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After protest, Lenovo adds Linux compatibility to Yoga 900 and 900S laptops
- adtac 10y agoSeriously, why isn't Linux higher on the priority list of vendors? A huge portion of devs have Linux as their main OS but support is so scarce.
- digi_owl 10y agoBecause the margins are just not there.
- marcosdumay 10y agoWhy a Linux computer should have any less margin than a Windows one?
- wmf 10y agoBecause crapware doesn't exist for Linux.
- eth0up 10y agoIt's pleasantly scarce, but does come along occasionally: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ubuntu-spyware.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ubuntu-spyware.en.html
- marcosdumay 10y agoDoes the crapware really pay more than the cost of a Windows EOM license? How does that work economically? Because not everybody buys the crapware license later (and they normally cost less than Windows), and mass stealing of data is not very lucrative.
- Alupis 10y agoTypically OEM's are paid per install of crapware (regardless if the user ends up paying for the subscriptions). It's just a form of marketing for these companies - ie. a certain percentage of potential users will convert into paying users. The reason Windows laptops have been cheaper or the same price as the linux counterpart is usually due to the combination of subsidized licensing from Microsoft, crapware installation kickbacks, and lower cost of support infrastructure (the OEM already has a huge Windows support staff and infrastructure, creating a new one for Linux - or more correctly, a specific distro of linux - costs more). If the linux laptops sell more and more, eventually the support costs will come down to on-par (or lower perhaps... who knows). It's a chicken-and-egg problem, and one that OEM's are not willing to foot the bill up front for. We have to vote with our wallets and take that short-term hit in order to push the ecosystem in that direction.
- marcosdumay 10y agoSupport might be a reasonable reason, yes. But crapware can not pay that much. The crapware creators themselves get less revenue than licensing costs, and they can kick back just a fraction of that revenue. (That is, unless they have another business model that isn't selling licenses or spying on users.)
- Alupis 10y agoMargins on computers are notoriously thin. Even say, $1.00 per system sold with crapware pre-installed can make a difference in the profitability of a product line at scale. Then there's the kickbacks for when a customer does pay for a subscription.
- marcosdumay 10y agoThe crapware can not pay more than the Windows cost, simply because it does not have enough revenue. Unless, of course MS is paying the OEM to install Windows, or billing for Linux computers. Or crapware has some business model that I'm not aware of.
- antoinealb 10y agoThe correct comparison would be "Linux + Windows" one will have less margin than "Windows only" one, only because of cost of testing / opportunities of bundling software with it.
- frostburg 10y agoMost of their clients aren't developers, I imagine.
- SEJeff 10y agoThe same could be said about windows on supercomputers. Why is windows supported so poorly by Cray and other HPC supercomputer vendors when Linux is supported so well? It is just about the demographics.
- syshum 10y agoThat is easy. Linux is technologically superior to Windows in every way.
- jpitz 10y agoI think hyperbole is unnecessary here - Linux is superior in many ways, but your statement is only going to provoke arguments of exceptions.
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- semi-extrinsic 10y agoActually, MSFT has pushed Windows Server on supercomputers a few times, as well as for other latency critical applications like the London Stock Exchange. Each time they've ended up with egg on their faces for technical reasons, i.e. Linux consistently outperforms Windows Server both on speed and reliability for these workloads. Example: http://www.computerworld.com/article/2467082/data-center/london-stock-exchange-to-abandon-failed-windows-platform.html http://www.computerworld.com/article/2467082/data-center/lon...
- SEJeff 10y agoRight, you're simply providing reasons that agree with me! I work as a tech guy (linux wrangler / code monkey) for a finance firm. I worked in finance during the meltdown of LSE and the new linux based "Millennium" platform. I agree with you that Linux consistently is higher throughput AND lower latency, but that is my point. Windows isn't on supercomputers because it isn't a great fit and there isn't much of a market for it. Ditto can be said for Linux on the Desktop. * This message brought to you from my RHEL7 work workstation running GNOME 3 and Chrome :D
- JamesBaxter 10y agoThe Stack Overflow developer survey would suggest that's not correct[0]. Mac OS X 26.2% Windows 7 22.5% Linux 21.7% Windows 10 20.8% Windows 8 8.4% Windows XP 0.4% Though it is possible that the sort of developers that use desktop linux don't use Stack Overflow. [0] http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#technology-desktop-operating-system http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#tech...
- captainmuon 10y agoHuh, 21.7% is a surpizingly huge portion in my book. I would have suspected a much smaller number. One fifth is a market segment that is large enough to cater for. If you even put a small team on the task of ensuring that Linux installs on your notebooks, and make the minimal neccessary changes (like this BIOS change... or better revert of a breaking change), then you could claim Linux support as your unique selling point, and grab a huge fraction of those 20%.
