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Dell's New Sputnik 3 Mates Touchscreen With Ubuntu
ClaraBow writes "I find it interesting that Dell has started selling a thin and light touchscreen laptop called the XPS 13 Developer Edition, which will have Ubuntu Linux OS and Intel's fourth-generation Core processors, code-named Haswell. The laptop, code-named Sputnik, has a 13.3-inch touchscreen and will run on Ubuntu 12.04 OS. It is priced starting at $1,250 and is available in the U.S." One thing I wish was addressed in the blog post announcing this newest entry in the Sputnik line, or its listed specs (bad news beats not knowing, in this case), is battery life.
It's interesting that a company that pretty much vowed to only be wintel is branching out.
I am guessing microsoft upsetting people with surface has thawed large companies to alternatives.
https://www.system76.com/laptops/model/daru4
a bit cheaper
It doesn't come with Windows or OSX.
Not exactly hard to do, but still exceedingly rare for laptops in the US.
We love Linux, that's why.
It's from a major OEM, it runs Linux which hopefully means it has Linux-friendly hardware and good Linux drivers. That's enough to be newsworthy on slashdot, which still hopes Linux will overtake the market share of such gems as Windows Vista and Windows 8 ;)
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
but at $1250 I'm not sure who it's for. I can almost buy a Mac book for that. Maybe developers in need of a linux laptop? Are there that many of them? A lot of my nerd friends could be talking into buying this, but they wouldn't do much with it...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
The cost of the machine is $110 less than an otherwise identical XPS 13 with Windows 8.
It's the same price as the Windows 8 version. (That's listed at $1299, but scroll down for the "$50 off coupon".) This is progress for Dell; most of their previous Linux offerings cost more than the comparable Windows machine.
Funny how the battery life, which just happens to be the single most important criteria for laptop buyers, is not listed... It's like they don't expect anyone to even consider buying it.
I find it interesting that BUY THIS PRODUCT NOW ** Awesome features!! ** Relevant to your audience!!! **
Within no time I'll have a nice KDE desktop installed.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Sorry, that's not the world I'm travelling in.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop ?
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
But hey, I can install more than one and at the login prompt I select the specific desktop that suits me best :)
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Linux-compatible does not mean anything more than "it works".
And, as far as I've been able to tell over the latest 10 years or so, Linux "works" on basically 99% of machines I've ever touched without having to do anything special (yes, I have jumped through hoops, but that's not the point - here someone else has jumped through those hoops for you).
Whether it works TO ITS FULL CAPACITY is another question entirely. For example, chances are that it's graphics chipset is "supported" but very, very slim that it enjoys full acceleration unless we're talking about an Intel chipset or a binary driver somewhere. And we can already do *that* anywhere we like.
The fuss about Linux drivers is no longer "does it work" (and hasn't been, for a long time) so much as "does it work as fully as possible?". And almost certainly, in a consumer laptop, the answer is no.
All this says is that their laptop happens to work in Linux with a certain configuration. There's no guarantee that it won't include a binary driver and/or only a certain Linux image being "supported" (i.e. working at all). And that leaves you off no better than a Windows machine that only comes with a recovery disk.
(For hoops that I've jumped through, try setting up your Linux partitions to mirror those of a Zip-disk on even boot/install USB disks, having to manually load soundfonts with a script to make soundcards work, or having to compile for some mini-ITX boards that can barely support the 486 instruction set to get an idea of the sorts of things that can crop up with old / embedded / poorly supported hardware).
Remember people complaining about Ubuntu because it was "brown" and claiming Mint was better because it was "green"?
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
(yes, I have jumped through hoops, but that's not the point - here someone else has jumped through those hoops for you). (...) And we can already do *that* anywhere we like.
Actually that's exactly what you can't do with a laptop, maybe this bit and that bit works great with Linux while others don't work well or at all. Been there, tried that and it had nothing to do with price or quality but simply that some companies cared to support Linux and other's didn't. Same with accessories, one printer worked brilliantly while an almost similar competitor was a paperweight but at least those you can research. And if it doesn't quite work well you've got nobody to blame but yourself, they didn't sell it with Linux and never claimed it would work.
