Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The Future of Linux on Laptops

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the penguins-on-the-move dept.

katie_york writes "CoolTechZone discusses the future of Linux on laptops after HP and Ubuntu's recent announcement. 'What would be even more exciting for Linux is if other OEMs, similar to HP, took the same approach by partnering with selected distributions of consumer friendly Linux and started offering an alternative not only in third world regions, but also in the United States. In addition to that, support for Linux on the desktop side of things would be just as welcomed.'"

12 of 375 comments (clear)

  1. Priceless... by TripMaster+Monkey · · Score: 4, Interesting

    From TFA:

    After all is said and done, I have to wonder if anyone from Redmond, Washington had any input towards HP's decision to offer Linux to the "3rd World" and exclude the U.S. (the richest Windows market) from it's[sic] Linux program. I would certainly like to believe not. Of course, we all love a good conspiracy theory now, don't we?

    Wow...sounds like Gundeep Hora wrote this article with Slashdot specifically in mind...

    ^_^
    --
    ____

    ~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey

    1. Re:Priceless... by NickFortune · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Just goes to show perhaps that this particular meme is starting to spread outside the fairly narrow confines of communities like slashdot.

      I'm surprised this doesn't draw more attention. I mean it wasn't that long ago that one vendor had MS threaten to withdraw their windows reseller's licence just for offering a machine with no pre-installed OS. I mean we're not even talking about support here - they went ballistic just because someone offered the consumerbase choice.

      In fairness, I should say that MS have no objection to vendors offering linux systems. Just so long as they're about three times the price of the wndows equivalent, run on crappt hardware, or are otherwise deeply unappealing. It seems to help the vendor hides the machine away or refuses to admit it exists as well.

      --
      Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
    2. Re:Priceless... by kesuki · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Don't worry, Wal-mart will never buckle down to pressure from Microsoft. They will continue to sell PCs w/out OSes, and/or w/Linux. Yeah, many people hate Wal-Mart for the pressure they put on vendors/etc... But what other main stream OEM will ship PCs without an OS/ with Linux, and not charge you for a copy of windows? No, Apple doesn't count!

      So if you want a Linux Laptop, in the US right now, you've got wal-mart, and some small computer shops that probably have the license cost for windows included in your purchase price.

      --
      https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
    3. Re:Priceless... by gowen · · Score: 4, Funny
      Wow...sounds like Gundeep Hora wrote this article with Slashdot specifically in mind...
      Maybe he was targetting it at his slashdot-reading sister ... "Karma Hora".
      --
      Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
  2. The world by Docrates · · Score: 4

    not only in third world regions, but also in the United States

    So I guess that leaves Europe, Canada, Australia, and many others out uh?

    I know, I know, it's a US centric site (per your FAQ), but we still feel it you know?

    --

    There are two kinds of people in the world: Those with good memory.
  3. Re:Europe the new third world by MoonBuggy · · Score: 4, Funny

    I take it you've never been to Birmingham then?

    *ducks*

  4. Upgrades? by bmalek · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I agree that this is the way to do it (making sure all the hardware works with Linux), however what happens when somone wants to do an upgrade down the road? Chances are they are going to have to choose from a very small list (by comparison to a Windows machine) of upgrades that now work with their version of Linux.

    Now some of you may not think this is a bad thing, but I can see where it could be heading... Want that new upgrade? Send your machine back to HP and for $400 you can have this $100 piece of hardware because you have no choices and we can charge you whatver we want! Profit margins here we come...

    1. Re:Upgrades? by jusdisgi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Chances are they are going to have to choose from a very small list (by comparison to a Windows machine) of upgrades that now work with their version of Linux.

      For fuck's sake, why don't you actually try a Linux installation sometime, instead of perpetuating this ridiculous bullshit story of Linux's hardware support "problems." Send it back to HP? Are you on drugs?

      Linux has excellent hardware support. There is one major wireless chipset that does not have native support, and thus requires you to use the windows driver through ndiswrapper. There are some winmodems that don't work, or are hard to make work. And there are a few printers yet out there that don't behave.

      Now, to put that in perspective, lots of printers won't work with Windows XP. And lots of wireless cards won't work in Windows 9x. Various legacy stuff doesn't work on newer versions, and the number of times you'll need a third-party driver is vastly higher in my experience on Windows than Linux. I've got 3 usb->serial dongles; in XP, they each need a different driver, none of which came with the OS....if you want to use them with XP, you'd better have the CD that they came with. Each one is automatically recognized and assigned a device file when plugged into any modern Linux box. Same story with my Sprint PCS phone's data connection; Linux just recognizes it as an ACM device, and you can use the regular dialup setup. To do that in Windows, you have to find a driver, which is very difficult without buying a $40 outlook-sync program.

      The truth of the matter is, more hardware will run on modern Linux than any single version of Windows ever produced. Your post was 100% sheer FUD. And if you disagree, and want to come back here and bitch and moan some more, why don't you start with theorizing at least one upgrade you can think of that a normal user would be able to do himself on Windows, but would have to send the box back to HP to accomplish on Linux. I dare you.

      --
      Given a choice between free speech and free beer, most people will take the beer.
  5. Whatever by Otter · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Anyone who was using Linux in 1999 remembers when there were announcements like this every day. (Dell partners with Red Hat! Compaq partners with Ximian! Dell partners with Eazel! Compaq partners with Red Hat!) None of it amounted to anything.

    This is good news, I guess, and making something work with free drivers on any one distribution makes it work (with some kicking and swearing, anyway) on all Linux. But I'm not throwing a party just yet...

    --
    What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
  6. Oh, the irony! by heffel · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I just got an HP ZV6000 series laptop, featuring an AMD 64 processor. I got it with all the intention of installing Ubuntu for AMD 64 on it.

    To say that the laptop is not linux friendly is an understatement. There are no drivers for the video card, you can get X.org sort of working with the vesa driver. The touchpad is partially supported, scroll bar doesn't work and you need to resort to tricks to make it work (remove and readd the psmouse module).

    I installed the latest Java development kit for Linux AMD 64 on it, followed by Eclipse. Eclipse keeps crashing every few minutes.

    Although my intention was to run Ubuntu on this laptop, I find myself booting to Windows XP home all the time just to get some work done.

    --
    Expert Java EE Consulting
    1. Re:Oh, the irony! by Arroc · · Score: 4, Informative

      Kinda offtopic....
      There's a known bug in hotspot's amd64 version that makes eclipse crash. Disabling the jit compiler worked for me, although with a performace hit. I've been waiting for Sun to fix it for a while already, it's pretty frustrating (so please vote for the bug).

  7. Re:Accurate Article by OptimizedPrime · · Score: 4, Informative

    No, it actually refers to communist versus democratic countries. 1st world countries are either "within the sphere of US interest" or were democratic and somewhat allied in the cold war. Second World countries are communist. Third world countries are not in either sphere of influence. http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/third_world_ countries.htm