- ddeck 10y ago>One fifth is a market segment that is large enough to cater for Keep in mind that that's 21.7% of stack overflow users (i.e. developers), not users in general. According StatCounter (based on browser stats), GNU/Linux represented 1.44% of desktop/laptop OS as of last month. Perhaps developers are more likely to use these laptops in particular, but they're unlikely to be 100% of users.
- Alupis 10y ago> Keep in mind that that's 21.7% of stack overflow users (i.e. developers), not users in general. The unfortunate reality is that while this number is largerish, whenever a company comes out with a linux-based "developer edition" laptop, folks don't buy it. The Dell XPS 13, for example, is a great looking machine - but too many folks were busy buying macbooks to help Dell learn this market segment does indeed want more products like this. We need to vote with our wallets, in order to reinforce this behavior. Perhaps this may change now that developers are feeling disenfranchised with Apple over the recent model releases.
- wmf 10y agoDell, Lenovo, and HP support Linux on their "pro" PCs but they don't bother for their toy laptops like this Yoga that we're talking about.
- tdkl 10y ago> This is a Linux-only BIOS, meaning it should be used only by those who want to load the OS. If you want to continue with Windows, do not load the firmware. “This BIOS is not intended to be used on machines running Windows operating systems,” Lenovo said. One step forward, two steps back.
- Johan-bjareholt 10y agoThe "Linux only BIOS" also works for Windows though so you can dual boot with it. The reason why they say it doesn't is because they don't want to spend money on officially supporting it and AHCI gives a slight performance decrease from their default RAID configuration.
- tdkl 10y agoWell if it does work with Windows, then fine, I took it from the article, that there's no chance running Windows or dual booting after switching to it. > because they don't want to spend money on officially supporting it I hope this doesn't mean the warranty and support is void after doing this, wouldn't even surprise me.
- marcosdumay 10y ago> I took it from the article, that there's no chance running Windows or dual booting after switching to it That's literally what they said. The GP is telling you it's a lie (and is very probably right, but I don't know the details), but they said you can not dual boot.
- wtallis 10y ago> "and AHCI gives a slight performance decrease from their default RAID configuration." Is that actually true, or is it really that using Microsoft's AHCI driver instead of Intel's driver hurts performance? Last time I checked, Intel's driver could be used even when the controller is in AHCI mode.
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- kbenson 10y ago> Locking specific hardware to Windows has emerged as an issue in recent years. For example, Intel’s Kaby Lake chips support only Windows 10, so will AMD’s upcoming Zen chips. > Another option is to buy Linux-based laptops with the latest Kaby Lake chips, like System76’s Lemur laptop, which starts at $699, or Dell’s XPS 13 Developer Edition, which starts at $949. So, which is it? Can Kaby Lake chips support Linux or not, because those statements seem contradictory.
- gpderetta 10y agoMisleading line. They do not support any version of window before 10 (that is, neither MS nor Intel or AMD will release drivers for other windows). Linux (and other OSs) should support them just fine.
- captainmuon 10y agoI'm curious, what do the CPUs need drivers for? I thought x86 processors are always backwards-compatible, in theory all the way back to DOS. Or is it the chipset driver? Here also I wonder what would have changed dramatically since the previous generation. I've found the only thing I needed to install chipset drivers for was for mainboard-specific features, like LED and Fan control, and for (back then) bleeding edge features like USB3. Granted, this was because basic chipset support was integrated into windows. Still, I wonder what the breaking change or new feature in Kaby Lake is.
- wmf 10y agoWindows 7/8 don't support xHCI USB controllers that are present in Kaby Lake. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/09/02/windows_intel_kaby_lake_amd_zen/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/09/02/windows_intel_kaby_l... I suspect this is mostly artificial and the EHCI emulation is still there but just fused off to encourage people to upgrade.
- djsumdog 10y agoThat's what I gathered. It just means older operating systems won't be able to take advantage of new instruction sets, or as other commenters have pointed out, we won't see USB3/Bluetooth drivers that are guaranteed to work on the older chips. Is that it, or is there more to this I'm missing?
- equalunique 10y agoThose are some nice looking laptops. With this development, I may be getting one. The 900S with QHD looks like fun!
- znpy 10y agoWoah, that is truly big. I remember that stuff like this used to quickly be redirected to /dev/null like five years ago. Great news then! Something has changed then :)
- croon 10y agoSo Lenovo only fixes bad stuff they do after vocal protest. Which time in a row is this now?
- hd4 10y agoToo late, I will never buy Lenovo again, there are too many other reasonable choices of companies who don't make anti-Linux decisions then backtrack when they get covered in shit. Once bitten..
- pavel_lishin 10y agoDon't forget anti-security, too! https://www.engadget.com/2015/08/12/lenovo-updater-security-hole/ https://www.engadget.com/2015/08/12/lenovo-updater-security-... https://www.cnet.com/news/superfish-torments-lenovo-owners-with-more-than-adware/ https://www.cnet.com/news/superfish-torments-lenovo-owners-w...
