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1+ Year Running Arch Linux On a Lenovo Yoga 2 Chronicled

Posted by timothy on from the not-yet-doing-corpse-position dept.

New submitter KeithCu writes with a lengthy explanation of the joys (and just a handful of glitches) he's had in running Arch Linux on his ultraportable, a Lenovo Yoga 2. Other than the hardware-specific issues, I've been amazed by how well Arch Linux works, given that it doesn't have release cycles, or a big team with a lot of money supporting and marketing it. I've heard only 30 developers maintain the core Arch packages, with most of them having a full-time job doing something else! At the same time, it shouldn't be a total surprise things work so well, because free software doesn't just fall off a turnip truck. Not many reviews feature pictures of a laptop charred from building LibreOffice.

38 of 74 comments (clear)

  1. Ah the Slashdot effect... by TWX · · Score: 1

    Tried to read the story, site already appears slashdotted.

    I'm stuck using a Thinkpad Yoga 12.5" at work, would rather run Linux but the damn thing's tablet-specific stuff seems like it'd be a huge pain in the butt.

    --
    Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
    1. Re:Ah the Slashdot effect... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Well, yes... The site is being served by a Lenovo running Arch.

    2. Re:Ah the Slashdot effect... by Hel+Toupee · · Score: 1

      http://webcache.googleusercont... Google cache to the rescue!

      --
      PERL:
      All of the power of Voodoo with most of the understandibility!
  2. Impressive... and improbable. by snarfies · · Score: 3, Informative

    I can't read the story - it is already Slashdotted.

    But Arch is notorious for breakage. Lots of it.

    I tried Arch myself on my own laptop for about a year. There were at least a dozen times where running what should have been a simple system update rendered things unusable. Sometimes it was just a few simple programs that ceased to function. Sometimes it was X itself failing to launch, leaving me at a command prompt. All of it took a fair amount of fiddling to fix, and eventually I got tired of it.

    I switched over to Manjaro. The same laptop has been running that for at least two years now and hasn't had a single instance of breakage.

    1. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Weird...really odd. I had the exact opposite experience. Arch has been super stable for me when Fedora was garbage, Manjaro and Antergos wouldn't install and Ubuntu was too resource heavy. Glad you found something that works for you though.

    2. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      And that's expected by the Arch community. I think it's part of what makes the experience fun, going online and having a seance on fixing the latest update incompatibility and learning something new.

    3. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by boondaburrah · · Score: 5, Interesting

      While I've had almost the exact opposite experience (my Arch laptop has been running a few years now without issues) I kindof appreciate that it breaks for people so often. It's lead to the Arch wiki being the most complete wiki for solving linux problems I've seen. Hell, I usually go there to fix problems on any linux. It's saved my ass on ubuntu quite a few times!

    4. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by tuxrulz · · Score: 1

      Arch has made some changes that required user interaction. And if those are done correctly and following the steps, is really minimized the chances to actually not break the system. I ran it for like 2-3 years, and hardly had any problem in it.

    5. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by macxcool · · Score: 1

      I agree. I've been running Arch for a few years now. If you pay attention to changes that need user interaction, you're usually fine. Arch doesn't really break things. It make for a very fast, stable system in my experience, especially if you stay away from the dark recesses of the AUR.

    6. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by Skarjak · · Score: 1

      That is not my experience with Arch. I very rarely need to do anything after the update. You just have to quickly check the homepage before updates to know if there's anything that could break, and that happens pretty rarely, especially now that the switch to systemD is complete.

    7. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by davidshewitt · · Score: 1

      This is why I run Debian. I don't have time to troubleshoot my laptop and my server every time I update them. That being said, I'm kind of biased since I'm a Linux sysadmin for a factory. :-)

      And thanks to everyone who does run Arch and posts their solutions on the Arch wiki. It's extremely helpful.

    8. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by Endloser · · Score: 2

      I don't have many problems with it. When I do I just fix it. Arch isn't really is distro for people who simply follow direction. Sometimes there are puzzles for us to solve. Usually though, "problems" that pop up just regular Linux system administration tasks other distros "fix" for you. I'm happy you found a distro you're happy with. That's one of the beauties of the Linux community. As of late there are distros for all skill and interest levels.

