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Thinkpads For Penguin Lovers: Q3 2000
MikeFM writes: "It looks like IBM is set to release
Linux Thinkpads! This is great news to my ears. I am just holding out for a Transmeta powered Linux Thinkpad and then I can be happy. I do hope these Thinkpads are compatible with other versions of Linux though. I always use either Debian or Mandrake. Being that these would have limited use as a server I'd probably go w/ Mandrake." Question is, why so long? Thinkpads have been running Linux for a long time, after all.
http://www.goingware.com/laptop
Note that the machine came with Windows 98 installed and doesn't support NT; NT was the most difficult installation and still doesn't work very well.
On the other hand I've been testing the 2.4.0-test1-ac* kernels every few days and generally they work pretty well. The only serious problem I had was that my Adaptec 1480 SlimSCSI card didn't work; that wasn't a problem with the laptop itself but some problem in the Linux PCI drivers as well as a temporary bug in the SCSI driver. Recent 2.4.0 kernel patches work great and I can burn CD's off my laptop through SCSI.
If you're considering buying a laptop, I encourage you to read my page on my laptop, as I think the information I give could improve the wisdom of your choice.
Generally I've been happy with how it works, but I'm afraid I'm not so happy with the mechanical design of the thing; there's a ribbon cable in the DVD drive that gets tangled when I close it if it's been opened too far, and the most serious problem right now is that the power adapter doesn't always make good contact so the battery drains even when it's plugged in. Sometimes if I leave the house with Linux running it will power down while I'm away. Note that I've only had the unit for 7 months; if they could have the same electrical design but built for more rugged use I think I'd be happy.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
The only problem is, a 1 GHz Crusoe chip wouldn't perform as well as an equivalently clocked P!!! or Athlon. Of course, you're also not going to see 1 GHz P!!! or Athlon notebooks for a long time anyway, thanks to the huge power consumption issues, but I just wanted to remind of the "megahertz trap" too many people fall into, thinking that the clock speed of the processor has anything to do with its actual speed.
Most Slashdot readers know the difference between performance and clockspeed, but I think this will be an issue that'll be important when Transmeta-powered equipment hits the mainstream notebook/PDA/appliance market: Joe Sixpack and Joe Marketing will get their Crusoe-powered notebooks, and realize, "Hey, what gives, this 1 GHz Crusoe notebook isn't any better than my P!!! 600 notebook. I've been cheated!" I fear that the clockspeed/performance differential between Crusoe and x86 processors will become an albatross around Transmeta's neck, possibly damaging its reputation among non-geeks. After all, the non-Geek would read that it takes a 1 GHz Crusoe to be as powerful as a 600MHz P!!! or Athlon*, and deduce that somehow the Crusoe is inferior, not realizing the Crusoe's strong points and completely different architecture. I fear that magazines for the semi-computer-literate will fuel the fire, magazines like those in ZD's stable of consumer-targeted stuff. A similar thing dogged the K6-2, though the K6-2 certainly didn't have Crusoe's low power consumption or nifty new architecture; but, not being clock-for-clock as powerful as P!!! or even Celeron did hurt its image.
*: The comparison here is pulled out of my ass rather than from actual figures since I don't have the time to look them up/calculate a good comparison, but they shouldn't be too far off the mark.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, *The Annals*
I used to sell Thinkpads running Debian GNU/Linux under the Linux Laptops Ltd. brand.
JWZ is right: they are buggy as hell. IBM documents the bugs candidly as "Considerations" in their manual, so they happen in Windows too. Thus, the answer to JWZ's question is, "No, it will be just as buggy under Linux as under Windows."
Incidentally, the IBM laptop drives were the least reliable of any I handled. I never had a Toshiba or Hitachi drive fail, but lost two IBM drives during burn-in.
The BIOS access problem, though, has been mostly solved by Thomas Hood's "tpctl" program. IBM, uniquely, has provided a protected-mode interface to the BIOS so that you can reconfigure BIOS modes without shutting down Linux. Furthermore, IBM's PS2 program runs under DOS, so you still don't need Windows even for the things tpctl doesn't do.