If you value your time then the fact that they have "jumped through those hoops" for you has value. That you have a company you can actually go back to and say "You sold me a Linux laptop but such and such isn't working!" has value. They're a big OEM, that puts pressure on the manufacturers to have Linux drivers. Perhaps during their testing and validation they've found bugs that have been fixed for this exact reason. Trust me, they do care a bit more if Dell says they'd like to sell a model but their drivers are buggy than if Joe Nobody says it doesn't work for him. But please use the Ubuntu install CD and take your chances on some random hardware, as somebody must figure out how to jump those hoops.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
What the hell are you people running on your machines?
I run 2-3 copies of Eclipse, DB/2 LUW, PostgreSQL, and MySQL with a JEE debug server on a 4GB box. I run Oracle, Sybase ASE, and SQL Server on a Windows 7 laptop with a JEE debug server and a couple of other things with 4GB RAM, usually including a couple of java programs that are sucking back 768MB each.
Neither box comes anywhere near thrashing. In fact, they hardly use their swap at all.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
And the answer "The drivers are as supplied on the recovery disk" is not familiar to you?
They are a big OEM. They don't care about supporting these drivers in anything but an OS they have supplied. Like my last 15 years of putting Linux machines into schools, I would bet that any Linux driver is tied to only a particular kernel, and that without proper source, and that they never update it. They won't support other distros and unless you want to run Ubuntu 12.04 (specifically) for ever, you won't see much action above and beyond telling you to put the machine back into it's factory state (i.e with Ubuntu 12.04 and their driver how it's always been installed).
But more likely, it will have some cheap base hardware that's already "supported" by chance and they do nothing special to sell it as a Linux machine. And you won't get anything beyond the standard binaries.
I will happily still to my "chances" on some random hardware, like I've been doing for over a decade. The examples I cite are few and far between and usually because support for a certain type of machine / hardware was DROPPED from Linux distros rather than anything to do with it not actually being present at all.
I think you've just fallen for the advertising - it says Linux so it must mean ALL Linux forever with open-source code, right? My hardware from pre-1999 that says the same will happily prove you wrong. Sure, if you're lucky it had a 2.0/2.2 driver for it at some point, but you don't stand a chance of getting it working nowadays - and some of those drivers refused to install on anything but the "supported" distro.
The fact that this comes with Ubuntu tells you one of two things:
- They support ONLY Ubuntu
- or -
- Ubuntu does well enough supporting this with no help required.
P.S. I have sent computers back to companies that claimed Linux support, and I made a major UK distributor fight with their suppliers to get me a custom BIOS made for a laptop because they sold it to me as "supporting" Windows XP and then found out it wouldn't boot XP if you had encryption software (required by law in my field) because of a crappy BIOS bug. Literally, I had an AMI BIOS written, just for that laptop, just for me, because of how much money it was going to cost them if I had sent the laptops we'd bought on the basis of XP support back.
Trust me, doing the same for Linux is a LOT harder, especially when they can demonstrate that on ***A*** Linux with ***A*** driver that it works.
"For example, chances are that it's graphics chipset is "supported" but very, very slim that it enjoys full acceleration unless we're talking about an Intel chipset or a binary driver somewhere."
It has an Intel chipset, which has full 2D and 3D acceleration.
I have the second-gen XPS 13 developer edition. Every function on the system works. It does not include any binary drivers. Yes, only the supplied Ubuntu install is 'supported', but then, if you buy a Windows 7 laptop and then self-install Windows 8 on it (for instance), your manufacturer isn't going to support that either. I run Fedora 19 on my second-gen XPS 13 and all its functions work fully and correctly.
"try setting up your Linux partitions to mirror those of a Zip-disk on even boot/install USB disks"
What? That fragment does not even make syntactical sense, so far as I can work out.