    9. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by fisted · · Score: 1

      I prefer proper documentation over the "fun" of googling for fixed to be tried out randomly.

      --
      CLI paste? paste.pr0.tips!
    10. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by Blaskowicz · · Score: 1

      Even with linux mint, which uses Ubuntu LTS I've come to appreciate that some people do have breakage. Upgrading from 17.0 to 17.1 should be the most boring and uneventful thing (it's worth it for the new, sharper default font) yet some people report problems with it. Ditto with the 3.13 to 3.16 kernel upgrade (optional, easy to do but you have to go looking for it and there's a warning)

      I'm glad to use a desktop, without even those new-fangled things like a USB keyboard or display over HDMI etc., basically nothing can break and if all hell were to break I can drop down to 80x25 text, the BIOS will still think I have a keyboard from 1984 and the CPU will cut off at 105C without burning down anything.
      I have been lucky with wifi (older ralink that never caused an issue)

    11. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by timetrap · · Score: 1

      I remember the dark days; the gentoo wiki crashed and burned. Arch took up the slack for a time, several weeks in fact, before the gentoo team could restore most of what they had.

    12. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by snake_case_hoschi · · Score: 1

      Manjaro is a copy of Archlinux, with security flaws.

    13. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by PPalmgren · · Score: 1

      I don't mean to single you out, and this isn't specifically about you, but your post is a microcosm of why "Year of the Linux Desktop" is a fantasy. People that enjoy Linux and use linux see a break or error as an adventure. Unfortunately, this is also the reason everyone who doesn't think that way finds it frustrating.

    14. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by Ivan+the+Terrible · · Score: 2

      I've been using Arch now for over 5 years now and Linux (Unix) for decades, and I recall only one instance of Arch breakage after an update. I run (or ran) Arch on an ancient i686 dual PIII file server, a Gateway netbook, a Lenovo T420i laptop, and now a (wonderful!) ASUS UX305F ultrabook. Your experience does not match mine, and certainly doesn't match the experience of the Window 10 user who comments later.

      Linux is not for everyone. Just like (La)TeX or Emacs are not for everyone. I've forgotten who said it, but Unix gives you many "words" and a "grammar" with which you can build sentences, and from these sentences, paragraphs. Windows and OS X give you many sentences that you can re-arrange to form paragraphs, but the sentences have been chosen for you beforehand. Carefully chosen to be useful, but nonetheless chosen for you.

      It takes more effort to learn the vocabulary and the grammar, and the sentences you first come up with are near nonsense. But patience, a certain tolerance for error, grit, a desire to be your own master, and a willingness to experiment allow you to have a computer system (editor, publishing system) that does what you want it to do.

      But, as I said, Linux is not for everyone.

    15. Re:Impressive... and improbable. by x_t0ken_407 · · Score: 1

      Weird...really odd. I had the exact opposite experience. Arch has been super stable for me when Fedora was garbage, Manjaro and Antergos wouldn't install and Ubuntu was too resource heavy. Glad you found something that works for you though.

      Exactly, I've had a similar experience, on more than a couple different laptops. My current laptop is about a year in...never have I had Arch itself take a dump on me. Stupid stuff I did caused issues, but not because of a simple update...odd that OP's comment was up-voted so much.

  3. Re:working link by viperidaenz · · Score: 1

    You've link to a working link that simply links to the broken link. Good job.

  4. I didn't know this was news by burdickjp · · Score: 1

    I ran Arch for a long time on multiple laptops and an HTPC. I run Manjaro now because it's just easier to install and functionally similar.

  5. Re:working link by Hel+Toupee · · Score: 1

    http://webcache.googleusercont... Google cache to the rescue!

    --
    PERL:
    All of the power of Voodoo with most of the understandibility!
  6. Expensive brick by digitalPhant0m · · Score: 5, Funny

    Other than the hardware-specific issues

    So basically: other than the fact that it can't connect to wifi, has no ethernet, 3d acceleration, and keeps my fans don't cool correctly which resulted in leg burns and a melted case, it's perfect.

