Fair enough, I agree with most of the things you said. The one I got is made of aluminum and doesn’t feel cheap/thin at all, I guess they have both cheap and “professional” options. Personally I wasn’t looking for something really unique, just for something that had a decent performance for a laptop and works well with Linux. I searched around and this model ticked all my most important boxes.
I don’t know whether Clevo engineers throught about Linux when they designed the device or not, but I can say after configuring it properly, it works without any flaws.
As for buying straight from China, I consider the idea, but at the time I didn’t find a way to buy it for cheaper than buying from a reseller. I’m in Europe, perhaps in the US or in Asia it would be different.