Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: GNU/Linux Laptops?
"I'm an OS X user looking to switch to a Linux laptop. I like the Unix/BSD aspect of OS X. Simple things like when I close the lid the laptop goes to sleep, the sound card works out of the box, long battery life, minimum cooling fan noise, and a comprehensive but relatively straightforward backup system and 'AppleCare' package are important to me. What all-inclusive model of laptop and distro would you recommend?"
He didn't mention it, but I am presuming that working Wifi should be on that list too.
Honestly, wouldn't a MacBook of some description be the best choice? You "like the Unix/BSD aspect...", hardware working, good battery life, AppleCare-type support, etc. Why switch? Are you looking for cheaper hardware? Philosophical leaning towards Linux?
Cemil.
ThinkPad + Ubuntu will probably work pretty well for you. ThinkPads have tended to have good linux support for a very long time. Check out ThinkWiki.org
Of course, they still come with Windows (you used to be able to order them without, but I think they have done away with that now) but they still work pretty good with Ubuntu.
http://www.system76.com/
System76 is the closest your going to get to a Apple experience with Linux.
Pre-installed so you don't have to muck around with drivers
Comprehensive testing and configuration of the hardware by professionals.
Support and documentation.
Company officially supports Linux.
Provides custom driver bundles to make upgrading effortless as possible.
etc etc.
You will get NONE of those things if you go with a Windows system from a large OEM and then try to install Linux on it yourself. You will be your only source for OS support and hardware configuration. You can have Ubuntu forums and mailing lists, but to be honest the chances of you getting useful answers is about 1 in 4.
I think any newer Dell or Asus are solid buys. The distro really depends on how involved you want to be. I find Arch to be a pleasure when it comes to solving problems because of the minimal patch policy.
Too bad you really can't avoid the Window tax.
Ubuntu has a list of Certified Hardware for ya. But I have yet to get a Thinkpad at least 90% running. I don't have the fingerprint reader on my X200s working with Fedora but everything else works, including the dock. The boss's Thinkpad T520 runs Ubuntu and has everything working except audio through the dock, but dual DVI displays on the dock do work.
Of course once you get a laptop working expect updates to constantly break things until you just get tired of rolling back failed updates and just stop, only taking critical security updates you can't live without.
It is worse with Linux because almost no OEMs are involved in keeping it working, most aren't even involved in initially getting it going so folks have to guess. But raise your hand if you haven't had to roll back a driver or update on that 'other' popular OS. Last week I had to roll back a mouse driver on a Dell laptop to get the pointer working.
Democrat delenda est
http://www.nycbug.org/?NAV=dmesgd You know, if you feel like reading a shitton of dmesg, it's really helpful.
You could also run Linux within a Virtual Machine on your Mac Laptop ... thereby you get the best of both worlds. If you want to run on bare metal, several Linux distributions are known to run on Mac hardware as well, so you could keep your laptop and just change the operating system.
Now, having said that, generally speaking you can't go wrong with Dell or Lenovo. I've been to many Linux conferences put on by RedHat and Novell / SuSE/ Attachmate, and I've seem more of those laptops running Linux than anything else out there. Dell offers Linux on some of its laptops (either Ubuntu or RedHat, depending on the model), Not sure on Lenovo, and there are some HP laptops that are offered with SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop.
Good luck...
As I see it this is the biggest soft downside to the Mac style.
Either you enjoy the comfy confines of PG, or you take a risk of some Bad Stuff appearing in return for freedom to do what you want with your machine.
So if the question wants Gnu-Linux, I don't think we should change the topic back to Apple.
Debian Mint Xfce edition maybe?
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
System76 and ZaReason are both good dedicated Linux laptop companies. Personally, I have a Dell n-series laptop .
These are the components which I have had issues with on various laptops i've installed ubuntu on. Be sure to check 3d drivers exist for the integrated graphics, and the same for wifi. Everything else should "just work".
The biggest problem I typically run into with installing Linux, nowadays, is the GPU.
The open source drivers are okay for most things. The proprietary drivers (currently, I have an nVidia based laptop for work and am running RHEL Workstation 6.1) tend to have issues.
For example, my current laptop, a Lenovo W520, cannot boot RHEL 6.1 if I have full ACPI enabled as well as the discrete graphics card enabled (BIOS switch; has both integrated Intel GPU and a discrete nVidia GPU). With some kernel parameter and xorg.conf finesse, I have a workaround with little issues... sleep works, brightness controls, battery monitor, etc.
Sound, integrated webcam, wifi, etc., all work fine.
If you don't care about GPU power and are just going to get one with integrated graphics anyways and use the open source drivers (like nouveau), that may make it easier.
There are a variety of online sites that have lists of laptops along with their various distro compatibility results. In general, I've had good results with Dell computers... and I actually haven't really experienced a wireless card issue in a while, nor a sleep/hibernate issue (and "sleeping when I close the lid" is easily changed; I like it not to sleep when I do that, so I disabled it).
Done and done.
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
I use ThinkPad W510 with Ubuntu and now Debian. There are some issues, I had to figure out how to have the sound behave correctly, but barring a few small things I find it to be a good value system.
You can't handle the truth.
If you can find something like the Dell Vostro v13 with linux preloaded (I did this a while back and got a nice ultralight for around 550 USD), you can avoid paying for Windows when you don't really need it.
I run both this v13 with Ubuntu, and a MacBook Pro. The v13 + Ubuntu LTS 64 bit is great but not as polished as the Mac experience. If you don't mind occasional use of a terminal window and more bugs in general I recommend it. It is very usable for me.
I purchased a System 76 laptop a few months ago after being on MacBooks for 7+ years and haven't looked back. My requirements weren't the same as yours so you might want to contact their customer support to ask specific questions, which I found to be responsive and friendly when I was researching them.
I have been Ubuntu user for quite some time, but always on my laptop because I needed Photoshop for my job. This last go around I decided to purchase a laptop from a vendor that specifically sold Linux laptops. I chose System76 because they happened to have the best laptop to suit my needs. I have been very pleased with the purchase. I can't say that the laptop is fundamentally better than any laptop I have owned, however it has removed the primary problem with all my previous laptops - the scourge of trying to get Ubuntu installed with all of the correct drivers. This is simply no longer an issue. I would highly recommend going with one of these vendors - there are quite a few, just Google "ubuntu laptop". It may be slightly more expensive, but I believe that supporting businesses who are putting their money behind Linux is an important part of the movement and, at the same time, it really does save a lot of time and effort to have a machine with linux that works out of the box.
I recently bought a new Sandy Bridge based Z series Sony Vaio. With a recent Debian, pretty much everything worked out of the box - wireless (a/b/g/n) , hibernate/suspend, sound, magic funtion buttons. Also, with Intel graphics on die, 3d accelerated X all just works out of the box. Not a cheap option, but I'm very pleased with it - it's lighter than a MacBook Air. Getting Linux installed was a little annoying as you have to use DM raid to deal with the Intel "fakeraid" controller and the 2 SSDs in RAID 0 internally, but once that was done, it's been fine. Sony sell extended warranty coverage comparable to Applecare as well.
I've never actually bought from them, but it sounds like you'd be an ideal customer of http://system76.com/ - they provide pre-built Ubuntu Linux computers, including laptops, with good specs. Since they're building the PC and installing the OS, they can test the compatibility of everything. This is a lot better of an experience than you're likely to get with an off-the-shelf laptop + a downloaded Linux ISO.
System76 also provides support, although I have no idea how it compares with AppleCare... but most Linux computers are home-built (or at least home-installed) and any support you can get for them will assume you're using Windows. Linux software support is typically user forums, although commercial distros typically have support staff.
The quality of the software (for things like backup) is something I can't help you with - every distro is different in what it includes, most software can be installed on any distro, and often Linux software isn't so much a cohesive package as it's a set of tools for any task. Running rsync using a cron job is a pretty respectable way to do backup.
I'm not personally a fan of Ubuntu, but it's the most popular home distro, and if you're coming from OS X it should be a relatively easy adjustment. Besides, you can always install a different distro afterward. Unlike on a Mac, the OS is in no way tied to the hardware - most Linux distros can be downloaded for free and installed on any PC (including, incidentally, a Mac).
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
This weekend, I went to Office Depot, bought an HP 2000 laptop for about $329, brought it home, backed up the windows image, and installed Ubuntu 11.10. All of the conditions of his post are met. Battery life is good, fan is quiet, sound works, closing the laptop lid causes the machine to sleep, etc. Not sure what he means about backup - I use grsync which is easy enough to back up my home directory to a flash drive (primitive, I know, but I've never been burnt). No special configurations were necessary to install Ubuntu. It's funny that people keep bringing up WiFi. The last time I had problems with WiFi on Linux was a Broadcom chipset on Ubuntu 8.04. After that, everything has worked without issue (and I could get it working by extracting / copying firmware). Sometimes I think a lot of the Linux complaints about sound and wifi are out of date.
I'm not sure what "AppleCare" is unless it's some sort of extended warranty / replacement program. Unless you're very unlucky, a decent laptop is cheap enough that you're better off self-insuring. While it might make sense for an Apple product (I'm being generous) I don't think it makes sense for a basic laptop workstation.
...has everything you requested.
There's been a lot of grumbling the past year or so about regressions in notebook/netbook power management which hurt battery life. Aside from that, I've generally had pretty good luck using Ubuntu Linux on laptops; but I haven't tried installing it on a new-ish laptop yet (all have been older HP/Compaq models).
I've been using a System 76 laptop for a few months and I am very happy with it. You don't lose the service relationship with the seller when you install Linux, because it has Ubuntu by default, and they are generally very helpful. All the hardware works fine. As for backup there are solutions to choose from which do not depend on which type of laptop you buy. As for battery life, I get 3 hours on my Gazelle Professional which is not as much as you get on other operating systems but decent for a 15 inch monitor Linux laptop. There is no Microsoft tax, obviously.
I fought to get linux on a samsung laptop so a better option would be: System 76
" ... minimum cooling fan noise ..."
I have a 2011 15" MacBook Pro. The new i7 quad-core + new GPU gets crazy hot. Often the temp gauge jumps to 80 degrees C + and the fans spin up. Those 2 fans maxed out at 6200 RPM is anything but quiet.
The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit.
It gets really annoying. 'I presume he wants working wifi, too'... ok, how about a working video chipset? If you're presuming, and you live in a 3rd world country, maybe you'd presume he wanted a modem.
If this is dude's submission, don't mess with it, it just doesn't help the guy get the answers he needs. Besides, most wifi chipsets I've used recently have been pretty damn good.
More-so I am aggravated at the editorial nature of these footer comments in general. Nerds don't like editorials, they like facts. Maybe that's my assumption, but I've been reading Slashdot for 11 years now. It. Gets. flippin'. Old.
I probably should have ranted on some other, more deserving article footer comment...oh well. I love you guys
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
You are amazed that the computer goes to sleep when the lid closes and sound cards magically work, but yet you want to get a linux distro? What is this like your second computer ever?
I'm running Fedora on my Macbook pro. Everything works, sleep, sound, graphics, mouse (with multitouch), you get backup similar to time machine in deja-dup. To get at the wireless you need rpmfusion, and install akmod-wl. Plus, you keep your "applecare" as that just covers the hardware component. If you already own an apple, just install linux to that - if you are planning to go out and buy one, look at a Macbook air, or a 13" Macbook pro.