I did get suspend/resume mostly working... on some models you have to unplug from the power main before popping out a network card. Also, you have to have all your programs close the sound devices first, or you won't get sound again until you cycle power. (Rebooting isn't enough!) Thus, the "esd" sound mixer daemon component of Enlightenment, or the equivalent in Gnome, messes up the hardware on suspend. It is useless to try to run APM event scripts: IBM's BIOS doesn't deliver the events, at least on the 600. (The 570 seemed to do better.)
I suspect the buggy BIOS is because they don't really have actual I/O devices; they are all simulated by the DSP gadget that also does the modem. The whole mess is probably so complicated they dare not touch it for fear of breaking something else too. At least, each model has a different set of bugs, and they never get fixed, year after year.
Why do people not complain more? Maybe because very few buy it with their own money, and maybe because most who have them are managers and don't really use them, or spent so much they feel they *must* have got their money's worth; or are embarrassed not to have done their homework. Your guess is as good as mine.
I saw this, and it brought to mind just how far Linux has come. Think back a couple of years: two years ago, before Mozilla, before the "great database ports of '98", back when kernel 2.0 had been current for years, we were glad to see any mention of Linux, any hint of support. If IBM had so much as mentioned Linux on a web page, it would have rated a mention on Slashdot.
Anyone remember the "YALA" (Yet Another Linux Article) Stories? Back when any mention of Linux in a magazine other than Linux Journal warranted a Slashdot post?
Yet, today we complain when a major manufacturer is sluggish in pre-loading Linux. Not that we shouldn't complain, but I think it's an interesting contrast.
I look around, and I see a whole new band of Linux users. People who've never edited a Makefile -- who think that installing a program consists of "rpm -ivh" or, just maybe, "tar -xzvf" are becoming commonplace. Advanced users may know how to run "./configure; make; make install" -- but xmkmf (then editing the created makefile because xmkmf never worked right on any system I ever used) is a thing of the past. I don't resent these newcomers. In fact, I'm delighted to have them.
But it's definitely a totally different world from the Bad Old Days when I first ran Linux by booting from a floppy, then switching over to a root disk! (This was before lilo). No hard drives, no nothing. Anyone else remember SLS?
*sigh* I guess I'm getting old.
--
-- Slashdot sucks.
IBM has been shipping ThinkPads with Linux for a couple of years now. A friend of mine at a former job was able to order, straight from IBM, a ThinkPad 600 (IIRC) with RedHat 5.2. They have been quietly shipping them this way if you requested it. Its good to see them being more open about it.
--Storm
But you had to buy windows with it and install linux yourself. :] but Seriously now the ibm thinkpad I series seems to be 100 percent linux compatible ive been running red hat 6.X on my 1400 since i got it 8 or so months ago.
Too bad there won't be any machines like this based on Athlons anytime soon. AMD is having some serious problems with power consumption.
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Oscarfish.com: tropical fish with attitude. Way t
I think you're still haven't "lowered" yourself to the consumers level here. IMHO most members of the Sixpack family won't notice the difference between a Pentium at 600MHz and one at 1GHz. The vast majority will just go for the Gigahertz label at a good price, and then get a pleasant surprise from the extended battery life that Crusoe notebooks are likely to be sporting.
ZZ
that, will be the day we know linux has finally arrived.
They may also have to replace certain components (like winmodems, DVD players) with Linux-compatible ones, which cost more money.
Is it just me, or does it strike anybody else that there's something very, erm, down-right disturbing about the title of this article?
Stay up hacking each weekend. Sleep is for the week.
Somemore good news about the Microsoft break up.
Do you think that even Big IBM would have done something like this before Microsofts business practices came under carefull eye of the US Government? Nope, not at all. MS would called them up and said, "I think your OEM contract is going to increase ALOT unless you dump Linux".
Now with MS under control and getting punished for their past business practices we will now see more thing like this. More companies saying, "Hey! we can release products and hardware that dont support MS products only".
I dont know about you, but I think this is a good thing.
Linux O Muerte!