     

  7. Way too many problems by PRMan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yeah, yeah, we know. Windows and Mac are terrible and Linux is so much more "stable".

    Scanning for networks failed No networks found

    the de-facto wireless GUI on Linux...was broken for my machine because it thought my wireless card was disabled

    Meanwhile, my mouse is the most frustrating issue

    Resume has been flakey...I never closed my screen because I didn’t trust it would come back. Sometimes, it would come back, but Gnome wouldn’t let me login!

    For a while, the laptop speakers never worked after a reboot until I plugged something into the headphone jack, and then removed it

    One time I was building LibreOffice while it was on a blanket and it overheated and charred the bottom. When doing CPU-intensive work, I now place this laptop on a metal plate

    There are 4K videos on Youtube, but they are extremely jittery and suck all the CPU as the GPU is not being used

    It took hours to render these 3200×1800 Arch wallpapers

    [The mouse] use[d] to jump violently all over the screen while typing, but now it just hovers in small circles

    In spite of my problems, I’m very glad I don’t need to mess with the Windows or Mac world.

    Unfortunately, such advanced battery features are not yet enabled in Linux

    OK, so let's see. Other than the network card, mouse, 2D graphics, sound, CPU, 3D graphics, battery and the fact that normal usage melted it, it works awesome. I think I'll stick with Windows 10 TP on my laptop, where I've only had minor network issues requiring a reboot to get it back sometimes.

    --
    Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
    1. Re:Way too many problems by conoviator · · Score: 2

      Maybe Arch isn't the right distro for that particular notebook. I've been using MintOS on my Yoga for several months. Works great!

    2. Re:Way too many problems by dudpixel · · Score: 1

      In the Linux world, I guess we would call this "natural selection" ;-)

      I've been using Arch Linux as both a work and a personal desktop for over a year now. What am I doing that you're not, or vice versa?

      Arch excels at its primary purpose. It's by far the best linux distro I've used, and I've tried many (for serious work not just tinkering).

      --
      This seemed like a reasonable sig at the time.
    3. Re:Way too many problems by Gaygirlie · · Score: 1

      and the fact that normal usage melted it

      I do have to point out that it wasn't "normal usage." The article says the laptop is designed to blow the hot air out from the bottom, but he had the laptop on a soft blanket so it couldn't do that. It would've gotten charred regardless of the OS if you're so stupid as to block the exhausts.

    4. Re:Way too many problems by rdnetto · · Score: 1

      OK, so let's see. Other than the network card, mouse, 2D graphics, sound, CPU, 3D graphics, battery and the fact that normal usage melted it, it works awesome. I think I'll stick with Windows 10 TP on my laptop, where I've only had minor network issues requiring a reboot to get it back sometimes.

      To be fair, Arch is a distro for people who are fine with things breaking all the time, which is what you'd expect of a bleeding edge rolling release distro. A review of someone who spent a year running Ubuntu on their laptop would be far more realistic in terms of what a casual user would experience.

      --
      Most human behaviour can be explained in terms of identity.
  8. BTRFS makes Arch awesome by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    For me, the fact that an update was allowed to break things made Arch a no-go. I'm not adverse to tinkering on my own schedule, but my machine should die just from running an update.

    On a new Fedora install, I used BTRFS. I would snapshot whenever I was going to run an update, just in case. One time a Fedora update broke something and i was able to rollback in about a minute. It was fantastic.

    I realised this meant that Arch was now an option, and I haven't looked back. I have exactly what I want installed, exactly as the developers intended it. It's rock-solid stable, fast, and gets good battery life.

    The documentation is truly amazing. It's now the first place I go even when I'm working with other distros at work.

    The act of installing one feature at a time means that it's much easier to pinpoint what is causing a problem, and the manual configuration means that you tend to understand the applications better when problems arise.

    I really can't recommend it enough, provided you use BTRFS (or XFS I guess). Having rollback abilities is an absolute game-changer for linux desktops.

    1. Re:BTRFS makes Arch awesome by TyFoN · · Score: 1
      I can't remember breaking any of my arch installations for the past few years. Just make sure to pay attention to the announce list or have the arch linux news rss in your aggregator of choice.
      arch-announce

      And yes, it is awesome I use it on my home computers and the development workstation at work.