DO NOT get anything with a dual-gpu (Intel and ATI/NVIDIA, commonly in the 15" MBP) - To enable this you need to know how to EFI boot your macbook pro, and that is a world of hurt that I don't think you want. Sticking to the single GPU models, like the Macbook air, will do you nicely.
I used to run various versions of Linux on a couple different ThinkPads, and over the last few years (2006 - 2008 or so), each new release seemed less solid than the one before. I would spend days or weeks trying to hunt down fixes for various problems (sleep wouldn't work, WiFi wouldn't work, audio wouldn't work, etc.).
Finally, in 2009, I bought a MacBook Pro (17", 8GB RAM), and used that as my primary machine. Best decision I've made in a long time. I wanted one laptop that I could use for everything, and with VMs running Windows 8 and whatever flavor of Linux I feel like playing with at the moment, I can develop and run any software for any platform.
I might feel differently if I were a gamer, but I'm not, so this is the best setup. Since you're coming from a Linux system, I'm guessing that any games you might play are already available on the Mac.
Seconded!
Trolling is a art,
>I probably should have ranted on some other, more deserving article footer comment
Nah, this one deserves it. The footer is a backhanded slap at WiFi support for Linux when it's greatly improved over the years. When I installed Ubuntu 10.04 on this laptop, which was current when I bought it, everything worked, including the touch panel below the screen and the infrared remote.
Trolling in the summary is bad form, and yes, it did get old a long time ago.
--
BMO
hp8540w running Debian "Wheezy". I will tell you that I have run Linux on literally dozens of models of laptops over the years and of all of them, the HP 8540w is BY FAR the least hassle to get going. My installation procedure was effectively this: I downloaded the net-install media from ftp.debian.org, burned it and booted to it, and when prompted I provided a USB key with the iwlwlan-*.ucode drivers on it (these are all located in the firmware-iwl*.deb package, by the way), and that's it. Everything else worked like a freakin' champ right out of the gate!
I run openbox, tint2, thunar, and nitrogen for my desktop, and I gotta tell you I am freakin' IMPRESSED. No bloat, so all eight of my cpu cores are free to do whatever I ask of them, and all eight gigs of ram hum gloriously along... I've been running Linux since 1995, and Debian or Ubuntu for the last decade. I will tell you that I had a number of problems with Ubuntu, but not Debian.
Cheers,
-C
GNU/Linux is not Mac OSX. If you want a linux laptop that works just like a Mac, get a Mac.
If you want something inexpensive, Dell Vostro V131 is under $500 and ships with Ubuntu 11.04.
If you want something more expensive, see System76, etc. Or the various Dell's that ship with Linux.
If you want solid service and don't want a Macbook, then Lenovo Thinkpad is it. The support is domestic/insourced (my service center was in Georgia). As long as you're under warranty (comparable or cheaper in price to Applecare, but a larger number of somewhat confusing choices), they'll overnight you a mailer which gets overnighted back. After the service (which in my experience was very fast), they overnight the laptop to you. It can't get better than that without local repair centers (=apple stores).
This was with an X61s, but I think it would hold for all real Thinkpads (business-class), i.e. not Ideapads which are junk anyway.
Caveats: touchpad/nipple not as nice as macbook unless you really like the nipple; the AC adapter will probably fail within 2 years (although they'll replace this for you); mine died 2 months after the end of the 3-year warranty.
System76 is the only other option I'd consider, but I have no experience with them. I wanted an ultraportable, which they didn't have.
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
I couldn't care less about "just works". Half of the fun of running Linux laptops is the challenge to set them up to do all those things you want.
The other half is to see the Apple funboys fiddling with their Macbooks to make projectors display their stuff (that is when they find someone who actually has the right widget to plug it in).
ROFL
metageek
oh well. I love you guys
A worthwhile point that made me smile -- always remember, Slashdot, we wouldn't bitch about you if we didn't care. :)
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
It should have (depending on the kind of hardware, you have (out of the box): 1. Backup, very similar to Time Machine, with the added advantage that you can actual performed a backup not only locally, but remotely or in the cloud (Ubuntu One)> Extremely easy to configure 2. Ubuntu One is very similar to iCloud, as it even synchronize with your phone. 3. Unity is getting more and more similar to OS X 4. You can pay for support.
I got an Asus 1215T for $275 new: http://www.asus.com/Eee/Eee_PC/Eee_PC_1215T/
Everything worked OOTB with Kubuntu, including suspend to disk, sleep when you close the lid, wireless, and sound.
People have recommend Ubuntu, but you really want one of the other "flavors" of it, like Kubuntu or Xubuntu. Otherwise, you'll experience the whole Unity debacle. KDE isn't lightweight, but it works flawlessly on my netbook, which supports 64 bit extensions.
http://zareason.com/shop/home.php
Just when I had bought a new lenovo with windows 7 on it.
PS: I'm not a spam machine.
I've been running various flavors of Linux as my primary OS on laptops for roughly a decade, and I highly recommend the Thinkpad line of laptops (originally by IBM, now by Lenovo). Thinkpads tend to use mostly Intel parts, and Intel has great support for open drivers (see intellinuxgraphics.org or intellinuxwireless.org). There's also a great community at ThinkWiki (http://www.thinkwiki.org) which focuses on Linux on Thinkpads. My current personal laptop is a T400, and everything works (suspend to RAM, hibernate, sound, video, WiFi, etc.). My wife also has a Thinkpad, a SL400, and likewise has no problems running Linux (it actually runs much better than Vista which it came with). I was actually able to get my T400 from Lenovo's Outlet without Windows installed (it came with FreeDOS), so I even got out of having to pay the Windows tax. The Thinkpad is Lenovo's business line, and the build quality (on their T & W series in particular) is fantastic, and personally I can't live without their Trackpoint.
I have found that if you don't mind doing your homework ahead of time (mainly checking parts on the "customize your machine" section of OEM sites), it's fairly trivial to find a machine that fully supports Linux. With that said, Thinkpads are still my top recommendation (followed by Dell's Latitude line which also has a Trackpoint). I have no connection with Lenovo; I'm just a happy customer. For the record, I run Gentoo on my T400 and my wife's SL400 (she previously ran Ubuntu on it).
Sadly, PS/2 was yet another victim of USB, which doesn't care what you plug into it, the electrical slut.
Or buy a Mac (or use existing Mac), download Linux and dual boot and/or wipe out OSX completely!
Thinkpad X220 works without any problems, and is fully supported.
X220t version is fully supported, too (I had to make a patch for cellwriter to fix window layout -- as far as I know, it's not applied yet) but I consider tablet mode impractical under any OS.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
If you're up for a half decent price for a laptop, I found basically everything worked out of the box with the Dell XPS 15 (I7, etcc). I used Fedora 14 and I think there may have been some initial snafoos with video and Wifi. If there was, the fixes were straight-forward.
For Noise, everything was quite on the unit normally as long as you're not cracking out 8 threads at a time (like when I make a build it becomes quite a bit noiser). The one bug that is with the unit is the NVidia GPU. When you're driving two monitors, the laptop always runs the clock at full speed which means that the fan speed is never at minimal. When I'm just driving one monitor doing average work, I barely notice the noise at all.
Bye!
A fairly comprehensive list: http://linuxpreloaded.com/
just get virtual box, and run linux on your mac book.
HP EliteBook 8540p works reasonably well here, with the latest (K)Ubuntu (with proprietary Nvidia drivers).
I have a Lenovo at work that runs Fedora 14 beautifully. Performance is excellent and graphically it does everything I need, which is typically web development. Though I do quite a bit of browsing in chrome. The default graphics card is fast enough, and I presume it's an inboard Intel chipset. I don't know what CPU it has but I'm guessing it's two years old; it was someone's hand me down.
The whole "walled garden" metaphor applies to iOS products, not Mac OS X. You can download and install whatever you want on a Mac. Including Linux or Windows if that floats your boat.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
Dell's Ubuntu offerings are in Small Business section, not in Home section.
I bought a Vostro 130 six months ago, and have been happy with it. I found some flakiness opening and closing the lid. Everything else works, including WiFi, sound, and video.
When using the ALT-F{1..6} text consoles, I had to close the file manager in the GUI to avoid complaints.
Peter Traneus Anderson
This is what I would suggest as well. I was working on a project in which all of the members were developing on Ubuntu machines. I had to move away so I didn't have access to a Ubuntu machine anymore, just my Macbook Pro. Changing the build scripts to work with Ubuntu and OS X would have been a big pain, so I installed Parallels and had Ubuntu running as a guest OS. Part of the program in the project had to pull images from a USB camera and render it with OpenGL and to save some resources I ssh into the guest Ubuntu and have the X11 apps inside Ubuntu forward to the OS X's X11 server. Performance is pretty decent.
Yet another user who *can't stand* Lion.
I run OpenBSD -current on my Dell Latitude 6500. Swap out the broadcom crap wifi for a ralink based wifi (RT3090 based), and use the Intel HD graphics vice the Nvidia crap that require you to take the table scraps from AMD, and you're golden. And still 1,000 USD cheaper than a decent iBook...
I don't use sleep/hibernate, but the ports/packages has everything I need. Add to that the fun of reading the misc@ mailing list (especially the new troll Zantgo)... good times... pure class
It's all damned lies and statistics!! I mean 47% of all people use statistics to back up their arguments.
> Is this really your current experience?
Yup, take the two examples I noted. The Thinkpad 200s I'm typing this on was installed with Fedora 12. During it's errata stream the kernel broke undocking. So I had to roll back and hold.... all the way through the F13 and F14 cycles I got to stay midway in F12 and hope a remote exploit didn't force me to upgrade anyway and just shutdown and reboot instead of undocking. The bugzilla is now closed since things started working with F15. So I could chose stay with a totally unsupported OS or GNOME3. I'd much preferred F14 so now I run XFCE on F15.
The Boss's Thinkpad can't update Ubuntu anymore unless great care is taken to ensiure Xorg doesn't update lest the second DVI port stop working and of course a distro update is out of the question because of the GNOME problem, so she will be stuck on 11.04 until that situation improves.
I have a machine at home with a PATA RAID card that hasn't worked with new kernels for years. RHEL4/(clone of) is rock solid though. Stuff doesn't officially go depracted very often while examples are still in the wild, but most stuff will eventually stop working unless a lot of people use it or a key kernel dev uses it.
Democrat delenda est
Thinkpad T400 with extended warranty + Ubuntu LTS. Or X series if you want something a little lighter. Everything works "out of the box" after installing Ubuntu with the possible exception of the fingerprint reader (you may have to apt-get that after install).
I know several people who installed Linux on laptops for a while, but then they got tired of the hassles and went with Macs. The BSD environment on OS X is "good enough" that they can run all their UNIX/Linux apps, more or less.
I, on the other hand, am stubborn and will only run Linux - in large part because you then get a much wider range of hardware options. I've run it on 3 generations of Thinkpads, 2 generations of netbooks, 2 desktops, and a tablet. In NO case (even when Linux came preinstalled) did everything "just work" - there was always some fiddling to do. The biggest problem is the hardware "arms race" - vendors are forever tinkering, either adding features or taking shortcuts and compensating for it in proprietary drivers. The Linux kernel eventually catches up, which means that the best strategy is to use the latest distro from whoever - Ubuntu, Fedora, etc. and find one that works. I load them all onto bootable USB drives and try out the "live distro" version first before installing.
