I put a LOT of the blame on ARM chipset manufacturers. The reason you can't get a good ARM laptop that isn't a Mac is because the chipset manufacturers treat them like they treat everything else. They want to have a custom patched kernel that's already 2 decades old and they drop support for it next month.
It says a lot that probably the best in the space is the humble Raspberry Pi.
I'd probably make a point of buying a half-decent Pi laptop. I bought a 400, compile the Pi versions of my audio plugins on it.
Pi laptop with the most cursory audio I/O? I'm there. Not to live, but to support as a first class production option. There's something very 'sailboat with solar panel' about 'em.
It says a lot that probably the best in the space is the humble Raspberry Pi.