  9. What is this guy's background? by damn_registrars · · Score: 1

    He seems knowledgeable on a lot of the Linux stuff but he doesn't seem to understand that his Lenovo Yoga is not a thinkpad. He mentions a few things that he misses from having previously used a thinkpad (the better keyboard and the better pointing device being two such things) and doesn't seem to realize that he is using a laptop that is not designed to compete with the thinkpads. There are convertible thinkpad tablets out there for that purpose.

    --
    Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
  10. One year after switching to Arch as my work OS... by Endloser · · Score: 1

    and I don't have any complaints. I wanted to up my skill level and have done so dramatically. I know what services are running on my machine and why. Also, I know how to perform routine networking tasks without ifconfig! Sure there were challenges at first, but after the initial learning curve I feel much more in tune with my OS than when I ran Debian or CentOS. Servers at work still get Red Hat because that's what we're allowed to use. However, when I get to spec out a special project (which is the focus of my job) I usually choose Arch because I want a very specific set of services running and don't want anything to interfere. Use what works for you. This works for me.

  11. Re:One year after switching to Arch as my work OS. by timetrap · · Score: 1

    I concur. Arch is an easy way to learn linux from a services and utilities point of view. I am somewhat skeptical still about the value of LFS (from a services point of view). Too much time is spent in the build cycle. You will understand how to compile things, but you don't get enough "trigger-time" on the important day-to-day services that most people expect to run. I ran Arch on a laptop and on a workstation while managing about 200 windows servers. Get remote desktop client installed, samba, and you are good to go! (all automation happened on the automation server)

  12. and the point? by play_4124 · · Score: 1

    who is KeithCu? why do we care what his experience with arch has been on his lenovo? any basic googling will show the distro isnt the most stable. probably explains why the arch wiki are so visited. i dont understand the point of the article. arch is a 10+ yr old distro. hows this any different then a "hey heres john doe's experience with gentoo the last two years!" almost slashvertisement

  13. Not pretty, but just VM it by Fencepost · · Score: 1

    Unless you have deep philosophical reasons to never ever run Microsoft software, for almost any cutting-edge hardware youmay be better off just running VMWare (Workstation or Player) on Windows, then running your Linux within the VM. You may lose convenient access to some features, but you'll also get the advantage of better hardware compatibility and with most usage you probably won't much notice the performance hit.

    --
    fencepost
    just a little off
  14. Archlinux on desktop at work and laptop at home by snake_case_hoschi · · Score: 1

    Archlinux is a pretty good example for "Keep It Small and Simple" (KISS). Plain text-files for configuration, a well-working package-manager without any magic and only the absolutely required patches. My desktop at work is running with Archlinux since years and my private laptop (ThinkPad X22O) also.

    You have to be experienced with UNIX or GNU/Linux and will have only little maintenance duties and always an stable state-of-the-art system.

    Honestly, I'm a long standing user of Gentoo and compiling the kernel on my self. So "experienced" mains clearly not "can install Windows", it means experienced with UNIX. On the other side, using Windows and keeping it up-to-date is a nightmare for me because it just enforce a bad usage-pattern and I'm not really longer experienced with Windows.

    1. Re:Archlinux on desktop at work and laptop at home by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      KISS does not mean that.

  15. No need to be cutting edge by aNonnyMouseCowered · · Score: 1

    "Unless you have deep philosophical reasons to never ever run Microsoft software, for almost any cutting-edge hardware youmay be better off just running VMWare (Workstation or Player) on Windows, then running your Linux within the VM."

    Well, for the last five years, I've never found the need to buy cutting edge hardware for my desktop and laptop computing needs. My desktop runs fine with an all Intel setup (a NUC mini PC with no discrete video cards) with a CPU that was two generations behind the bleeding edge. Ditto for my laptop. Not a gamer of the FPS variety, so I've got all the speed I need with my "obsolete" hardware. So a Debian Linux install works just as fine as any commericial OS full of desktop bling. However, I do have a fairly "modern" tablet by a certain Korean company, whose bloatware infested Android variant I promptly replaced with a more open custom ROM.