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As someone who's just (last week) started to get Arch Linux up and running on a T490 I would assume that: Yes, this is _at least_ the amount of things you need

As someone who's just (last week) started to get Arch Linux up and running on a T490 I would assume that: Yes, this is _at least_ the amount of things you need to do but if my experience is any indication this is only like 10% of it. Most of the things in Thinkpads work but not all (notably the latest WWAN LTE Modems don't have support). I could write up my experience if there's interest.

faizshah 7y ago
I just set up a new laptop with fedora because I figured Arch would be too much effort. Is it really that easy to get running? I figured with arch when you run into an issue it must be much harder to fix than fedora or ubuntu. I just want to open up an ide, terminal, and a browser but arch seems to be a whole hobby in itself.
- kart23 7y ago
  Stick with ubuntu. Arch has benefits, but most new users will do just fine without it, and arch can be a big pain to get running.
  - PPAqualifier 7y ago
    Until you figure that Ubuntu is full of shit. Snap packages are a piece of shit, and, whenever you need any kind of unmastobatory software packages you'll need to add PPAs. Ubuntu has gone to hell since the Snap ordeal. Arch is the only way to go.
    - kart23 7y ago
      I use arch exactly for that reason, but I could not imagine getting started with arch as my first linux experience. You should at least learn the basics on ubuntu first. I think there's a good natural progression with linux, and that you can and should switch to arch once you outgrow ubuntu.
- i_dursun 7y ago
  I have installed Arch Linux on a Lenovo Ideapad 700 last year and everything worked out of the box. Didn’t have to configure a thing. I haven’t noticed that I haven’t installed Nvidia drivers for four months because vanilla 4K support was so good.
- jamienicol 7y ago
  Yes, a hobby is a good description. If you enjoy it it's great, and you can learn a lot. I certainly used to, but nowadays prefer to just use fedora or mac OS and have more time for other hobbies
- SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
  I've been a Linux user since 1999 and recently got Arch up and running on a spare laptop just to see what it was all about. Not sure if my experience is typical but compared to my day-to-day Ubuntu system it was like going back in time 20 years. I'm sure some people enjoy the challenge (and the learning opportunity) but I've been spoilt now and already have too many hobbies as it is.
  - gaspoweredcat 7y ago
    if you want to learn about linux then distros like arch and gentoo are a great learning experience but for the average end user the potential issues far outweigh the benefits
- jplayer01 7y ago
  If you like to tinker for hours, Arch. Otherwise Manjaro, which works out of the box and still gives you the benefits of Arch.
  - nvarsj 7y ago
    You really don’t need to tinker with Arch much at all. Linux and systemd have sane defaults for everything these days. An Arch install takes me about 15 minutes, I install Gnome, NetworkManager, GDM and am done. The Arch package manager is so much better than the debian/ubuntu/red hat ecosystem that it is totally worth it for a developer. Almost every esoteric package is managed by someone on AUR so you get self updating packages installed with a single command for almost any software you need. All software is kept in sync with upstream so no need to hack in stuff for times when you need the latest package. Of course you’ll need to know basic Linux fundamentals and understand systemd at a basic level to get through the install process - but these are not hard, I think.
    - jplayer01 7y ago
      I've done it countless times. There's always tinkering. It does not work out of the box. You might think so because you've memorized all the steps, but there's so much that needs to be thought of in the first place and then configured.
  - eptcyka 7y ago
    Manjaro is strictly worse when it comes to the quality of software. I wouldn't agree that installing Arch is that big of a hassle - yes, you don't a nice menu based installer, but really, after setting up all of your partitions, installing the root filesystem, adding a user, and installing some packages, and installing hte bootloader, what else is there to do? To be fair, the install process has become easier over the years, as things like timezones and locales are becoming easier to configure due to systemd. But I must concede, if you've never partitioned a drive manually, or added a user, you'll want to take your time. And I always read the wiki's install instructions anyway. And whilst this does mean that there's a bit more complexity associated with setting up Arch, if you're using installing a non-standard OS on your hardware, the knowledge you gain will by doing so will almost always turn out to be useful in some way. As far as tinkering with it, I've never had to explicitly tinker with exotic configs to get my hardware to work as good or better than it would on Ubuntu, and to get my exotic config requirements to work is far easier on Arch than it is on Debian, Ubuntu or Fedora. Manjaro is so broken that I can't even boot the gnome installer on a VM. Besides, it's far easier to manage my machine if there's no auto-updater grabbing a lock on my package manager on for the first 15 minutes of a boot, every boot (looking at you Fedora), or having an update process that may leave you with a severely outdated kernel even though you jumped through the hoops to get a recent kernel (Looking at you Ubuntu 16.04 LTS).
- beatgammit 7y ago