E.g http://zareason.com/
but there are many like that out there.
DL a copy of Pinguy x64. Burn it to a USB or a DVD. Take it to Best Buy and try it on a Toshiba Satellite. Once loaded, use the switcher to change it to mimic a Mac. If you like it, you're golden. Pinguy is a nice MAC-like *nix and should work for your needs. You should be able to get the Toshiba for about $450.
Will that work?
My experience with ZaReason was really, really poor. The laptop they sent me had some issues (with the mobo, I think) and after a few attempts and fixing it, they stopped responding to my e-mails.
Weeks later, they told me they'd sent the laptop back to the manufacturer -- in other words ZaReason is a reseller and so you're stuck going through them for warranty repairs.
Anyway, 6 weeks after I got the laptop, I just asked for my money back and bought a MacBook Air instead. Could not have been happier with that decision! At least Apple stands behind their products and repairs take a day or two instead of months.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
I have a Lenovo S12 netbook with the older processor and an Intel graphics chipset that's fully supported by X.org. The wireless is broadcom but the closed-source broadcom drivers are in the Fedora rpmfusion repos, and they work very well. The laptop works just like my old PowerBook. Close the lid, it goes to sleep. Open the lid, it wakes up. It has barely enough horsepower to run Compiz. All in all it's a slick machine. The Nvidia Ion version may work just as well too, with the Nvidia proprietary drivers (Again in rpmfusion).
My girlfriend bought a Lenovo Thinkpad X220, and it's a sweet machine. However it has the new AMD integrated graphics chipset and I have no idea how well that is going to work on Linux.
Have to agree with above poster. I've installed Linux Mint on literally dozens of notebooks and netbooks recently, and only had a problem once on some rather dated hardware. Most of the new stuff JUST WORKS pretty much out of the box. There's some configuration or tweaking to do usually, but nothing a competent 10 year old couldn't muster (IE changing resolution, connecting to a wifi router with a WEP password).
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
I have the Serval laptop from System76. They vet the hardware and guarantee that everything works with Ubuntu (Ubuntu comes pre-installed and fully loaded with drivers). Awesome computer. The biggest issue is dual monitor support -- but this is an Ubuntu thing, not System76. Oh, and my System76 sticker came off the cover from sliding in and out of my backpack :(
No single raindrop believes it is to blame for the flood.
We ship Linux machines based on ubuntu/xubuntu:
Shipping soon (testing now) with 11.10 on Thinkpad model netbook and on our dual/quad/hex core desktop machines
http://www.csspc.com
4gb flash drive plus pendrivelinux.com = try before you buy. Linux Mint worked with a few issues for me (Windows share, wrong driver for laser printer, slow wireless) on a POS HP. All three issues were quickly resolved by searching the forum. Forget AppleCare, buy cheap replace as needed...
There is a slashdot advertiser that advertises linux pcs. I forget the name. anybody wanna help? Dell makes some ubuntu laptops. www.dell.com/ubuntu
I have a Macbook that I just installed Ubuntu 11.10 32bit using a live CD and holding the option key during boot. No refit no bootcamp crap just pure linux. I don't even get the Apple logo or that idiot of a sound when I boot anymore. I have no issues with any hardware, it sleeps fine and battery life is the same as OSX roughly. Also Apple care is still good to some extent because if i ever have a problem ill just load OSX on and send it to them to fix it.
Although I am a long time user of Linux my experience has been Ubuntu tends to work great with everything out of the box. I grabbed a new model Toshiba Satellite recently for just under $600 Canadian, tax included. No distro supported everything out of the box ... except Ubuntu.
"Toshiba Satellite 15.6" Laptop featuring Intel Core i3 - 2330M Processor (L750-0PU) - Black " from Bestbuy is what I grabbed.
i3 cpu, 6 gigs of ram
Works brilliantly and everything worked out of the box. I could have gone Mac but would have doubled or tripled the price for similar hardware.
Unity desktop aside, Ubuntu's hardware support is stellar. Bring a live cd into the store and try it out to be sure.
Nearly all laptops by quality manufacturers have excellent Linux support these days, especially if you are inclined to use Ubuntu.
Your MacBook is an excellent candidate. I have a couple Dells, one that came with Vista and the other with 7, that I put Ubuntu on, and they run great. I also took an older MacBook that had fell out of use, and it also runs Ubuntu like a champ. I can't say I prefer one or the other; both brands have their strongs points in terms of hardware, but the Linux experience is about as close to perfect as you can get on either Dell or Apple hardware.
If I were you, I'd seriously run Boot Camp Assistant, set up a partition, install the distro of your choice, and continue to enjoy OS X along with Linux on that nice hardware.
:q!
I've talked with a few other HP owners / Linux users, and their experiences were similar. HP wouldn't seem like the place to go for a Linux-compatible laptop, but the dv7 series, at least, works quite well. I think the key is to make sure you get the Intel CPU / chipset and nVidia GPU.
I've been using Linux since the early slakware days, and though the brief detour through OSX did show us where the commercial workstation vendors could have gone a couple of decades ago, it's always felt clunky to me. I wouldn't suggest buying a new Macbook for that purpose, but if you have an old one laying around, that might be the route to go!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Check out System76 http://www.system76.com/laptops/ and ZaReason http://zareason.com/shop/Laptops/. They sell laptops that come pre-installed with Ubuntu. I've never used one so can't comment on their quality but at least you are guaranteed to have all the hardware working out of the box.
Stay with the Mac!
I purchased one from the linux laptop company and everything worked right out of the box and came with a full warranty from Dell.
>I probably should have ranted on some other, more deserving article footer comment
Nah, this one deserves it. The footer is a backhanded slap at WiFi support for Linux when it's greatly improved over the years.
-- BMO
Thank goodness for BSD.
ducks
This author takes full ownership and responsibility for the unpopular opinions outlined above.
Facts??!! the article is a request for opinions. Opinions are like hind ends, everyone has them and no two are the same, and everyone's stinks sometimes.
As for out of the box success, if you get a model with a webcam it might not work (last time I checked, the x220 webcam had not yet appeared on the compatibility list). I actually haven't bothered to try setting up my fingerprint reader since I moved to GNU/Linux. On the whole, whatever does not work out of the box is generally worth learning to set up yourself. Notable is fan control, for which you'll want to use the thinkfan daemon available in the repositories. Requires some tweaking, but well worth it. Here thinkwiki.org is probably your best source of advice.
Asus x101:
- It's all tested
- It's 200$ (well, 199)
- There is no windows sticker.
DISCLAIMER: well, this is pretty much an advertisement. sorry.
I suggest buying a laptop model of at least 1 year old, or older.
And Linux with real updates.
I use ASUS R1F with Ubuntu and always the LTS updates.
All fine.
I know it would take time to configure but you could get it tuned to exactly how you like and then never have to worry or wonder about it again. Gentoo is bar none the best distro on the market.
Looks like the things you want in a LinuxTop are already in an AppleTop. Why change? Macs "generally speaking' are a little/lot more expensive (depending on your definition of 'expensive' and available funds) but will have the features you want right out of the box.
I'm quite happy running OpenSUSE 11.4 in a Toshiba Satellite. Everything works and the machine is rather cheap. The dual core CPU performs nicely and there is enough disk space to run everythink I can think about. Even Kstars runs with ease and being Linux, you know that unlike the mac, you have not subsidised a company that uses child labour to build their machines!
In all seriousness, the best laptop for Linux I've ever owned. I bought a lot of five on ebay for less than any new laptop would cost. Went solid state with a CF card and adapter. Ubuntu boots in under a minute and works out of the box with all the hardware, including hot swapping the DVD drive and Ultrabay battery, and a $15 USB Wifi with a realtek chipset you can buy anywhere. Switched to Lubuntu with 11.10, it's even fast enough to watch 720p movies. No, seriuosly, it is. I don't understand the obsession with having so much power in a laptop, it's just not needed. I have a Dell XPS M1330, but I use the T23 more. I'm not constantly worried about breaking it or losing it, it's cheap and easy to fix, and it does everything a laptop needs to do. Leave the heavy loads to the desktop, or the server. Get yourself an old Thinkpad for the best mobile computing experience.
I am really thinking the submitters should try out Emperor Linux. ZaReason might also be a good place to look, or possibly System76.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
If you live in the US, try out the Asus K53TA. It's available at Best Buy for just 450$. Specs: Processor: AMD A6-3400M @ 1.4Ghz (quad core, Llano APU - can be overclocked to 2.3 Ghz or even 2.8 Ghz) Memory: 4 GB DDR3 RAM - 1333 Mhz Hard disk - 500 GB 5400 RPM Graphics cards: Integrated: Radeon HD6520G (integrated into the processor). Dedicated: Radeon HD6650M with 1 GB dedicated VRAM. (Both are connected through Crossfire). And the other stuff. 15.6 inch LED screen, Altec Lansing Speakers, Wifi b/g/n support. 0.3 megapixel webcam (not great but for the price....). No inbuilt bluetooth. For GNU/Linux, everything works out of the box except.....graphics. In Ubuntu 11.04 works with software rendering and you can install Catalyst after which it works amazingly well . Cannot even install Ubuntu 11.10 since it tries to use the open source drivers but doesn't bundle the required firmware - shows black screen - might be installable using alternate CD. Fedora 15 works with Catalyst. And if you use something with newer software versions (kernel, mesa etc.) you can use it on the opensource drivers.
I personally use Fedora, but just little side note. I would stick with Fedora 14, I am not a fan of GNOME3. As for the hardware side. I would go with anything that you can find that is NVIDIA based. The most issue I have had with nvidia drivers is the fact that I installed the wrong one, and the driver wasn't updated for the new kernel. Almost every laptop and desktop I have install fedora on, the audio has worked out of the box. For gaming, I am running about 60fps in WoW, and 60fps in CS:S, TF2, BioShock, and Left 4 Dead.
I run GNU/Linux on my MacBook, and it works great. Everything but the webcam works without a hitch. Is that not an acceptable option?
For the past 4 years, I haven't had many problems with things not working with Slackware 'out of the download' or with minimal changes.
The main thing I have found is with wireless connections. The 'out of the download' manager sucks. If I can't connect with that, (and a quick dmesg shows that I do indeed have a wireless driver loaded) I install wicd.
My only other real gripe is 3D. I can't always get 3D support from the video card. I don't really game on them - so that's not much of an issue.
The default kernel has gotten large enough to support most things 'out of the download' as long as I boot into huge.
If you want to streamline things you can - but I usually don't feel the need to.
I may just be lucky - but I have put it on many laptops. Another thing I have notticed is that a wirless connection that will work under windows will only work under slackware if the wireless adaptor is in *exactly* the right orientation.
To answer the original question, System76 (www.system76.com) five different laptop models with Ubuntu pre-installed. They also offer support.
I'm dual-booting Xubuntu 11.10 & Windows 7 on a Lenovo T-60 and it works great. Absolutely no hardware issues. But as mentioned above, your support will be in the Ubuntu forums (which is very good by the way, especially since it's also free). Cost: $300 (with new battery) on eBay + $70 for 500 GB HD (stock model only 80 GB).
