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I think this is great. I bought a chromebook flip a couple of years ago, with the intention of putting Linux on it---only to find that the hardware is depressi
by paultopia 8y ago
I think this is great. I bought a chromebook flip a couple of years ago, with the intention of putting Linux on it---only to find that the hardware is depressingly bad and the ARM processor makes the Linux experience terrible (had to install Arch, never did manage to make basic things like the JVM work right, eventually gave up on it). Since then, I've been very skeptical of the notion of buying chromebooks as cheap and lightweight mobile working tools.
But I will buy a pixelbook in an instant if I can get a fully functional, no bullshit with having to install custom kernels or new firmware or god only knows what and what will happen to the hardware and what just won't work despite The Internet insisting it does, insisting! Oh Lordy. A Linux environment available on decent hardware, without having to MacGyver it together with bubble gum and safety pins? Where things like power management actually work? What other options are there, really, for that? Purism? Dell XPS13! All of those are actually more expensive than the Pixelbook. (Though the Dell thing does look pretty sweet.) Hell, I may go order one now.
- jmagoon 8y agoThe other good thing about this is that the Pixelbook is a 3:2 screen, so finally there's a laptop with a proper display resolution that can run Linux nicely. There's a good community of folks over at https://www.reddit.com/r/Crostini/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Crostini/ who have been tinkering with this for quite some time.
- mschuster91 8y ago> with a proper display resolution 3:2? No thanks I don't really want black bars when watching movies... What I'd really really like is something with the build quality (especially the touchpad!) of a MacBook Pro, with decent and recent hardware, first class Linux support for all features, support for both USB-C and "old" USB and a decent keyboard with it. And that without paying more than for an technologically outdated yet still top-of-the-line MBP...
- lallysingh 8y agoSo a thinkpad.
- mschuster91 8y agoGive me a Thinkpad with a full aluminium body, a touchpad with a size that's actually usable and we'll talk. Sorry but I have developed a real dislike for small touchpads incapable of reliable gestures and full plastic bodies.
- nsriv 8y agoThinkpads have magnesium chassis (X1 is carbon fiber).
- willtim 8y agoA metal body is heavy, prone to dents and attenuates radio. Why are you so keen on having one? The X1 Carbon is lighter, tougher and more serviceable than a MacBook Pro, in part because of a better choice of materials. As for trackpads, Apple keep making them larger and larger, so a ThinkPad trackpad is no smaller than a MacBook from a few years ago. The keyboard is surely the primary concern.
- mattnewton 8y agoThe trackpad is also terrible compared to modern MacBooks aside from the size. It flexes, feels worse and does not reliably track gestures. The whole thing feels stuck a decade ago.
- grover_hartmann 8y ago> The whole thing feels stuck a decade ago. Says the macOS user... did you even get a newer version of bash yet? I heard even Debian stable has a newer bash version than macOS.
- 8y ago
- nqzero 8y agohuawei matebook x is 3:2 and runs linux nicely surface book appears to as well, but i don't have one of them to vouch for
- lunchables 8y agoThe Verge makes it sound like the touchpad is basically unusable and battery life is apparently poor. https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/24/16007692/huawei-matebook-x-laptop-review https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/24/16007692/huawei-matebook-...
- jacksmith21006 8y agoThis should be better battery life using GNU/Linux. The process the supports the VM runs under ChromeOS.
- Daycrawler 8y agoWhy is 3:2 better than standard 16:9?
- ptman 8y agoIt depends on what you do. 16:9 is better for wathing 16:9 movies. But if you read lots of text, narrower, longer columns are usually a lot more handy. We have way more vertical than horizontal scrollbars.
- jeffhuys 8y agoI prefer 16:9 or 16:10 because I have a lot of windows side-by-side most of the time. I don't have 1 file open while coding, most of the time 2 or 3, in that case a wider screen is better in my opinion.
- cube2222 8y agoI've got a surface and in my opinion 3:2 is actually better for multitasking. You can fit two windows vertically. So you end up having 4 windows side by side.
- aembleton 8y agoMore vertical space for reading text, including code
- euyyn 8y agoTaller, better for coding.
