux Laptop

Ever since AMD has been on a stellar trajectory with their hardware, users have been begging System76 to release an AMD Linux laptop... That's now finally coming with their upcoming Pangolin launch.

System76 today disclosed Pangolin as their first AMD-powered laptop with Ryzen (Zen 2) CPU cores and Radeon graphics. In particular, the Pangolin comes with the option of the Ryzen 5 4500U or Ryzen 7 4700U and making use of the integrated Vega graphics.

The System76 Pangolin features a 15.6-inch 1080p display, up to 64GB of DDR4-3200 memory, one M.2 NVMe SSD slot, USB 3.2 Gen1 / USB 3.2 Gen2 connectivity, and other standard features. The Pangolin measures in at 36 x 23.9 x 1.99 cm and weighs 1.65 kg.

Pricing will start at $849 USD for the 4500U model. There doesn't appear to yet be a firm launch date but the Pangolin product page simply says to be notified in the future of its actual launch.

It's nice to see System76 finally introducing an AMD Ryzen laptop though a bit unfortunate it's launching so late after the other major laptop players with their Renoir laptop models while still priced at a premium. At January's CES 2021 virtual keynote is where AMD is expected to already announce their Ryzen 5000 series mobile processors. With next-gen Ryzen 5000 mobile CPUs just potentially weeks away and given the incredible uplift we've found out of Zen 3, those forthcoming parts will likely be very compelling. Hopefully System76's next iteration of their AMD laptops will be able to arrive more punctually now that they have left the gate with their first mobile AMD design.