I hate to be a stickler but just because some of these people cannot get certain hardware to work with Linux does not mean that it does not work completely. There is too many factors to take into account: What hardware you use, what distro you want to use, what features you need, etc. Your best bet would be to do your own research to see what fits your needs the best. Then go on to search if the hardware included with the laptop is compatible with the Linux distro that you want to use. Most distros have an open and up-to-date HCL. Too many times I have seen people bitch and moan that "this audio driver" or "this wireless card" doesn't work but the end issue was usually pebcak. Take the time to do your homework and you will be fine...
Nerds don't like editorials, they like facts.
No. Nerds like to read facts; they like to write editorials.
Got a HP 2000 for the wife and have had a similarly painless experience. Sleep, two finger scroll, wifi all work great and out of the box.
HP doesn't want to refund windows, though.
Worst-case scenario your brand-new chipset will lack acceleration for a few months or you'll have to plug into LAN after an install to get proprietary wifi drivers. Ubuntu seems to be the best fit: support packages, dejadup, out-of-the-box /home/ encryption, etc...
"...the sound card works out of the box"
The fact you have to mention this concern (and that it is even a concern at all) is troubling to me. Is it still 2001?
I've had a variety of high end (for their time) Dell laptops, and generally have not had problems. Over the past 10 years or so, I've had an Inspiron 8000, 8200, 9400/E1705, and most recently a Precision M6500, which is the best of the lot. I've always bought them used. They tend to be very easy to upgrade, and it's no trouble finding parts on eBay. I've run SUSE/OpenSUSE on everything. Since the 8200, I've had no problems with suspend/resume; the 9400 failed to resume maybe once out of every 100 tries. The M6500 has had a few more suspend/resume failures, but lately it has been much more reliable; I'm not sure why.
I'm careful to look for sellers with very high positive feedback (at least 99.7% for something like a laptop, and preferably at least 99.9%), and I look hard at the negative feedback (there is some junk negative feedback out there -- some people clearly make no attempt to resolve issues with the seller, for example).
Of course, if you want something equivalent to AppleCare, you're going to have to go with a new piece from System 76, Emperor Linux, or the like.
I took a quick look on eBay, and it looks like M6500's go for about 25% less than the closest equivalent 17" MacBook Pro. They're also more expandable. But that's just my take on the matter.
Incidentally, I consider the M6500 to be more desirable than the current M6600. They both have the same expansion capability (2x2.5" drives plus an mSATA, 32 GB RAM, 2xUSB2, 2xUSB3, eSATA, plenty of wireless options including WWAN, and the other usual suspects), but the M6500 has a 16:10 screen (1920x1200) while the M6600 has a 16:9 screen (1920x1080). For photo work, that's about 23% more pixels on the older machine; even if I did watch movies, I don't care about the slight letterboxing. Obviously, you can plug external monitors into both, but that's not how I usually operate. I think Dell did this for cost reasons, since that's what the screen makers prefer to make, but on a flagship laptop like the M6600, that doesn't make a lot of sense. On the Alienware, sure; that's a gaming machine, but the M6600 is a portable workstation. The only advantage of the M6600 that I can see is that it uses Sandy Bridge rather than Nehalem processors and has newer graphics options, but you're going to get more of a speed boost in practice from your memory and disk configuration. Anyhow, the M6500 is very easy to work on; you don't have to remove nearly as many screws as the older ones, and everything is seated very solidly.
I would recommend buying yourself a Macbook Pro, getting VMWare Fusion or if you're low on funds after buying the MB, then VirtualBox, and running a Linux VM. You get the solid quality of the MBPro hardware and the standardised hardware environment that a VM offers and the resulting good linux driver behaviour.
I use VirtualBox on my 2010 MBPro and it works like a charm.
I believe he needs my username
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
As someone who writes automated tests for wireless routers that stress the hell out of the linux wifi stack, I would highly reccomend going with an Intel based wifi card.
The Centrino 6300N is a beautiful 3x3 card with 5ghz support and has been rock solid especially compared to broadcom or ralink chipsets.
I would love to see this chipset in a desktop package but sadly, there isn't a real good solution.
I have a banging-hot girlfriend (she's easily a 10), but she's low maintenance. She loves sucking my dick and fondling my balls while I play mine craft or compile linux kernels. Oh, and she likes having anal sex when she has her period. Did I mention she has wealthy parents, a trust fund, and doesn't mind if I fuck other girls (she like to surprise me by inviting her banging-hot friends over for threesomes). For some reason that won't mention, I would prefer a fat ugly bitch. If she's missing teeth or has a meth addition, that would be best. Where can I find a girl like that?
Thanks!
Just burn a USB drive with the *ubuntu of your choice. Test the floor model to see what works and what doesn't. Start with obvious: video, sound, networking. Then take a look at your syslog and make sure nothing ugly is going on. Takes all the guesswork out of it.
I won't bother telling you what make or model my laptop is. Last time I bought a laptop, I went in with an Ubuntu LiveCD. I'd pop it in a machine, wait for it to boot. I checked out 3 systems, and found one whose sound, video, wifi all worked after suspending and hibernating. The employees didn't bother me, but if they do, just explain that the cd won't harm the system, and you won't buy a laptop without verifying that everything works in your OS of choice. I'd walk out before purchasing another laptop that needs hours of fussing with drivers.
I've found Toshiba uses good, non-off-brand hardware so I've been using them for my notebooks and all the notebooks I provide to customers for years. I've never had an issue with them under Linux. By rough count I've put Linux (primarily Ubuntu) on 9 different models (not units, different models) in the last 5 years and I haven't had any issue I can remember.
Lately GNOME 3 has been giving me issues which I'm told is a symptom of the binary NVIDIA driver, and after installing the open source driver things seem to have cleared up, but that may be something to look out for and don't jump to conclusions if you have that combination.
Ubuntu. I will probably have a million responses saying I am wrong and that there are better distros (there are) but Ubuntu is the distro that supports the most hardware, has the most support and is the de facto standard at this point. I might suggest Kubuntu for KDE but test out the standard Ubuntu first.
as for hardware... Just got out and buy a cheap laptop. You don't need expensive high end stuff. Acer makes good laptops cheap that run Linux perfectly well.
Lin-sux dont know what hit it. Fucking amateurs.
I was thinking of buying a Macbook a while ago, but when I got to the store I ended up buying a used $150 (current yen>dollar exchange rate here...) Lenovo ThinkPad T60s. For the money, it's a really nice little machine with a great keyboard and specs (1gb, core solo, intel GMA, 60gbHDD, wifi, 13inch screen) that are adequate for everything I need it for (web, mail, not particularly demanding programming basically). They were very popular as business laptops so there are probably a lot of refurbished ones around for very low prices. Like I said, it's not what the OP wanted exactly, but as a simple and cheap Linux* machine they are great.
*came with Win XP installed, which also runs smoothly. It's not very good for gaming though, as you might expect.
...11 years now...
Newbie!
And am very happy. I know three are newer Asus machines that work even better than mine today due to improved dual graphics card support. I usually have my machine running more than 6 hours on battery in Linux! It is rated as 10 hours max in Windows, however I find Ubuntu 64bit overall uses less resources except for when totally idle, and Ubuntu is much more responsive than Windows 7 on this machine!
I typically follow this guy for these machines: http://wiki.daviddarts.com/Ubuntu_Maverick_on_the_Asus_UL30VT
Not the sexiest of laptops and you need to buy the "slice" battery with it to get anything more than 2 hours when not plugged in. But it works brilliantly with Fedora 15 and gnome 3 (I like gnome 3 but you can KDE or gnome 2). Install was simple;
It is seriously that easy, it has work perfectly for 3 months now and I like you came from a mac book (Lion was just not for me).
It said "windows 98 or better" so I installed Linux
I'd recommends Dell Latitude or Precision laptops. Matte LCD and linux works great.
Was going to get a Thinkpad, but those didn't support the ExpressCard/54, and I'm glad I went with the Dell M4600. Dual drives (mSATA SSD and bulk HDD). Intel wifi works, but the nVidia optimus doesn't.
For the original poster though, I'd suggest just running VirtualBox.
I have a different question - a few, actually, but very much like this. Mine is a home laptop that only I use, so my options are open. I bought this laptop when Vista was around, but didn't want to go back to XP, nor wait for 7. While I do use Windows on another PC (which is used by other family members), Windows is not something I want to use on this laptop.
I'm looking @ the various distros in distrowatch for a new Linux to put on my laptop (a Lenovo 3000 G410 - a celeron w/ 1GB RAM and 120GB HDD). Previously, I was running a little known distro called Maximum Linux, which is no longer around. It was based on Redhat and running fine, but one day, the network configuration tool 'system-config-network' seemed to get corrupted and stopped working, and there was no way I could edit things either there, nor under KDE or Gnome. After I changed my ISP, I stopped working on it.
Rather than re-install it, I'm looking @ other distros, and even BSD and Minix. Some of the things I'm looking for:
1. A distro that supports both wired and wireless networking on my laptop seamlessly (according to the manufacturer, the ethernet is Broadcom NeteXtreme and the Wi-fi is Gemtek. I didn't know that Gemtek makes wireless chipesets.)
2. One that has sound working smoothly right out of the box (previously, I had to match the exact kernel w/ the exact Alsa version, and needed the help of someone else. This time, I'd prefer it to be right out of the box. Also, I'd like to be able to control the volume using the Fn-Left & Right arrows if possible, but it's not essential, and similarly, I'd like to be able to adjust brightness w/ the Fn-Up & Down arrows. Also, if the Windows key works in pulling up the Start button for KDE, that would be great. All these are optional things, so if nobody supports them, no big deal, but the sound has to work right out of the box)
3. For the distros, if it's a Linux, I'd prefer it to be Debian based, since I was always apprehensive about whether any software I was updating on my old distro would actually find all its dependencies w/ either yumm or rpm. If it is an one that is RH based, it should have a good software updating tool (like if it is Ubuntu, the software center would be good) - I've not been satisfied w/ the one that came w/ my distro, which is the same as Red Hat's. If any distro can support installation of both RPMs and DEBs, nothing like it! But I don't want to see installation failures due to missing dependencies.
4. Also, I've tried installing Minix, but it recognizes neither my network card nor wi-fi, so while I was intrigued to try a microkernel based OS, Minix is out of my list - for now. I'd have been interested in Hurd too, had it been around. I'd also be interested in the BSD's, provided that they have software updating tools as smooth to use as Debian
5. For the DE's, I want KDE and GNUSTEP. With KDE, I'd like all the KDE special apps that come w/ it (KOffice and the like), and the same w/ GNUSTEP. I'd like to see included a video editing software of the simplicity, if available, of Windows Movie Maker. I've tried Avidemux and Cinerella, but they have a gazillion options and controls, which seem great for professional video editors, but overkill for me.
6. I'm a strange creature who uses different web browsers for different sites. On Linux, previously, I used Firefox, Flock and Konqueror. Of course, Flock is now dead, so I want to use Firefox and Konqueror (I might try out SeaMonkey, and Vespucci for GNUSTEP if it comes w/ it, since IE and Safari ain't available) I'd like the Konqueror version to be the latest one that supports HTML5, so that I don't have problems viewing YouTube videos.