- slantyyz 8y ago> Why is 3:2 better than standard 16:9? It's not better. It's usually just people projecting their personal preferences as though they should apply to everyone else. Every one is different, so as long as the individual is content with what they've got, it doesn't really matter what aspect ratio they're using.
- mindslight 8y ago
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- bobajeff 8y agoYeah, I'm happy there is official support for using Linux on a chrome book. Still holding out until Crostini is supported by more Chromebook manufacturers and can be used outside of developer mode before I get one.
- fdrs 8y agocrostini does not need developer mode to run. what happens is that it is still in chrome os developer channel, which means is still in beta and can have bugs, but is something diferent then developer mode, just to make things clear.
- bobajeff 8y agoOh great. Thanks for clearing that up. I'll still wait until it's on the release channel but it's good to know I don't have to turn on developer mode to use it.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- toast0 8y ago> Since then, I've been very skeptical of the notion of buying chromebooks as cheap and lightweight mobile working tools. You have to be careful about which processor powers your Chromebook if you want to do non chrome os things. The processors from the mainstream core line (Haswell, Skylake) etc do pretty well, although they're usually fairly low clocked. The chromebooks with Atom or ARM processors usually have a harder time booting other things, and the ARM linux ecosystem is a lot trickier than the x86-64 ecosystem. Avoiding Atom processors is harder than it looks, because Intel keeps changing the branding, probably to confuse users.
- Mindwipe 8y agoBy the same token... if you want to run Android applications the situation is much worse on x86 processors, because while Android is supposed to be agnostic the reality is that there hasn't been any requirement for developers to target x86 market wise for a long time, and anything that goes remotely near direct graphics rendering or video DRM tends to break quite badly.
- mkozlows 8y agoThis isn't my experience. I have a Chromebook Pixel, which is x86, and games and movie apps work fine on it. I think anything major is likely to be cross-compiled, and it's only niche apps that won't run.
- Mindwipe 8y agoI mean, literally any movie apps I can think of don't work in anything above SD on the Chromebook Pixel. Certainly Amazon and Netflix don't.
- chubasco 8y agoThis is true, but I feel like the popularity of the Raspberry Pi has done a lot to improve the ARM Linux ecosystem in recent years.
- 8y ago
- colordrops 8y agoI was gonna suggest the Dell until I read the end of your message. I have one and haven't regretted the purchase. Pretty much everything works out of the box except for the fingerprint scanner.
- sandGorgon 8y agoXPS 13 with Fedora is sheer brilliance. I'm actually hoping that Android apps will run natively on Linux. Thats really the endgame.
- rahimnathwani 8y agoThis is what Anbox is trying to do: https://github.com/anbox/anbox/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/anbox/anbox/blob/master/README.md
- WindowsFon4life 8y agoThe jvm would be bad, but in my case it was very underpowered for Virtualbox. Unsure how it is usable by anyone.
- em3rgent0rdr 8y agoI've had quite good performance on my C201 economy Arm chromebook running Arch Linux. It is quite snappy. And I can do dev work on it.
- dzonga 8y ago$899 definitely a steal, if it starts running Linux easy. Damn, my 2013 MacBook pro getting old, so this looks like an awesome deal. Since Apple wants to put shitty keyboards
- ilovecars2 8y agoI have a Dell XPS 15 at work and it's so difficult to install and setup Linux between the M2 SSD drive and the Nvidia Optimus GPU. Would not recommend.
- jhoh 8y agoI run Arch on my XPS 15, too. Had it up and running after the usual Arch Wiki binge reading and a couple hours of trial and error. But that's what I always do when installing Arch. A couple weeks ago I did a fresh install with Manjaro. With this the installation process goes down to around 10 minutes and everything (bluetooth, touchpad, function keys, optirun etc.) works out of the box.
- Blaiz0r 8y agoI'm using a XPS 15 9550 with Arch linux installed, didn't have to setup up anything special apart from bumblebee I suppose it works really well for me. What sort of issues did you have?
- Daycrawler 8y agoMy last two laptops were an HP Pavilion and an Acer Swift. Linux Mint installs and works without a problem.
- jacksmith21006 8y agoHave a pixel book and love it. Fantastic piece of hardware.