  It certainly can be a hobby, but so can any other Linux distribution. I've been using Arch for years, and the amount of tinkering I do is pretty close to none. The most difficult part is the install, which really isn't that bad if you read the installation guide. My first install took about 2 hours, and now it takes ~20 minutes. When you install, you basically do the following: 1. Configure internet access (netctl is pretty simple) 2. Set up mirrors (if you're lazy, just enable the kernel.org ones, they're the most consistent) 3. Mount partition(s) - need to create them manually too; cfdisk is great 4. Install base packages 5. chroot - basic configuration (hostname, locale, etc) 6. Install/configure grub 7. Reboot 8. Install everything else, may take a few reboots to make sure everything comes up as expected In my recent installs, I install the desktop environment (and drivers) and enable it before rebooting, so when it comes up, it's ready to go. The important thing to remember when coming from something like Ubuntu is that you need to enable services through systemd manually. What I really appreciate about Arch is that I really haven't had to touch it since I got it configured. I run updates every week or so and check archlinux.org first to make sure there are no weird steps required to do an update (usually deleting a file on the filesystem or upgrading a dependency first or something due to a package change). I haven't had any significant breakage, though I have had to roll back the kernel once or twice in the last couple years (Arch keeps one backup kernel by default). Make sure to always reboot when the kernel gets upgraded and you'll be fine. Also, the issues I've had are because the nvidia driver didn't get updated with the kernel, so if you have AMD or Intel graphics, this likely won't happen to you. I've tried a few different distributions (Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE), and honestly Arch has been the least finicky once installed. I hate release-based distributions since doing a release upgrade tends to break things.
- mises 7y ago
  It's not too hard, if you know what you're doing. It's trite, but read the stinkin' wiki; it's very good. Some people are intimidated by the cli; it's a matter of personal preference, but it's marginally faster if you know what you're doing. It's not really hard to fix (compared to other distros), and I've had a stable system which I don't touch much for quite a while. It took a while to configure (back up your dotfiles!), but these days I just leave it alone. You can tinker, but you can also just use your system. I think arch gets the "constantly-needs-tinkering" reputation because many of its users like tinkering, not because your system dies every time you `pacman -Syu`. As pointed out by others, pacman is that good. Much faster than others, better dependency resolution, and AUR. From a productivity stand-point, AUR allows me to avoid the significant tedium of cloning, fiddling with, and cajoling a git package to build.
naikrovek 7y ago
And who says Linux isn't ready for the Desktop? Seriously, though, you folks put up with _a lot_ of crap like this (the jokes and the endless system configuration tweaking)
- sunaurus 7y ago
  That's funny, I only feel like I'm putting up with "_a lot_ of crap" when I'm working on a system where I'm not able to tweak the configuration. I'm currently working on Mac OS, and the limitations when rebinding keyboard shortcuts for example are absolutely infuriating. Getting to log in on my home Arch Linux desktop is so relaxing every day after work - if something doesn't work the way I want it to work, I can just fix it myself.
  - laumars 7y ago
    Likewise here. OS X user at work. I don't mind OS X but it's one of those platforms where you just have to learn to love many of the decisions made on your behalf. Whereas when I switching to Arch everything works how chose it to. The thing with Arch is it is a bit of a pain to install compared to basically every other OS. Needlessly painful in my personal opinion but I'm not going to argue against the hard work the maintainers put in. However the beauty of Arch is once it's running it will last for years with very little effort. It's funny you mention keyboard bindings though, I've spent so much time trying to get keyboard bindings right on OS X and it's still not right. I wish OS X had an option to toggle between Mac and IBM bindings. I get the command key is useful on occasions but Apple really are the odd one out these days and it's a pain switching between Macs and PCs because of it.
  - antigirl 7y ago
    so keyboard binding vs spendings weeks trying to get drivers to work on your machine properly ?
    - Insanity 7y ago
      Have you used Linux recently? In the past 5+ years I've not had to install a single driver _except_ one nvidia driver on one of the machines I wanted to game on. And that was not necessary except for gaming. Lately, it's just pretty much "install Debian from .ISO" -> done.
input_sh 7y ago
You've started with Arch and are judging the entire ecosystem based on that? That's ridiculous. Start with Ubuntu, Fedora, elementary OS, or any of the myriads of actually complete operating systems that let you get some work done less than half an hour since you start an installation.
- pjmlp 7y ago
  Well, not if doing some work is somehow related to hardware video decoding or taking advantage of latest GPGPU features.
  - input_sh 7y ago
    I don't know about your specific situation, but I think we'll both agree that the majority of HN readers need a browser, a terminal, a text editor, and an operating system that gets out of their way.
    - pjmlp 7y ago
      I don't agree and would gladly get some numbers confirming that assessment.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    Ubuntu comes with hardware video decoding support out of the box, just install it on a machine with an Intel or AMD gpu, and tick the "Install third-party software" box during installation.
    - pjmlp 7y ago
      If you're lucky with the card. https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/03/ubuntu-drops-amd-catalyst-fglrx-driver-16-04 https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/03/ubuntu-drops-amd-catalys...
      - icebraining 7y ago

faizshah 7y ago

I just set up a new laptop with fedora because I figured Arch would be too much effort. Is it really that easy to get running? I figured with arch when you run into an issue it must be much harder to fix than fedora or ubuntu. I just want to open up an ide, terminal, and a browser but arch seems to be a whole hobby in itself.