"having to manually load soundfonts with a script to make soundcards work"
Along with the reference to 'Zip-disks' - 1996 called and it wants its problems back.
"or having to compile for some mini-ITX boards that can barely support the 486 instruction set to get an idea of the sorts of things that can crop up with old / embedded / poorly supported hardware"
So, buying CPUs that 'can barely support the 486 instruction set' is a bad idea in 2013, huh? Thanks for the tip, I never would've guessed.
If it's anything like the last xps 13 then it will be fucking awesome. I love everything about this laptop. It's incredibly thin and light. The screen is vivid. It runs everything I want it too and never hesitates on me. Plus with the solid state Hard drive it wakes up from sleep in about 2 - 3 seconds.
The Blade Itself
Well said! Unfortunately, catering for idiots is the mark of the late 20th century and early 21st and it isn't going to get better. People are busy and lazy. They don't want to have to learn new things. Learning for the joy of learning is going out the door and has become 'vocational learning' only. Universities even back in the 70's were dropping art and history courses as well as classical languages and history etc. The industries that have run the American economy that has influenced the world in these things so much just want consumers. People who know what the specials are at the dept store, but don't really think much. They know how to use facebook, are not savvy enough to avoid the ads and know how to use youtube enough to view cat videos. Mostly, they know how to buy, buy, buy and consume what they are told to consume. Stupidity is the desired outcome. Stupid consumers who just buy whatever crap is dished out to them.
sudo mount --milk --sugar
I had the previous gen XPS13 for a bit, including a long work trip. It got great battery life even then, but the keyboard was miserable. PgUp, PgDn, Home, and End required a function keypress. The tactile response was weak and it felt like a cheap model, despite the price. The 1 year warranty was lacking too. Ended up handing it off to a coworker and now running a Latitude E6430U for the same money - much better keyboard and tactile qualities, and no question it is more robust with a 3 year warranty. You pay for it with a slightly heavier chassis but I'll take it. 16x9 resolution is still weak though, just waiting for the higher res screens on the Dell mobiles.
And at $1,250, overpriced. And of course they can then point to poor sales as to why they only sell Windows laptops / tablets at a reasonable price.
It comes with one year support with the option of extending the support. Perhaps this is why Dell is trying out the market with Linux. It is billed as a developer device so one would think that the specs are for those who run and compile software not exactly your average joe consumer. If you notice the price is slightly lower than a comparable Mac Book PRO. The only difference is the screen res as Mac Books have a Retina Display, whatever the hell that is LOL. So this is not designed to be sold in the box stores. If it takes off then perhaps a cheaper line of consumer Linux option laptops might show up. Somehow I don't think Dell is going to dabble in the Chromebook market the way Samsung does.
There is another thought, perhaps Dell is doing this to piss off Microsoft again, every time they have offered a Linux or no os option in the past all of a sudden they get a quick visit from the men in black from Redmond and POOF the line gets axed. The other thought is the reason why they have chosen Ubuntu this time around is because a stock Ubuntu need to be tweeked to do certain file formats and in selling Ubuntu in a stock format the goons from the MPEGLA cannot come after them, even if Microshaft comes knocking about fat and ntfs patents perhaps they will just turn around and sick them on Shuttleworth this time around instead of just dumping the Linux line like they did with their RedHat option laptops and desktops in the past.
Considering that Dell already got cash from Redmond, perhaps they are trying to squeeze a little more cheese out of MS. Either way I do not expect them to actually aggressively market an alternative OS, they like all the other manufactures just kowtow to the almighty Windows, always have and I doubt they actually have the balls as a corporation to break the free from the OS monopoly.