- lacampbell 10y agoI have a lenovo thinkpad x140e and I love it. It's underpowered and "bulky", but as a healthy adult I really don't care if a laptop is a few hundred grams heavier. I've dropped it once or twice as well. But I am not going to buy a laptop that won't run Linux. have any recommendations?
- chrisper 10y ago>But I am not going to buy a laptop that won't run Linux. have any recommendations? Just keep buying Thinkpads. They are fine and support Linux. I would stay away from regular consumer laptops anyway.
- hd4 10y agoThe Dell XPS seems to get recommended a lot. I have a 2012 HP Pavilion which works fine with Ubuntu 16.04.
- yuhong 10y agoI have been thinking about whether the distinction between "consumer" (eg IdeaPad) and "business" (eg ThinkPad) machines even makes sense. This is not even limited to Lenovo of course.
- mappu 10y agoIntel submitted a patch to the linux-nvme mailing list to support the original raid system used in the Lenovo Yoga. However, the kernel maintainers turned down the patch because the hardware itself was bizarre, underspecified, and unreliable in common cases. This is an ongoing story and i expect there'll be a resolution in a few months. ML discussion thread is here: http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/linux-nvme/2016-October/006800.html http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/linux-nvme/2016-October...
- voltagex_ 10y agoI'm sure there was a post on linux-ide in the same vein. It's frustrating because my XPS 13 is also affected.
- incompatible 10y agoIs the unreliable hardware causing problems for Windows users?
- dogma1138 10y agoNo.
- digi_owl 10y agoNope, because Intel can just push some binary drivers out and everyone will down it with a gargle. The kernel patches are refused because the kernel devs expect to maintain the code for as long as there are devices in active use that need it once allowed in. Thus they demand a proper spec for the device behavior so they can test for breakages down the line. And apparently the patches are already violating AHCI behavior expected by the kernel. Or at least that is what i got out of reading the short ML thread.
- revelation 10y agoCan someone explain in greater detail what exactly Intel is trying to do here? It sounds like trying to tunnel NVMe through something that is only connected over an AHCI interface.
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- stormbrew 10y agoThis is interesting, considering I'm running stock ubuntu 16.04 on a lenovo yoga 900. Didn't have to do any magic at install. I was under the impression that newer kernels already supported The Thing That Is The Problem. It's either that or my laptop is magic...
- shmerl 10y agoAt least it's something, but good luck getting any refund from them for the Windows tax. Unless you summon them to a small claims court, they staunchly refuse to refund you, even if you don't plan to use Windows and don't accept the Windows EULA.
- zeta0134 10y agoWait, why would they? The Windows license is bundled with the cost of the computer. You bought the license, whether you plan to use it or not. They are under no obligation to sell the license separately or offer you partial refunds, that's not how sales work. Good on them if they do, but I feel like you'd be laughed out of Small Claims court. What's your argument? You weren't forced to buy a Lenovo computer, you could have bought any machine, including one with Linux preinstalled and no "Windows Tax."
- shmerl 10y ago> Wait, why would they? Because they are obligated to. Forced product bundling is illegal - it violates anti-trust law.
- zeta0134 10y agoHrm! IANAL, I was entirely unaware this was even a thing, and now I'm deep down the Wikipedia rabbit hole. The more you know! Looks like the legality of it varies by state / region / country. Maybe it's not illegal where I live; I'm in South Texas. I'll research it though, thanks! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tying_(commerce) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tying_(commerce)
- shmerl 10y agoThis case is especially bad, since you can say it's an anti-competitive practice which benefits Microsoft - it helps them to retain their OS monopoly.
- zeta0134 10y agoSo if I'm understanding this correctly, Lenovo isn't actively blocking Linux, they're just using a newer RAID mode in their storage controller that there are no existing Linux drivers for? This doesn't seem like that big of a deal actually. It's nice of them to provide a legacy mode bios, but this will perhaps encourage the community to write open source drivers for the storage controller in its native mode, expanding the hardware that the linux kernel can support. That would be a win win.
- Hydraulix989 10y agoWell, they initially only released a custom BIOS with a goto statement added to jmp out of the disk controller mode setting (which is normally present and allows the user to change back to AHCI mode). Reverse engineers on the Lenovo forums discovered this modification while studying the disassembly. Then, one user patched the BIOS and manually reflashed it using an SPI flasher and some soldering, and Linux worked just fine by detecting the drive. Yes, the ideal solution is that Intel gives specs to OSS devs to build a driver (or even builds on themselves), but the path of least resistance is to have Lenovo unblock that BIOS setting, which amounts to changing one line of code, or 15 minutes of one engineer's time.