kart23 7y ago
Stick with ubuntu. Arch has benefits, but most new users will do just fine without it, and arch can be a big pain to get running.
- PPAqualifier 7y ago
  Until you figure that Ubuntu is full of shit. Snap packages are a piece of shit, and, whenever you need any kind of unmastobatory software packages you'll need to add PPAs. Ubuntu has gone to hell since the Snap ordeal. Arch is the only way to go.
  - kart23 7y ago
    I use arch exactly for that reason, but I could not imagine getting started with arch as my first linux experience. You should at least learn the basics on ubuntu first. I think there's a good natural progression with linux, and that you can and should switch to arch once you outgrow ubuntu.
i_dursun 7y ago
I have installed Arch Linux on a Lenovo Ideapad 700 last year and everything worked out of the box. Didn’t have to configure a thing. I haven’t noticed that I haven’t installed Nvidia drivers for four months because vanilla 4K support was so good.
jamienicol 7y ago
Yes, a hobby is a good description. If you enjoy it it's great, and you can learn a lot. I certainly used to, but nowadays prefer to just use fedora or mac OS and have more time for other hobbies
SmellyGeekBoy 7y ago
I've been a Linux user since 1999 and recently got Arch up and running on a spare laptop just to see what it was all about. Not sure if my experience is typical but compared to my day-to-day Ubuntu system it was like going back in time 20 years. I'm sure some people enjoy the challenge (and the learning opportunity) but I've been spoilt now and already have too many hobbies as it is.
- gaspoweredcat 7y ago
  if you want to learn about linux then distros like arch and gentoo are a great learning experience but for the average end user the potential issues far outweigh the benefits
jplayer01 7y ago
If you like to tinker for hours, Arch. Otherwise Manjaro, which works out of the box and still gives you the benefits of Arch.
- nvarsj 7y ago
  You really don’t need to tinker with Arch much at all. Linux and systemd have sane defaults for everything these days. An Arch install takes me about 15 minutes, I install Gnome, NetworkManager, GDM and am done. The Arch package manager is so much better than the debian/ubuntu/red hat ecosystem that it is totally worth it for a developer. Almost every esoteric package is managed by someone on AUR so you get self updating packages installed with a single command for almost any software you need. All software is kept in sync with upstream so no need to hack in stuff for times when you need the latest package. Of course you’ll need to know basic Linux fundamentals and understand systemd at a basic level to get through the install process - but these are not hard, I think.
  - jplayer01 7y ago
    I've done it countless times. There's always tinkering. It does not work out of the box. You might think so because you've memorized all the steps, but there's so much that needs to be thought of in the first place and then configured.
- eptcyka 7y ago
  Manjaro is strictly worse when it comes to the quality of software. I wouldn't agree that installing Arch is that big of a hassle - yes, you don't a nice menu based installer, but really, after setting up all of your partitions, installing the root filesystem, adding a user, and installing some packages, and installing hte bootloader, what else is there to do? To be fair, the install process has become easier over the years, as things like timezones and locales are becoming easier to configure due to systemd. But I must concede, if you've never partitioned a drive manually, or added a user, you'll want to take your time. And I always read the wiki's install instructions anyway. And whilst this does mean that there's a bit more complexity associated with setting up Arch, if you're using installing a non-standard OS on your hardware, the knowledge you gain will by doing so will almost always turn out to be useful in some way. As far as tinkering with it, I've never had to explicitly tinker with exotic configs to get my hardware to work as good or better than it would on Ubuntu, and to get my exotic config requirements to work is far easier on Arch than it is on Debian, Ubuntu or Fedora. Manjaro is so broken that I can't even boot the gnome installer on a VM. Besides, it's far easier to manage my machine if there's no auto-updater grabbing a lock on my package manager on for the first 15 minutes of a boot, every boot (looking at you Fedora), or having an update process that may leave you with a severely outdated kernel even though you jumped through the hoops to get a recent kernel (Looking at you Ubuntu 16.04 LTS).
beatgammit 7y ago
It certainly can be a hobby, but so can any other Linux distribution. I've been using Arch for years, and the amount of tinkering I do is pretty close to none. The most difficult part is the install, which really isn't that bad if you read the installation guide. My first install took about 2 hours, and now it takes ~20 minutes. When you install, you basically do the following: 1. Configure internet access (netctl is pretty simple) 2. Set up mirrors (if you're lazy, just enable the kernel.org ones, they're the most consistent) 3. Mount partition(s) - need to create them manually too; cfdisk is great 4. Install base packages 5. chroot - basic configuration (hostname, locale, etc) 6. Install/configure grub 7. Reboot 8. Install everything else, may take a few reboots to make sure everything comes up as expected In my recent installs, I install the desktop environment (and drivers) and enable it before rebooting, so when it comes up, it's ready to go. The important thing to remember when coming from something like Ubuntu is that you need to enable services through systemd manually. What I really appreciate about Arch is that I really haven't had to touch it since I got it configured. I run updates every week or so and check archlinux.org first to make sure there are no weird steps required to do an update (usually deleting a file on the filesystem or upgrading a dependency first or something due to a package change). I haven't had any significant breakage, though I have had to roll back the kernel once or twice in the last couple years (Arch keeps one backup kernel by default). Make sure to always reboot when the kernel gets upgraded and you'll be fine. Also, the issues I've had are because the nvidia driver didn't get updated with the kernel, so if you have AMD or Intel graphics, this likely won't happen to you. I've tried a few different distributions (Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE), and honestly Arch has been the least finicky once installed. I hate release-based distributions since doing a release upgrade tends to break things.
mises 7y ago
It's not too hard, if you know what you're doing. It's trite, but read the stinkin' wiki; it's very good. Some people are intimidated by the cli; it's a matter of personal preference, but it's marginally faster if you know what you're doing. It's not really hard to fix (compared to other distros), and I've had a stable system which I don't touch much for quite a while. It took a while to configure (back up your dotfiles!), but these days I just leave it alone. You can tinker, but you can also just use your system. I think arch gets the "constantly-needs-tinkering" reputation because many of its users like tinkering, not because your system dies every time you `pacman -Syu`. As pointed out by others, pacman is that good. Much faster than others, better dependency resolution, and AUR. From a productivity stand-point, AUR allows me to avoid the significant tedium of cloning, fiddling with, and cajoling a git package to build.