This message was not sent from an iPhone because Peter Sellers really was a deviated prevert without a dime for the call
Windows has it's place but it's not because MS has such a clean rap sheet forcing it upon us.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
I just run top and sorted by memory usage. I see firefox (with 10 tabs open), thunderbird, emacs, skype, nautilus, dropbox, Xorg followed by many other system applications. I have mysql and postgresql running by the don't make it into the top 50 or something. If I had a ruby on rails application running, or cassandra, they'd be in the top 10. I can run all of these quite comfortably together on my 4 GB laptop, unless something gets unexpectedly too big and I have to kill it. But I'm always a little on swap. I know that if I start Eclipse I have to close something else. IntelliJ is much more RAM friendly but luckily my job doesn't involve stuff for which I need an IDE. emacs is really enough. Even vim would do.
What I can't run in 4 GB is all of the above plus more than one VM. Actually if the VM is not a headless Linux server or a WinXP client I can't run it unless I close some of the applications I keep open all the time. The free Win7 and Win8 VMs from http://www.modern.ie/en-us/virtualization-tools#downloads tend to use a lot of RAM and if one does web development it nice to have a couple of them open for testing on IE. That's less and less important because all of my customers moved to Firefox or Chrome over the years but some of *their* customers are still on IE, which is getting more standard. (BTW, I used to run this laptop with Windows and a virtualized Linux development server, but as my job is to develop for Linux servers and web browsers I decided to go the other way round and I'm perfectly happy with that.)
Furthermore there are occasional memory hogs. A sample program from a Coursera big data course (don't remember which one) required 2 GB of RAM to process some sample csv file for an assignment. Those were program and data provided by the teacher and there was nothing I could do about it. Plus I do occasional video editing. Extra RAM is always handy.
Because of those memory constraints (and end of support) I'm looking for a new laptop and I'm not considering anything that can't be upgraded at 16 GB minimum. I like the internals of HP's new Zbook 15 (fully user serviceable parts, up to 32 GB RAM, up to two disks, etc). I don't like some of its exteriors: the keyboard with small arrow keys and the number pad which turns it into an interface for left handed people (the touchpad is placed to the very left, which is common but inappropriate for 90% of the population). I definitely prefer the keyboard arrangement of their Elitebook 850 g1 (about the same width and no numberpad), which stops at 16 GB and is a weaker machine in many other ways. Actually I prefer the case of my current nc8430, which has a better keyboard (more key travel) and a 16:10 screen (the zbook has to be wider to raise to the same screen height). My Core 2 Duo is still good enough for my job, disk speed (or lack of, compared to SSDs) is not a problem but obviously everybody welcomes a faster machine, me too. However the limited memory is definitely becoming a problem.
I recently needed two new Linux laptops. A small one and a big fast one. With some special requirements: qwerty keyboard, but shipped out of the US, matte screen, fast CPU and mem but doesn't care about GPU, etc... Well, I simply couldn't find anything. The Dell site had only the aforementionned 'development laptop'. System76 and other Linux vendors all had something missing (often the shipping or the matte screen). I was about to get a Win8 laptop to wipe when I got a mail from Dell at work (we buy stuff from them): basically their entire lineup with Linux. With full options. You just had to get into the site in a different way. It's dumb but I know have an ugly but nice M6700 with Ubuntu.
Non-Linux Penguins ?
It's available in Canada too, at $1289.99 to start....
http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/xps-13-9333/pd?oc=cax13u1238&model_id=xps-13-9333
For those who don't want to click the link (or if the link is geo-locked)....
Core i5 4200U (2.6GHz)
13.3" 1920x1080 touchscreen display
8GB DDR3 memory (1600MHz)
128GB SSD
Intel HD 4400 graphics
Ubuntu 12.04
Weight: 3.04lbs
Warranty: 1 year Next Business Day onsite support (after remote diagnosis, also 1 year). You can extend that to 3 years, and you can also buy up to 3 years of accidental damage coverage.
That's not a low end laptop. You are getting your money's worth, and it's in the same price range as Windows-based laptops with similar spec.
If you really want a cheap laptop with Linux on it, buy a chromebook. You can unlock them and replace the Chrome OS with a standard Linux distro if you want.