7. Non-free software is acceptable - I can do squat w/ source code, and prefer not to. My apologies to the FSF ;-)
I generally buy Dell Inspirons. I always try to limit my choice to the models with Intel wireless and Intel video, though I can be okay with a Broadcom wireless if it has been checked out by others. I've typically been very happy with Inspirons (note, I've had more glitches with Latitudes). The only issue I can think of on my current Inspiron 1520 is that the Svideo out is glitchy. It definitely worked best a couple versions Ubuntu back. But except when I hook up to my TV I have no problems at all.
Do a Google search for the model you want and Ubuntu, and poke around the Ubuntu forums, and you'll know if people are having trouble or success.
"GNU i/nu/[1] is a Unix-like computer operating system developed by the GNU project, ultimately aiming to be a "complete Unix-compatible software system"[2] composed wholly of free software."
.39 kernel (correct me if I am wrong someone) and as for your wifi, it's best to check the chipset against google and see if anyone else is having issues with the said chipset.
Now, I'm not sure if you meant to say GNU/Linux or just Linux. If you're saying want to install a GNU Linux Distro like Debian, which is totally comprised of free software (including all the drivers/firmware/everything unless you enable the non-free repo) - Then the laptop you purchase matters. Why? Because some laptops require "non-free" drivers, like the Nvidia line of video cards and thus would require you to install binaries from the non-free repository and therefore would not be GNU.
If this is not the case and you just meant LInux, then it is pretty straight forward - Check for driver support for everything in the laptop you're interested in. The most common problem if video and Wifi support, but this can be overcome if you do some quick research into the chipset of whatever laptop you're interested in. If graphics performance isn't important to you, the Intel sandy bridge line is great and I believe is supported natively in the 2.6.38 or
Also, somebody mentioned Dell N Series laptops, I second that. A friend recently purchased one and it had Ubuntu pre-installed. Apart from being plastic fantastic, it's a great laptop at a great price.
Utilitarian value? Have you seen GNU's list of recommended distros? Names that one's never heard of, like Blag, Dynebolic, Trisquel, et al. What about Red Hat, Debian, Canonical, you may ask? Well, GNU very helpfully explains why they're not truly free. In general, they 'do not have a policy of only including free software, and removing nonfree software if it is discovered', and also, the kernel includes “blobs”: pieces of object code distributed without source, usually firmware to run some device. In short, if a non-free firmware is needed to make your box work, software freedom would be better off w/ your box not working rather than being contaminated w/ a working driver whose source-code isn't publicly released. It is this equating of non-free software w/ E-coli that keep sane people away from FSF and their wacko campaigns
You can even recompile the kernel if you so desire.
I run: Windows, OS X, Linux, FreeBSD. Just because you have a hammer, doesn't mean everything is a nail.
Look here, here or here.
If you want to support Open Source Software, you should buy a laptop from these vendors.
IBM sold the laptop business to Lenovo a few years ago. I am currently moving from a Thinkpad T61 to a Thinkpad W520, and currently only the integrated screen drivers work for me out of the box, which means I can't plug in my external monitor.
Try the Efika Smartbook from Genesi-USA or Genesi-Europe http://www.genesi-usa.com/products/smartbook
Really good build quality with thickness rivaling the macbook air. Real life battery life is over 7 hours (though mfr rates it only at 4 hours - but i have used it extensively for over 7 hours. YMMV)
Customized ARM Ubuntu with flawless sleep & wake-up with wifi/3g reconnect within 2-3 seconds. Has inbuilt 3G sim slot also.
Its only $200 and really nice product. I place it next to the MacBook Air in usability and convenience. Off course, I am a little enamored with Arm devices these days and if you want x86 then maybe a Macbook or Samsung 9 or one of the ultrabooks (asus/lenovo) could be preferable
I had bought one a few months back and liked it so much i have ordered 2 more for my family members. FYI, i don't have any link with Genesi etc
Exactly. And you can upgrade it with commodity hardware, readily available from any retailer.
Oh wait.
if you are just play with linux, virtualbox may fill your needs, and it's free. Else IBM/Lenevo.
There was an unknown error in the submission.
I recently bought this laptop from JB Hifi. The best recommendation for Linux compatibility is that ASUS sell this model in some markets with Ubuntu so free drivers should be better than for other laptops. The only problem I have so far is that the volume control function keys don't seem to work. The part number seems to be R011PX.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Such a laptop does not exist, hell, not even a desktop exists with that level of support.
Best stick with OS X and go with the VM route. Less headache.
Both system76 and lenovo have topnotch hardware in their lineup. Also, Dell laptops usually work extremely well with Linux (Ubuntu mostly).
Avoid sony vaio at all costs if you want to install linux. the hardware quality is quite good imo (next to lenovo), but they do not behave with linux (personal experience).
As far as gpus go, again my experience has been that nvidia cards and their proprietary drivers work quite well. i may be wrong but i remember reading somewhere that gnome shell and radeon do not mix, perhaps that has changed in the past month.
Exactly. And you can upgrade it with commodity hardware, readily available from any retailer.
Oh wait.
To a perhaps lesser degree, that also applies to non-Apple laptops (and, as per the title of the article, the person who Asked Slashdot the question wants a laptop).
This particular thread appears largely to be about software, not hardware, and the use of "walled" and "curated" in close proximity to "garden" several postings up in this thread suggests that the person who made that posting may have confused Mac OS X with iOS. (Cue the "yeah, and you can be certain Mac OS X is going there as well" followups in 5...4...3...)
"Hi I'm a trendy moron, who when not racing down to my local growers co-op in my recumbent bike, wants to blow some money on something I barely understand based on buzzword love. I want a mac, because its overpriced and I love Justin Long, but its just not pretentious enough. Can someone please tell me how to buy a
Mac with the words "Linux" on it so I can be the envy of my dorm.
Nailed it right?
I am using the HP Elitebook 2540p, and pretty much all the functions work out of the box (lid open/close, special keys, sound, WiFi, wired, battery ACPI events, webcam, USB ports, display port, CD ROM drive). I am very happy with the performance. I use Ubuntu 11.04.
Unix, Computers and science fiction... What else can one want in life ?
You might consider waiting for a zenbook from ASUS. It is essentially a macbook Air without the apple logo. ASUS usually have pretty decent linux support too. http://www.anandtech.com/tag/zenbook
I'm using a Acer Aspire One 721-3070 with Ubuntu and every single thing works perfectly (and I mean everything: especially Wifi, Standby when I close the lid, waking up again, external vga, all keys including the "multimedia" keys, touchpad including multitouch and scroll area, external keyboard and mouse, etcetc)
Everything works out of the box. Number of customizations I had to make in the OS: 0
In UK you can get a Novatech laptop without an operating system & install whatever you want yourself. I don't know much about quality of their hardware (I have bought one, it was a rebadged Clevo, worked OK). Most laptops today are compatible with Linux. But when it comes to hardware support, these guys do their job.
--Coder
As others have said. Thinkpad. Linux support is excellent. The only thing not working on my T420 running Arch is the fingerprint reader. And I probably could get that working if I could be bothered, but who wants a fingerprint reader?
It's also a really nice machine. A little on the pricey side, but you get a lot more than the MBP of a similar price.
Lenovo can only use the name "ThinkPad" until 2012 As part of the conditions of the IBM sale of its PC division to Lenovo. So hopefully we'll see ThinkPads with PowerPC's in them, imagine PowerPC A2 manufactured using 45nm has four 64-bit cores and 16-threads running at 2.3 GHz all cunsuming less then 25-watts. WOW! No imagine if it was manufactured at 32nm or even 22nm it would be under 10 watts. It would take Intel 14 years to match that performance.
Some bad experience with their product - U250 Wind and even worse with their tech support. Avoid them especially if you want to go for alternative OSes.
Which is the bad thing about their laptops, besides being over-priced for the hardware they deliver. If I had the bucks, I'd buy them all the time, but on this HP G76 from Office Depot, Ubuntu 10.04 runs fine. Network and everything runs and looks much like a Mac. You can even theme Gnome (version 2.xx) and XFCE to look somewhat like a Mac. There's a launcher available.
The advantage of Linux is the free software, with a good package manager on a Debian distro that has good driver/detection support (Mint, Ubuntu) you can't go wrong with most anything but a Thinkpad (which is kind of dicey with their wifi drivers and thumbprint device). I would recommend a 17 inch machine, the bigger screen is a godsend, and bigger machines run COOLER which seems to extend their life. More room for the hardware and heat to escape. Toshibas tend to run hot, avoid them. The one thing about Ubuntu is that their Unity desktop has a lot of people ticked off, many prefer either Xubuntu (XFCE based) or reverting to Gnome 2.xx which while tricky is supposedly still possible after install. Or there is Mint, and Debian itself.
Running FreeBSD is an adventure, there is much less auto-detection and installation of wifi drivers, sound can be dicey, their ports system is nice though. FreeBSD does have the ZFS file system available, however, and that is nice.
On this laptop I've recorded a bunch of LPs using Audacity, it was a bit more tricky than using a Mac and say, SoundEdit or that app that comes with Toast for Mac. But nothing major (just zoom out when recording to view more than say, 45 minutes on an LP side, that's an Audacity bug). K3B is as easy to use as Toast Platinum, and costs nothing.
THE ONLY THING that is tricky with Linux is ... IPODS. I've yet to get full Ipod support for the Nano or Mini, even using a custom, late release compiled version of GTKPOD. This is with the damn things formatted for Windows (not HFS+) and all that. Keeping a Windows partition and using the Win version of Itunes is highly recommended. Linux just can't do Ipods, but that's Apple's fault. Most USB-mass-storage based MP3 players like the Sandisk or Sony work fine, Ipods just don't. And Itunes won't work under Wine either!
You can definitely save a lot of money going cheap Windows laptop, keeping a Windows partition, and using Linux every day. Libre Office, Freemind, MySQL, GIMP, ImageMagick, Thunderbird, about five different browsers besides Firefox, Debian package management and updating, these are all first-class. The great thing about a distro like Mint or Ubuntu vs. Mac is that every app in the distro or installed from a repository will be checked for updates, installing is usually pretty simple. As opposed to the Apple model where only the system and a few Apple apps like Itunes and Safari get updated regularly. For things like Thunderbird or Firefox this is quite convenient.
Finally, Ubuntu/Mint rocks as a multimedia system. If you go with Mint, or follow the Multimedia instructions on the Ubuntu Forums, you can play FLVs right from the desktop. Rip them, using FFMPEG, to audio or whatever. Tools like Soundjuicer, RubyRipper, K9Copy, Cinelarra, Avidemux, are all great and best of all, FREE! By going cheap Win laptop and linux you save twice: once on the hardware outlay and over and over again on free instead of pay software. Most of the free software is amazing.
I thank the OSS Community every day for their work. They really are amazing.
