5 ms·

I'm getting more and more incentive to just drop macOS and start using Linux as my daily driver. Apple has absolutely no excuse for this, and I hope they correc

by lprd 6y ago

I'm getting more and more incentive to just drop macOS and start using Linux as my daily driver. Apple has absolutely no excuse for this, and I hope they correct it. That said, I am curious which laptop brands today are most compatible with Linux. I've heard good things about Lenovo and Dell XPS. As for which flavor of Linux, I have my eyes on Arch...

claudeganon 6y ago
Thinkpads: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/Lenovo https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/Lenovo
- adkadskhj 6y ago
  Any thoughts on Purism or System76? I like the Thinkpads but i'm tempted to go Purism or System76 purely to support them.. but i don't want to do it at the cost of being dissatisfied with a lesser product.
  - claudeganon 6y ago
    I haven’t used either. I’ve heard a fair amount of complaints about the build quality on System76s.
vladvasiliu 6y ago
Can't speak for all their models, but I've had success with HP. My work laptop is a ProBook 430 G5 and everything except for the fingerprint sensor works great. The G4 also worked well but I only tried it for a short period. I've only tried Arch, but I suppose Ubuntu should work too.
acomjean 6y ago
I looked into this a couple years ago for notebooks. Dell and Lenovo are pretty popular choices. Dell will pre install and I think Lenovo does now. I think desktops are easier to do your own install. I bought a system 76 which comes with Linux (Ubuntu or Popos). I’m using pop and things work (jet brains, bitwig, I compiled unreal engine..). Those machines are rebranded clevos (so they say) but I know drivers will work. Build quality is decent but the machine has lasted. It’s been good and pretty much maintenance free. The os updates frequently. My only complaint is the machine has 2 video cards and will only drive externals with the nvidia one. Switching requires a reboot. The battery life isn’t great when driving the nvidia card. Maybe the new ones fixed this (onyx pro)
fernovus 6y ago
Take a look here, you can see what works or not according to users: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/HP https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/HP . This URL is for HP, but there are pages for other brands as well.
fsflover 6y ago
> which laptop brands today are most compatible with Linux Why just not buy preinstalled Linux? https://puri.sm/products/ https://puri.sm/products/
- amedvednikov 6y ago
  FullHD display in 2021. Ridiculous.
  - fsflover 6y ago
    Your eyes will probably not distinguish fullHD from 4K on a 14" screen. The 15.6" laptop is 4K: https://puri.sm/products/librem-15/ https://puri.sm/products/librem-15/.
nothis 6y ago
There simply doesn't seem to be a culture of usability in Linux environments. "But, it's not that bad, I set up a Google/LibreOffice laptop for my mom!"– yes, it is! I hit a rage-wall any time I try to actually use a Linux distro as an 8+ hours a day working environment. Unless you almost exclusively work in command lines, it's no replacement for macOS (or even Windows, for that matter). And macOS does command lines just fine. (btw, I admit that some of this has to do with a general lack of support for Linux by software and hardware companies, but there's only one side of this Linux distros can work on and that is making it a more pleasant environment for end users and most Linux users seem to sneer at that thought)
paco3346 6y ago
I bought an XPS 2 years ago and haven't looked back. It's extremely well supported by most kernels and just worked for me. Furthermore- Dell's WD19TB dock works on most kernels (and all newer XPS models) as well. I'm talking power, USB, network, and 3 2k@60 (or 1 4k@144 & 1 1080@60) displays all on a single cable. The future we were promised 4 years ago is finally here.
adkadskhj 6y ago
I recently bailed out of Apple into Linux. I put this transition off for a long time because i've used Linux (Desktop) in the past and it was rough, so i knew i'd have some hills to clime... but.. my life on Apple was rough, too. Ultimately i didn't switch because i could get a better UX on Linux, i switched because the huge market i'd pay Apple for a beefy Tower was not worth the degrading user experience i was receiving. In my past experiences a big frustration was configuring/debugging some random thing and ending up with a solution that - given 12 months of time - i needed to tweak and cannot remember what i did. Or worse, i upgrade software and something breaks. I identified that this effort was wasted if i couldn't roll back easily, or incrementally document my steps through the OS. To tackle this i chose to go with NixOS. It's got a lot of rough edges, but a few days of dedicated learning time was enough to make me feel mostly productive. I still have a lot of hanging questions, but with NixOS + Flakes + Home Manager i have a system that i feel confident about stability and my ability to roll back as needed. This softens the blow for me personally of needing to figure stuff out that i otherwise wouldn't of had to on OSX. Since my focus is building a beast PC (that i don't want to pay Apple for) i might still use Mac Laptops, and as a bonus my Nix setup can still be applied on Apple. From NixPkgs to Home Manager dotfiles i plan on using my setup on both Mac and NixOS. I switched fully ~4 weeks ago, and my only real complaints are (as a Linux Desktop beginner): 1. X11 seems awful. Notably i have one 4k Monitor and two 1080p Monitors and .. it's annoying to setup. I'm using XFCE because it was notably faster than KDE and especially GNOME, and so i set XFCE to 2x Window Scaling but that scales all 3 monitors. So i have to use xrandr to tweak the scalings, and that has been a chore. Lots of experimentation for a janky experience, but i've got it working good enough for me. Wayland will hopefully improve this, but that's a long ways out it seems. 2. Basic features like scaling seem hit or miss. On KDE i recall it working pretty well with all my normal windows. On XFCE if i set 2x Scaling, Spotify and Zoom don't recognize the scaling. Resulting in very small text. I'm willing to overlook a lot of the Mac "pretty" - but i really wish Desktop Environments would perfect the basics. 3. Discoverability on Linux (any distro, imo) is .. bad. We all know the trend of immediately going to Google for everything if you're unfamiliar with the toolset or the domain, but i feel like there's got to be a better way to navigate a OS from both CLI and UI. Linux has the same discoverability problem that Windows has, it's just easier to Google things.. and that feels bad. For a hacker friendly OS i think we could do better here. NixOS, while equally terrible on this front, strikes me as something uniquely fit to be discoverable - given that nearly the entire experience is immutably configured. All in all, so far i'm quite happy with my switch and looking forward to buying a Zen3 to build a new workstation. Hope this summary of my month long journey is of use to someone lol. It's far from over.

