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Review: LinuxCertified LC2210 Laptop
'It's me' writes "OSNews reviews LinuxCertified's LC2210 laptop, which comes with Xandros Desktop 2.0. That laptop is meant to be 100% certified with Linux, but Xandros seemed to have problems with it (namely there is no "sleep" function, while WiFi was not as robust as users would want it). LinuxCertified said that newer distros should be able to support this laptop with no hickups. The reviewer concludes that this a great purchase, as long as you are more selective over the distro installed."
that certified actually doesn't mean certified completely. I'm sure this will instill a lot of confidence in non-linux users going to linux.
This is an encouraging step forward. I've bought a few laptops off ebay in my time and spent many an hour researching beforehand to ensure that every part would work with my favourite OS.
What would be great would be an independant company that could certify linux compatibility for a one off fee. I realise there are various websites where users can submit whether it worked for them or not, but it can take a while for new hardware to be listed and the information is often out of date.
That laptop is meant to be 100% certified with Linux, but Xandros seemed to have problems with it (namely there is no "sleep" function)
Sleep?! Linux geeks dont need no stinkin' sleep!
But seriously, nice to see linux certified consumer hardware making its way into the market.
Sorry for they thinkgeek plugging, not associated, just a happy part of the smart masses
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the
And just to validate my statement, let me mention briefl the 'ups' of the laptop, and the 'downs':
ups:
The laptop has a pretty good, bright screen (minus one dead pixel, visible when the background is dark).
Performance is very good. In fact, I think that laptop has more sprightly response and speed than any of my other machines here. KDE's and Xandros' applications pretty much load instantly. 3D support is also preconfigured and display a flight simulator with no lag at all.
The feel and construction of the laptop is very solid overall. The keyboard's feel is also very good, I just wish the PgUp key was not just next to the BACKSPACE key...
I tried out my USB Palm device and it worked out well with any of the usb slots. Ethernet also worked very well and with no problems. I burned an ISO image with the DVD/CD-RW combo drive, which also worked fine. On board speakers did the job as expected as well.
Being a Centrino, battery life is pretty good.
ok, now the downs:While this product is Linux-certified, the "sleep" function simply doesn't work.
Half the time the WiFi card won't initialize
When I visited the KDE control center and clicked the "monitor" preference panel, Xandros greeted me with an alert box telling me that it won't allow me to do anything
On the front of the laptop, there are four "quick launch internet buttons" for email, browsing etc, but pressing them does nothing at all. Apparently there is no driver for them or a remapping tool available on Xandros.
So basically, the battery, display, and keyboard work. As does the USB, sound, cd-burner, and presumably the firewire port. Unfortunately, the sleep function does not, nor do the included extra shortcut keys. And to top it off, the wifi gui setup appears to have some issues.
Now, these are all rather standard issues with a non-linux certified laptop. Regular hardware (video, mouse, keyboard, cdrom) works, and laptop-specific hardware (sleep, wifi pcmcia cards, funky extra keys) does not. However, with linux certification, I would expect at least sleep to work. Thats a core point of a laptop. And Wifi today is so essential to working without being plugged in, I'd rate it right up with sleep and battery life.
While this laptop does for some reason claim to be linux certified, anyone can buy an off-the-shelf compaq, ibm, toshiba, or viao and have the same experience. The only thing that makes this laptop, complete with its 'internet shortcut keys' that don't work, linux-certified is that it comes without windows.
Everything should work out of the box or there is no point in trying to sell it. I am sorry, but if I buy something that says linux certified on it, the sleep function should work without any effort my part. Why not just hack at a new machine without the linux sticker on it myself like I have been doing all these years? Most of us linux folk get some sort of twisted pleasure out of that kind of thing anyway. Furthermore, why would a linux novice buy a machine without a working sleep function? Its one thing to sell a house or a car and say that it is an ole' fixer upper. A laptop? C' mon.