I found the most difficult task was finding a high spec CPU with lots of memory in a laptop without having to pay for a high spec graphics card. I also demand a minimum build quality. I am finding the main hardware problems that exist for Linux are related to power management and a BIOS that does not comply with standards. I had to disable the power management scripts on my Clevo, otherwise I was finding my network card would fail if I wasn't connected to the mains power, and if I connected mains power while running on battery, the whole machine would freeze. Power regressions within the Linux Kernel seems to be quite a hot topic of late, so it pays to be aware that running the newer Linux versions will reduce the battery life. Other than the power management problem I am quite happy running Ubuntu 11.04 64-bit. The build quality is good and I have found it to be a good price point. It is a high spec machine running the i7 2820 with 16GB RAM. Cost about $2500AU with a , FHD 95% gamut screen and extra power pack. Battery life suffers a little due to the spec and PM problems, but I still get around 3 hours on battery. In Australia the closest price I could find for the same spec and build quality at the time was about another $1000AU more. Apple had the physical build quality (feels sollid in the hands) and were one of a few that used the higher spec i7 CPU, but I didn't want to buy one since I had heard they had all sorts of issues with the new MacBook Pro overheating (the complaints thread was quite long as I recall and Apple were not officially recognising the problem at the time). Not sure if they ever fixed the problem? Dell build quality I have found is quite good, my previous laptop was a DELL Inspiron 9400 and it has been running for the last 6 years and still works. My wife uses it at the moment for her studies. Unfortunately I would have had to buy the gaming machine version to get the CPU I wanted, ie around $4000AU, and again with a high spec GPU. Looking around at all the current laptops, they mostly have crappy keyboards that flex. From my searching and trying in shops, only Clevo, DELL, Sony, high end HP (EliteBook) and Apple seems to have a decent keyboard. Once again it comes back to price, a good keyboard should not be exclusive to high end laptops, all laptops should have a descent keyboard without flex. Then we come to the elusive good trackpad, Why do companies persist in making trackpads that have textures and sticky surfaces, the newer versions of Clevo also suffer from this from what I have read, using a rubber surface of all things? Luckily the earlier Clevo that I bought doesn't have the problems and its trackpad is not bad. Of course Apple wins hands down in this department, last I looked they have the best on the market. If money was not an issue, I would buy the HP EliteBook as they have everything. Unfortunately they cost way too much in Australia, we are looking at a prices range of $4000 and above. The place I work uses the EliteBook range and build quality is great and I never hear of issues with heat, or noise. they also come with just about every port imaginable. So hopefully this gives the op some idea of the problems in looking for a laptop in general and what I see as the mains issues when buying when it will be used with Linux.
Thinkpad X30, X31, X40, X60, T500
Fujitsu Siemens Amilo L1300
HP TC4400
I buy many laptops for people in the Computer Science department at Queen's University in Kingston. Of course, things vary by the model but in general I stick to HP's EliteBook line of business laptops, Lenovo's ThinkPad T and X series, Panasonic Toughbooks, or Apple MacBook Pro/Airs.
Personally, I own a mix of the above, almost all of which I purchased used. Ebay can be a brilliant resource if you know what you want.
My current favourite laptops are:
- 11" MacBook Air. 2lbs, silent, solid, awesome. - $999
- 12" HP EliteBook 2710p with SSD. Silent, 3.6lbs, fabulous screen, great build quality, ThinkPad-like light, perfect Linux compatibility - ~$300 on eBay
- 14" Panasonic ToughBook CF-Y5. less than 3 lbs, 1400x1050 screen, incredibly light for the size. Perfect Linux compatibility - ~$400 on eBay
- 17" HP EliteBook 8710w. 7lb 17" 1900x1200 display. FAST Core2duo with good worsktation-grade card, decent battery life, a screamer. - ~$500 on eBay
As you can seem, I have a laptop for pretty much any size and need, all of which combined cost about the same as a well configured new machine. Two of the eBay machines had a 3 year warranty, so I ended out with about as much warranty left as if I had purchased a new low-end machine.
Honestly, unless you have a very specific need, I'd buy used. I love what System76 is doing, but having seen one of there machines, they aren't brilliantly made. Certainly as a Canadian it doesn't make sense for me to buy one and ship across the border. Stick to high-end business machines. New if you have money to burn, used otherwise.
The main reason OSX 'just works' as they like to say is that the hardware spec is tightly controlled and the OS drivers are written and tested specifically for that hardware. Unless there's a linux vendor who's maintaining a distribution tailored for the hardware, Linux won't give you that level of smoothness. Sadly I don't think that will ever happen as the idea of tightly-coupling a distribution to particular hardware is naturally contrary to the nature of most Linux users so we have a deadlock.
Personally I love the integration of Mac hardware OSX and it's a premium I am happy to pay for myself. I write code personally and professionally much of my waking life. I love figuring out and optimising systems but when I get home and want to chill I appreciate not having to do maintenance on my own machine! I run Linux (and that other OS) in VMWare Fusion and it works perfectly plus lets me hotswitch and easily archive virtual machines and I find the performance hit isn't a big deal for my needs. It might not be for everyone but for me it lets me spend time focussing on what I want to achieve and not waste my valuable spare time ****ing about in stuff I already know about and don't need to deal with over and over again like a high-tech factory worker...
I have a pile of bills for mac book repair and replacement if you don't believe me.
Every single apple product we've purchased has had problems (1 emac, 2 mini,
3 mac books). Every one.
System76 makes laptops ONLY with US keyboards. This is not quite a show-stopper, but it's a major put-off. It's more-or-less impossible to get a substitute laptop keyboard, and keyboard stickers don't last long.
The rest of the spec is good, but the keyboard issue is a large minus factor.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. - Voltaire
Mine is a netbook, an Asus Eeepc 1201PN. It's a bit old, but I use it to watch movies on the tv (connected via HDMI) and browsing, and maybe some very light gaming (like, say, quakelive), and it works perfecly with ubuntu. I've set it to suspend on closing the lid, except when plugged, because then I use it closed down to watch tv and navigate with an usb-to-IR remote I bought for next to nothing on dealextreme (and I've already ordered the remote-keyboard). Great buy!
But as I said, they're netbooks so if you really need a full blown notebook, look elsewhere.
"Luck is my middle name," said Rincewind, indistinctly. "Mind you, my first name is Bad." -- Terry Pratchett
I use a macbook pro....any linux or windows systems I need I run in vmfusion....
works for me
www.ggsdata.se in Sweden sells high-end laptops with Ubuntu preinstalled.
suspend, wifi, audio and usb3.0 works
I'm not sure if I'm just lucky, but I installed Ubuntu (11.04 at the time) on my HP Pavilion DM3-1170US, and everything worked perfectly on the first boot, except the button that turns the trackpad on and off. Even the overloaded function keys controlling brightness, volume, etc worked without any modifications.
If you want an easy solution, Ubuntu certified hardware might be a good choice:
http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/
Thinkpads and Dells seem to be well supported.
I'm very happy with my laptop from http://zareason.com/ they select hardware with Linux support in mind. They might not have all the features you list but it would be worth talking to them about it.
You mean there WAS a time on Slashdot when the editors didn't troll or ask inane, asinine, or stupidly leading questions as part of TFS? When was this golden age?
I bought a Lenovo laptop that was touted to run Linux without problems. It came with Windows7. I loaded Ubuntu on it and have had no problems.
Not a troll, but...
...ask Google. I've had excellent results with Dell laptops over many years now, as well as Lenovos and HPs and Toshibas and... pretty nearly anything will run Linux, or (I'm guessing) any of the BSDs. The one thing you have to watch for is device drivers, and really you only need to watch carefully for four of them -- sound, video, wireless and wired networks. Google is very much your friend here -- it will fairly expeditiously help you find out if the devices on any given laptop are well-supported.
In cases where they are not -- usually brand new hardware or hardware with really obscure e.g. networking chipsets -- one can almost always find workarounds and make the laptop work, but getting an install to work then starts to require uber-skills with Unix and a lot of practice e.g. rebuilding kernels and things like that. Not for the tyro, in other words, although this sort of thing is often how those obscure devices eventually are well-supported in the FOSS world. However, these days, Ubuntu or Debian or Fedora will often/usually "just work" right out of the box, and at most require a decision about whether or not to install e.g. Nvidia's custom linux drivers for their screens or stick with the FOSS drivers that don't provide the same speed but do provide adequate functionality otherwise.
As a number of people have pointed out, it is also pretty easy to purchase laptops with Linux pre-installed, in which case there is really no question about the drivers, is there? Or buy the same laptop models without any OS installed and install it yourself.
My only suggestion there is to do your best to buy laptops where you don't have to pay the "Windows Tax" -- some version or other of Windows pre-installed on the laptop (for which you pay, never doubt it) and that you are just going to trash and replace with Linux. I would say that it is this "tax" more than any other single thing that creates anti-Microsoft sentiment among Linux/BSD users. Microsoft (and, for that matter, Apple) have the markets wired so that you have more freedom to purchase any given system without any other feature -- a different hard drive, a different video or networking feature -- than you do to purchase it with your choice of an operating system. If I were the king of the forest, there would be a massive anti-trust lawsuit (and/or legislation) on behalf of The People and that would be that -- all systems sold could offer the purchaser a pre-installed operating system at a discounted price but sellers would no longer be able to mandate the purchase of a preinstalled operating system or sign deals with Microsoft giving them the preferential prices required to survive in the low-margin retail business in exchange for exclusivity. In the meantime, vote to the extent that you can with your checkbook, without paying Microsoft for the privilege of not using their operating system.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
I've been building Linux laptops for my customers for years (most refugees from Windowsia).
As hardware goes, Acer's Aspire line never gave me problems, IBM's ThinkPads are IMO ugly but very reliable, and I've been using Fujitsu Lifebooks for a decade - they tend to run a little hot but have some relly sweet features if you're not lazy to get them to work.
I've been running Mandriva, later switched over to Mint, and Puppy Wary can usually revive even the most obsolete piece of junk.
As for how to avoid the Microsoft Tax: notebooksbilliger.de sells laptops without Windows (usually preinstalled with FreeDos or Linpus, occasionally Suse), I'm sure they're not the only ones.
We fetch your mail, we route your packets, we guard you while you surf. Don't fuck with us.
Their linux laptops are awesome--everything works out of the box. Lincoln Durey really knows his stuff, too, so if you ever run into even esoteric issues with aftermarket additions he's typically able to work it out in no more than a day and a half, even if he's never seen or heard of the issue before. I've gotten two thinkpad convertible tablets (x41 and x200) from Emperor and they work flawlessly.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
I don't know. If your're not a real comfortable with compiling drivers or laoding them into the linux kernel or in other words, are DIY a real type person, I think you might ought to stay with Mac OS X. I have had alot of experience with GNU/Linux and I have yet to install a distro and not have some minor hardware issues (granted I dont buy pre-loaded systems). Why am I willing to do that? because GNU/Linux is free and REAL customizeable if you really get into it. I am not a Mac Os user (yet) but I would imagine, unless your a hard core user, most Mac Os software is distributed in Binaries and loaded that way onto the system. On the plus side (and why I also tip my hat to Apple) Mac OS X uses BASH (so does Linux) and
If your just looking to taste some Linux, I would recommend 1. Ubuntu (the support is great with Ubuntu) 2. Linux Mint 3. openSuSe (The KDE desktop is really nice).
Being a Mac OS X user, GNU/Linux will probably not be that big of a leap for you.
I love my T410s with OpenSUSE 11.4. All the drivers "just work" out of the box, and support from IBM was decent the one time they had to replace the keyboard.
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
I won't use Macs for a lot of reasons, but I have to admit : PC laptops suck big time. It's not so much about build quality. Well, not juste that.