naikrovek 7y ago

And who says Linux isn't ready for the Desktop? Seriously, though, you folks put up with _a lot_ of crap like this (the jokes and the endless system configuration tweaking)

sunaurus 7y ago
That's funny, I only feel like I'm putting up with "_a lot_ of crap" when I'm working on a system where I'm not able to tweak the configuration. I'm currently working on Mac OS, and the limitations when rebinding keyboard shortcuts for example are absolutely infuriating. Getting to log in on my home Arch Linux desktop is so relaxing every day after work - if something doesn't work the way I want it to work, I can just fix it myself.
- laumars 7y ago
  Likewise here. OS X user at work. I don't mind OS X but it's one of those platforms where you just have to learn to love many of the decisions made on your behalf. Whereas when I switching to Arch everything works how chose it to. The thing with Arch is it is a bit of a pain to install compared to basically every other OS. Needlessly painful in my personal opinion but I'm not going to argue against the hard work the maintainers put in. However the beauty of Arch is once it's running it will last for years with very little effort. It's funny you mention keyboard bindings though, I've spent so much time trying to get keyboard bindings right on OS X and it's still not right. I wish OS X had an option to toggle between Mac and IBM bindings. I get the command key is useful on occasions but Apple really are the odd one out these days and it's a pain switching between Macs and PCs because of it.
- antigirl 7y ago
  so keyboard binding vs spendings weeks trying to get drivers to work on your machine properly ?
  - Insanity 7y ago
    Have you used Linux recently? In the past 5+ years I've not had to install a single driver _except_ one nvidia driver on one of the machines I wanted to game on. And that was not necessary except for gaming. Lately, it's just pretty much "install Debian from .ISO" -> done.

input_sh 7y ago

You've started with Arch and are judging the entire ecosystem based on that? That's ridiculous. Start with Ubuntu, Fedora, elementary OS, or any of the myriads of actually complete operating systems that let you get some work done less than half an hour since you start an installation.

pjmlp 7y ago
Well, not if doing some work is somehow related to hardware video decoding or taking advantage of latest GPGPU features.
- input_sh 7y ago
  I don't know about your specific situation, but I think we'll both agree that the majority of HN readers need a browser, a terminal, a text editor, and an operating system that gets out of their way.
  - pjmlp 7y ago
    I don't agree and would gladly get some numbers confirming that assessment.
- icebraining 7y ago
  Ubuntu comes with hardware video decoding support out of the box, just install it on a machine with an Intel or AMD gpu, and tick the "Install third-party software" box during installation.
  - pjmlp 7y ago
    If you're lucky with the card. https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/03/ubuntu-drops-amd-catalyst-fglrx-driver-16-04 https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2016/03/ubuntu-drops-amd-catalys...
    - icebraining 7y ago