Yes it is a great step forward, but it just seems like a half-assed one to me. Call this trolling, but if linux ever hopes to gain any respect as a desktop OS, then people shouldn't be selling "linux certified" products that don't work as they should.
I'm not as patient as I wish I was, which is a failing many share. As a result I don't want to spend spare hours I don't have just trying to get a system to do what I need it to do. No, installing Linux isn't difficult. But trying to figure out how to install additional (and often essential) stuff, especially drivers, is not easy, particularly if you're unfortunate enough to have spent the past X (meaning, too many) years of your life becoming familiar with Windows, and forgetting about something called a command line (and a very different syntax).
I know Windows pretty damn well now (which is why I'd love to switch to Linux...), and I began in the dark days of MS-DOS, but back then I had the time and the contacts to get help with it, to get going. That's not an option available to me any more, or most of those like me who want to switch after years as Windoze Lusers.
The hand-holding of knowledgable, experienced users helped me get started with computers, and from there I could start figuring things out for myself, but now I just need Linux to work. Once I can do what I need to, then maybe I can tinker and become familiar with the other, more geeky bits. But not if I'm expected or required to spend untold hours of hair-pulling and HOWTO-reading just to get the computer to actually work.
Come on Linux folk: start getting fully-working machines to market, and the rest of us will take the plunge. Or do you feel it should be the exclusive province of uber-geeks...?
This laptop should be "Linux certified" and even the review says: "Overall, this is a well-working, robust laptop, hardware-wise. My problems were all OS-related." So, what kind of a certification is this? I thought that the whole point on "certifying" something is same as promising that there are no hick-ups in the product - in hardware-wise or software-wise. Why would the company, who makes this kinds of promises, ship the hardware with the software which clearly doesn't support the hardware fully? They even admit that the computer isn't fully functional with Xandros Desktop 2.0.
I can see that in this case the "certification" is more of a promise that the machine will work with future versions of Linux distributions (which is stupid, because the LinuxCertified.com says: "We make sure that all the core components, including the screen in its full resolution, sound etc., are correctly configured with Linux.", which at least for me, is a promise of fully functional OS shipped with the product).
Consumers in general aren't interested in future compatibility of products. They want fully functional product NOW. Without any hassle of installing newer version of the OS later.
In general, I like the idea that there will be companies who are willing to guarantee that the hardware will work with Linux. But I also want to see products that are usable without any additional tinkering.
Trying not to troll... My next computer will probably be a laptop, and it will be an iBook - maily because they're better made than other notebooks, rather than because I'm a Mac fan (I'm not, at least not yet). At the moment, the choice is a no-brainer. I can get a sub-1000 quid iBook these days that will do all that I want a wintel/*nix laptop for, but with very good quality hardware and *nix set-up with everything working. Compare that to spending the same cash on a less sturdy wintel item with an OS I dislike, or a less sturdy item with a reduced functionality for linux (simply because linux on a laptop is a pig to get working). I'm sure it can be done, but I just don't want to invest cash and then time as well getting it working. But rather than saying "Use OSX!" I'd say "take a lesson from Apple". Engineer a linux solution specifically for the hardware. Because trying to make it work with every distro is plainly not working, and that's not going to get me to part with my hard-earned wedge...
These are all questions that should have been answered, they certainly were hinted at. But no, show Eugenia some pretty pictures and she'll do a friggin backflip for you. This thing is hardly functional and she gave it seven points out of ten. In the configuration shipping to customers it won't go to sleep and the WiFi is shoddy and unreliable at best. How in the hell can something like that get seven points out of ten? Somebody got themselves a free toy laptop and gave the POS a good mark-up so the company will let her keep it. This article needs to be posted in the "How to Review Linux" story as a fine example of how not to write a review.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
Linux vendors need to understand that they are not selling the possibility that you can recompile and fix an issue, they are selling the fact that THEY have recompiled and fixed the issue for you.
:)
Geeks are using a lot of Powerbooks because the hardware is supported seamlessly for sleep, DVD play etc: Apple has recompiled bsd for you
This is not a signature.