Take the keyboard backlight : Most Mac laptops are back-lighted. Once you see and use that you don't want to use anything else. You'd think the next PC laptop will have this. I don't know how to say how valuable this is to me, to be able to see the freaking keys on the keyboard, especially given that on laptops, keys are often creatively misplaced.
THAT alone. ANY laptop that goes out of the factory without providing a means of seeing the keys in a dark (like the lid led old on thinkpads) room is just a badlyt designed waste of silicon.
also on the list :
-Crappy keyboard layouts (I need a direct access to my "page down" key. Do you hear me ? I *need* it. Period.
-Materials used for sensible parts, like trackpads (I want to use it with wet fingers, and please don't ask me why, just do it)
-Shiny screens (just so they look good in the store... Pfflease)
-Bits only there for "aesthetics", like false metal axis on the hinge, this is embarrassing for everyone, guys.
-Stupid ergonomics again : If there is two buttons (trackpad, rocker switches, etc) why does it look like one big unique one ? Just to confuse young and old people ? Good job.
And generally, the bad feeling you get when using this stuff, you know when you find yourself asking, many times, "why was this implemented this way" ? And can't find ANY good answer.
To illustrate my post, take a look at any HP, Acer, Dell, MSI produced in the last 5 years. Yes, it's that bad.
That's another thing I hate about apple : Just by actually using their *brains* when they design stuff, they make the rest of us look bad.
pX
Recently, I got a new MacBook Pro through work.
I looked around for good Linux laptops, but as people have said, you just can't find an equivalent laptop not sold by Apple with anything even close to the build quality, battery life, keyboard, screen etc. I don't think I would ever buy a MacBook for personal use - they are just too expensive - but the space I save in my bag, the length of time I can use the machine for on battery power and the quality of the screen, ergonomics etc. are fantastic. I have looked for many hours and found nothing comparable, sorry to tell you that.
That said, the issue of things 'not working' with Linux is a bit misleading... people often claim that Macs are flawless, so when I started using mine I expected it to be. But it's not: for example, I have had to reboot my Mac many times when the O/S has hung. This rarely happened with my last Linux laptop, where everything worked but the laptop itself was 'like one of those ruggedised laptops from the chemical industry' - an actual quote from an interview! Also, the wireless chipsets have problems, especially after waking the Mac up, so I often have to switch wireless on and off to get it to work again. I've had to do similar things with Linux laptops in the past. You should also be aware that Linux achieves much better performance on less powerful hardware, so you might want to manage your expectations if you switch.
Finally, if you do give up and go for Mac, OS X is a bit of a mixed bag... windows management sucks compared to Gnome unless you enjoy using the mouse extensively, but it does look pretty and a few of the apps (iCal, for instance) are excellent.
RS
Seems like the only thing you can't really tweak is the window manager which is annoying.. but everything else is very linuxy. Fink and ports allow you to install most things.. or you could always just compile them.. Lots of linux programs that you might want actually have mac images for easy installation.. under the hood it is BSD.. you got a shell and all your favorite shell commands.. run all the same services linux does.. etc..
While I agree that sticking with Mac may be your best option (no learning curve and guaranteed functionality), your best Linu x option is Ubuntu. Head over to their website and look for certified hardware. Choose from that list and all is well. The list is extensive, as there are 100 entries for Dell laptops alone.
1. Make system restore DVDs.
2. Install Ubuntu 10.04 LTS
3. Download and install wifi driver, "rtl8192ce_linux_2.6.0006.0321.2011"
$650.00
Worked for me.
I always do a dual boot.
...what exactly do you want to run in terms of Mac software.
That doesn't seem to be addressed at all in the original question.
It seems like this guy doesn't want or need a Mac as such at all. They just want a vendor supported FreeBSD box.
All the other "bells and whistles" are entirely gratuitious.
They might be better off with a Solaris laptop if there were such a beast.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I run linux on a 4,1 series aluminum macbook pro. Runs really well, though the new kernal is killing my battery life for some reason. I've gone through a lot of distros on this laptop, so far Fedora 15 seems to run best! Mint, Sabayon, Debian, CentOS, and openSUSE were all pretty nice too.
I too wanted to run Linux on a vista laptop but the inability to run Netflix was a Showstopper.
www.Migrainesoft.com - Computer giving you a headache? We can fix that!
Buy an Asus EEE PC Netbook. They're light, they have good battery life, they have enough compute power for everything you really need.
They have good Linux drivers. The emphasis on battery life leads to underclocking options which mean that you don't need a whole lot of cooling just to use Firefox.
I'm on Ubuntu 9.10, so the latest Ubuntu should be even better; but get the KDE version.
For your insurance in case it breaks, buy a second, identical, Asus EEE Netbook, and a $6 set of mini-screwdrivers.
(Or just wait till it breaks then buy a new one. I dunno.)
For your backups, buy an external hard drive and copy things over manually (let it run overnight).
So please stop with that "neutral vs bias" nonsense.
OK, that suits me fine.
Until a few weeks ago, I had a MacBook that suited my requirements quite well when the heavy lifting capabilities of my (Linux-based) desktop machine were not required. I don't give a flying fuck about any religion regarding Apple, I just like to have a *nix-y environment to work in from the command-line (when the mood takes me) and a GUI that works when I feel like being a drone with a rodent or trackpad.
That MacBook has now died messily, and I am disinclined to spend much on a replacement. In the next day or two, I anticipate that I will be buying an Asus U31F-11YR-RX132V machine (a compact and lightweight machine easily available from local bricks-and-mortar shops) , on which I intend to set up an implementation of Arch linux. I'll add a post here if I hit any roadblocks.
I just bought a Compaq CQ56 from Walmart for $248 Came home and wiped the hard drive and installed The latest Xubuntu.
Everything worked perfectly.
add in the classic cracking/yellow plastic on prior models, the crappy 15-bit TN screens they've used in the past (fixed under performance guarantees, IIRC, after legal action), too much thermal paste causing massive overheating, nVidia gfx chips cracking and falling off, exploding batteries, cooling ports blocked by plastic film and numerous HW failures-by-design - well, it's no wonder he's looking for a heavy duty warranty.
Apple's biggest design flaw is that they use the same name ("Macbook") for all of their laptops, year after year. So a Google for "macbook battery" or "macbook screen" returns every rant anyone has ever posted about every Apple laptop ever sold.
All the other manufacturers keep changing names so you can't keep track. HP has added "Envy" and "ProBook" to the "Presario" and "Pavillion" and "EliteBook", plus they add random model numbers like "dv5000." Makes it a lot harder to keep track. Dell does the same thing: What the hell is a Vostro? Is it like an Inspiron or a Latitude? It's certainly not an XPS, right, because that's the line they built to compete with Alienware, except now they own Alienware, and use that name, too.
Changing names often helps to encourage the short memories of consumers. I don't know anyone that's had a problem with a Vostro or an Envy...because I've never known anyone whose owned anything other than an Inspiron or a Pavillion.
Yep, and if you don't mind the thought of some bored businessman having probably used it to look at porn then you could do worse than picking up a second hand Thinkpad. They come in a few varieties and the slightly older ones are very cheap. You sure as hell don't need Applecare when you spend less on the computer than the price of replacing a Macbook battery. My X60s was 20,000yen (about $260, not the $150 I mentioned in another post - my mistake), a Macbook battery replacement via the Apple store is double that. The battery died after about 9 months and I had to buy a new one for about 5000yen - 1/8th of the Macbook battery replacement/arbitrary repair cost, plus I didn't need to go to some fancy store to get it.
As the above post points out, Thinkpads are pretty well supported by many linux distros, probably because they are very easy to find and cheap to buy. I don't recall having any problems with mine - I installed Ubuntu and everything just worked right off the bat: battery reading, sleep on closing lid, sound, wifi, nipple pointer thing, volume controls. Everything I've tried has worked. There are probably a few things that don't work, like the fingerprint scanner (never tried it tbh), but everything you need works great.
The only problem is if you want to do 3d work of any kind. My laptop has some intel GMA graphics chip, which does support older versions of OpenGL, but it doesn't do shaders as far as I know. Until AMD get their Linux drivers sorted out, you might want to avoid them too. If you want Linux + OpenGL, Nvidia is the only good solution.
So long as you don't need a high performance machine, I think this is a great option. Thinkpad hardware is fairly robust too, and I'm personally quite fond of the design; They have a few too many unsightly bits and aren't so clean as Apple's designs (by a mile) but there is something kind of sexy about the industrial look that just screams "this thing is for work, not posing in Starbucks". Hmm, maybe I'm just bitter because I bought my gf a Macbook Pro (yeah, she just wanted it because it's silver) and she just browses the net and listens to music with it. Plus it causes weird problems with my house wifi.
I have been running Linux on my Thinkpad T43P for the past 6 years. First it was OpenSuse 10 and now it is Ubuntu 11.04. No problems whatsoever. All hardware worked right out of the box. I was even able to get drivers for my fingerprint reader.
I have dropped my Thinkpad numerous times. There is even a crack on the casing now but everything works perfectly fine.
I also have one of those neat 4:3 ratio 15'' monitors and the old style legendary thinkpad keyboard and I just love it. What not to say about the LED light on top of the monitor to light up my keyboard.
Thinkpads may not be the best looking laptop on the market but they are legendary in performance, longevity and functionality.
Efika MX netbook. Costs less than apple care.
I have bought a $400 HP/compaq laptop each year for 3 years and installed Ubuntu on it. All of the hardware is instantly recognized. The restricted drivers area always has a driver if I find that I need it.
BTW I'm not smashing my hardware once a year ;p My wife and father were each the recipient of the previous year's laptops and they couldn't be happier.
Got 2 laptops, both with different distro's on there and they work fine.
Lenovo T61, and Asus K52F.
To be frank, if you're interested in using Linux, you should be interested in getting your hands dirty and putting some work in getting stuff to work how you want. If you just want it all to work out of the box, stick to a commercial OS.
dual boot ubuntu and have it all. why buy when you can have it for free?
3M has a fix for that...
...and it protects your real screen from scratches, etc.
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
Fix an O.S. bug yourself?
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
Slashdot commentary is getting so stupid. You can install whatever you want on a Mac. There's even a UNIX ports system.
That's like dismantling a BMW to install a lawnmower engine.
shh, don't disturb the /. group think with pesky facts.
then install FreeBSD. Or if you want everything to be taken care of for you, try PC-BSD.
I recommend an used Lifebook
3 year old ones can be found on ebay for ca. 200 euros, and are as sturdy as an IBM.
Ubuntu + Unity should be perfect for a mac user, as it's a mac inspired GUI (i hate it).
aaaaaaa
I would buy a Toshiba or a Asus notebook and wipe and reload it with openSUSE. Given the current state of Ubuntu with Unity I personally would use the KDE 4 desktop. You will find some similar programs such as Back In Time works alot like Apple's Time Machine. Amarok now supports the IPod. And openSuse is one of the best Linux Distributions for a notebook.
I jumped onto Macs several years back because they were a nice platform for Java development but over the years I learned alot fo shortcomings that MAC has if you are a Java dev, open source advocate and just as a laptop in general: 1) 8 GB memory limit. This is what they tell you. This is what they support. This is their max in all their software... supposedly. You can look REALLY hard and find places that you can get upgrades to 16GB but if you are doing any VM'ing, graphics and/or heavy processing, 8GB's maxes out quick. And just to tell you how quickly, my wife actually got a new Macbook pro 2 weeks ago with 8GB of memory and it used 5GB with only a web browser open 2) not configurable. You can't change the battery and you can BARELY change the memory. They are working on fixing it so you cant even do that without bringing it in; they are switching to custom screws that no one sells screw drivers for and if you use existing screw drivers, you will strip the screws and make it so you can't fix or change out parts if they are broken. 3) HEAT!!! New mac book pro? 170 degrees in your lap when playing a youtube movie. 4) You dont own your media. Mac wants to index all your media, keep track of it, hunt it down and then make sure it doesn't work with anything if it doesn't recognize it. This isn't 100% true but they are dancing with media companies in that general direction and don't give a crap about consumers. 5) developers/open sources can go get screwed. Apple will gladly kick you off their app store and steal your ideas. Hell, they'll gladly kick you off the app store for arbitrary reasons. They have decided to tell Java developers to go get screwed. Macports breaks happily on updates and upgrades. So if you are in IT or are a software developer, get a machine that allows you to do software development and just create a Hackintosh as a VM. But if you are a consumer that wants to consume, go grab a Macbook so you can look cool with all your hipster friends before you go out for drinks; I'll be home programming.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
I have bought three laptopms in the last year, from local Tesco store.
All supported the ACPI power management features (lid, battery, fan), sound hardware, webcam, graphics, extended keyboard buttons, SD card reader, etc.
Additionally, all three had 3 year warranties, as opposed to Apple's one year warranty.
I find that Linux is far easier to set up than the macos. All software is available from the package manager, to produce a pretty functional system. Apple's don't have a good package manager built in, and use some clunky legacy disk image format that requires manual file manipulation to install stuff, and a horrible GUI with big fonts, where you have to drag around cartoon like icons.
I recently migrated from a macbook pro 13" for a thinkpad 12" x220.
I wanted to stop using mac os X because I was losing my skills and turning into a mouse pusher like Aunt Tillie.
So far, so good... the machine is (way) lighter than the macbook, the performance is awesome (I have a SSD drive), suspend and hibernate work out of the box, sound (except for the internal mic that I am trying to solve -- almost there!) and wifi. The keyboard is sweet, cardreader works, webcam, etc.
There is just one annoying thing, which is battery life.
I did not have the time to configure it, but you will have to spend a few days fine tuning the settings to improve the battery life of the x220.
Other than that, thinkpads continue to be excellent linux/bsd machines.
Highly recommended!
You can remove that "oh wait" since I do exactly what your first sentence says with my Mac machines.
Whitebox RAM, hard drives etc. In terms of laptop upgrades you're obviously limited, but how is that unique to Apple laptops? (excluding some custom 'luggable' laptops designed with removable GPUs and CPUs etc).
When the hard drive failed on my iMac I bought a whitebox bare drive and stuck it in. When my friend broke his DVD drive on his powerbook I installed a barebones slim slot load drive bought off Amazon...
Other than specific parts (eg, the logic board) the upgrade parts are all compatible.
Hell, the new iMacs use socketed Intel CPUs so you can upgrade to anything with the same socket (LGA 1155) - so if you want to upgrade your iMac to Ivy Bridge next year you're free to do so.
There is no genius bar at the non-existent Linux store.
I realize I'm being somewhat redundant here... But I also HIGHLY recommend system76. I'm on my 2nd bonobo class laptop, and I've been very pleased with both. As mentioned before, their systems all ship with ubuntu, but I always immediately reinstall with kubuntu while I leaving 1-2 partitions free for other OS's.
FreeBSD compatibility has been quite good with the exception of the intel wifi support, which FreeBSD eventually ends up supporting anyway. The only real issue I've had with FreeBSD on these laptops has been a distinct lack of power management (but FreeBSD's power management in general is almost non-existent with very very few supported systems). But if you want to install FreeBSD, I'd make sure you get a system76 laptop with an nvidia GPU as linux's open source radeon drivers aren't really there yet (especially in regards to power management)... and FreeBSD's open source radeon support is no where near linux's (and there are no proprietary radeon drivers for FreeBSD either).
I can't recommend their customer service, but when my Toshiba C655 hard drive died I grabbed another and installed Ubuntu 11.4
The only function that isn't working perfectly is the multi-touch pad... and it was driving me crazy when I bumped it using Win7
Toshiba, BTW, won't take back their hard drive for replacement unless I ship the whole laptop back... Not happening till I've got another netbook/pad/something to take over my mobile needs while it's gone...
Aside from moving my Win32 Audible program to running under WINE the transition has been pretty tame... I'd LIKE Netflix to work on Linux, but understand the economics of supporting a system that isn't mainstream on Lap/Desktop systems...
My kids are a bit jealous since their high tech laptops have webcams, HDMI ports and a host of goodies... mine, OTOH, merely had massive RAM and a fairly fast dual core AMD processor... which, added to Linux, smokes their Acer and HP systems for sheer speed
At least my Latitude E6410 works just fine, video, bluetooth, wifi, sound, ... with a stock Mint install. Runs Win7 in VMs only.
I got it from Dell's refurb site for cheap. Core i7, 4GB, 320GB
My last, until I gave it away, was a Thinkpad.
I read this article:
www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/may/17/computing-opensource
I immediately bought an x220 (from Lenovo) and installed Ubuntu 11.10 Desktop - 64 bit
Everything (*) Just works and I couldn't be happier with my purchase.
*) I didn't get the fingerprint reader, I didn't try external monitors yet
...but not the Thinkpad X100e like I got my mom last year (dual core). It was a DISASTER with Ubuntu! It was the first problem I'd had with installing Linux anything in years. I finally moved the X100e back to windows.
Who knows, it may work now that some time has gone by, but last year's experience sucked!
I have an HP dv7 ($925) laptop and an ACER ($280, walmart) laptop. Both work fine with Fedora. Good graphics. Good sound. Good ethernet. Everything worked pretty much right out of the box. (I could boot into rescue mode and use it all.) (Well, the HP needs me to unload and reload the linux sound kernel module before plugging in headphones will disconnect the built-in speakers, but other than that it's pretty good.)
Cooling worked out-of-the-box, stress tested with multiple concurrent kernel builds and >85% sustained system load. Sustained as in days of testing. Temperature testing, under Linux and win7, shows the HP hitting a max of 73C. Even that's pretty hard to hit. I usually see it max-out a few degrees lower.
I still have a little trouble with the HP getting the secondary radeon graphics interface to come up quite right under linux. But for 2D, it's just fine to use the alternate lower-power video interface.
Fedora seems to pick up the lid sensor, and then it's a simple matter of configuring that to do whatever you want. (There are different "sleep" options, with different levels of power consumption.)
Macs are great. They work pretty much out of the box, with very little setup. Linux will take some playing with.
I will say this much about HP: My laptop arrived with a bad harddrive. A number of sectors gave media-read-errors. Curiously, win7 said everything was fine. Even the SMART tests. Linux, of course, had kittens. 10k errors in the on-disk SMART log, tons of errors being logged, dd reporting bad reads, etc. HP believed me when I called them, gave me no grief about using Linux, had me run tests from a hidden BIOS menu, confirmed the drive was bad, mailed me a replacement, and let me install it myself. Very sweet of them! I was impressed!
On the darker side, my HP does not seem to be as "sturdy" as my macbook. (If that word can ever be applied to a laptop.)
You may find it worthwhile to check out HP's warranty program. (It's similar to apple-care.)
HP offers something like a 10-day (or is it 2-week?) return policy. Walmart is similar.
Best thing you can do it try one out...
PS: Check out http://slickdeals.net/. They have great discounts on HPs every 2-6 weeks or so over the past 6 months, such as This Deal.
PPS: My HP came with all 4 primary paritions used. (Win7-boot, Win7, Recovery, HP-tools.) The work around is to burn recovery disks from win7, then use the HP tools to remove the recovery partition, then install Linux on the extra space freed up. (After first shrinking the win7 partition.) (It should go without saying to image the drive under Linux with dd before you start... Just in case...)
I recently bought a HP dv6t i7-2630QM with a AMD Radeon 6770M GPU that has switchable graphics with the Intel integrated part. I've learned that both AMD and nVidia switchable graphics have created problems on Linux. I've gotten my 6770M to work in Kubuntu using the open source Radeon driver, but the driver does not come with easy fan control. It defaults to running at full blast, which makes the laptop sound like a hairdryer, get really hot, and have poor battery. There is a workaround where you can set the GPU to run on "low settings," but it is a little buggy as it sometimes doesn't load on startup. Even worse, the propietary Catalyst Driver doesn't appear to work with switchable graphics yet.
I have a desktop with a discrete nvidia 570 and it runs flawlessly under all varieties of Linux. I also have an older laptop with only intel integrated graphics, and it runs with few problems (besides being a little sluggy as the older integrated graphics is not very powerful).
My advice for a Linux laptop would be the following:
1) Find a laptop with a DISCRETE (not switchable) nVidia graphics card. Be careful here, though, as most of the recent nVidia GPU has switchable capabilities, which might be enabled even though not listed on the vendor's website. A 400 series nVidia mobile GPU might be a safer bet.
2) Buy an Intel Sandy Bridge laptop without a discrete graphics card. You will have fewer potential problems with heat, battery, and graphics drivers. The integrated graphics should be powerful enough to run compiz/kwin/Gnome3 without a problem.
http://www.system76.com/ has some great looking hardware, although I have heard their battery life isn't great.
I ran Ubuntu on a MacBook for years without issue. It's fantastic. If you want top notch hardware I recommend Apple, hands down.
In the US Lenovo sells ThinkPads without an OS (actually they come with DOS). When I bought one in May the discount was around $150 (including taxes) compared to the same laptop with Windows Vista.
http://shop.lenovo.com/SEUILibrary/controller/e/web/LenovoPortal/en_US/special-offers.workflow:ShowPromo?LandingPage=/All/US/Landing_pages/Promos/thinkpad/ThinkPad_DOS
I recently installed Debian on a laptop I got at work (after wiping the bundled windows). I was nervous about wifi-type issues, but to my surprise, the wifi drivers/hardware seemed to work fine out of the box!
Then I discovered my workplace uses a 3rd-party "authenticated wifi" that requires installing a windows driver to connect... (so mac users are out of luck as well!)
Ah, those wacky big-company IT depts!
[They also bought like a million USB sticks, which they freely hand out to anybody that needs one — except these too, require a windows driver to operate—the USB stick appears by default as an extremely small read-only disk, with an autoexec of some sort that loads the windows driver, which then proceeds to communicate with the stick via some proprietary protocol! All for "security," of course...]
We live, as we dream -- alone....
After nearly 19 years of near exclusively using Linux, I'm finally giving up on it. Why?
Chronic and ongoing problems with:
- Sound
- Video
- Wifi
- Power mgmt (suspend/hibernate/battery life)
- Hardware support in general
- Endless application problems (eg. no iTunes)
- A million applications that only partially work.
And all the distributions seem to be going sideways instead of forward.
Do yourself a favor, just go with Mac or Windows and run Linux in Virtualbox.
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