by lprd 6y ago

claudeganon 6y ago

Thinkpads: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/Lenovo https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/Lenovo

adkadskhj 6y ago
Any thoughts on Purism or System76? I like the Thinkpads but i'm tempted to go Purism or System76 purely to support them.. but i don't want to do it at the cost of being dissatisfied with a lesser product.
- claudeganon 6y ago
  I haven’t used either. I’ve heard a fair amount of complaints about the build quality on System76s.

vladvasiliu 6y ago

Can't speak for all their models, but I've had success with HP. My work laptop is a ProBook 430 G5 and everything except for the fingerprint sensor works great. The G4 also worked well but I only tried it for a short period. I've only tried Arch, but I suppose Ubuntu should work too.

acomjean 6y ago

I looked into this a couple years ago for notebooks. Dell and Lenovo are pretty popular choices. Dell will pre install and I think Lenovo does now. I think desktops are easier to do your own install. I bought a system 76 which comes with Linux (Ubuntu or Popos). I’m using pop and things work (jet brains, bitwig, I compiled unreal engine..). Those machines are rebranded clevos (so they say) but I know drivers will work. Build quality is decent but the machine has lasted. It’s been good and pretty much maintenance free. The os updates frequently. My only complaint is the machine has 2 video cards and will only drive externals with the nvidia one. Switching requires a reboot. The battery life isn’t great when driving the nvidia card. Maybe the new ones fixed this (onyx pro)

fernovus 6y ago

Take a look here, you can see what works or not according to users: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/HP https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Laptop/HP . This URL is for HP, but there are pages for other brands as well.

fsflover 6y ago

> which laptop brands today are most compatible with Linux Why just not buy preinstalled Linux? https://puri.sm/products/ https://puri.sm/products/

amedvednikov 6y ago
FullHD display in 2021. Ridiculous.
- fsflover 6y ago
  Your eyes will probably not distinguish fullHD from 4K on a 14" screen. The 15.6" laptop is 4K: https://puri.sm/products/librem-15/ https://puri.sm/products/librem-15/.

nothis 6y ago

There simply doesn't seem to be a culture of usability in Linux environments. "But, it's not that bad, I set up a Google/LibreOffice laptop for my mom!"– yes, it is! I hit a rage-wall any time I try to actually use a Linux distro as an 8+ hours a day working environment. Unless you almost exclusively work in command lines, it's no replacement for macOS (or even Windows, for that matter). And macOS does command lines just fine. (btw, I admit that some of this has to do with a general lack of support for Linux by software and hardware companies, but there's only one side of this Linux distros can work on and that is making it a more pleasant environment for end users and most Linux users seem to sneer at that thought)

paco3346 6y ago

I bought an XPS 2 years ago and haven't looked back. It's extremely well supported by most kernels and just worked for me. Furthermore- Dell's WD19TB dock works on most kernels (and all newer XPS models) as well. I'm talking power, USB, network, and 3 2k@60 (or 1 4k@144 & 1 1080@60) displays all on a single cable. The future we were promised 4 years ago is finally here.

adkadskhj 6y ago

I recently bailed out of Apple into Linux. I put this transition off for a long time because i've used Linux (Desktop) in the past and it was rough, so i knew i'd have some hills to clime... but.. my life on Apple was rough, too. Ultimately i didn't switch because i could get a better UX on Linux, i switched because the huge market i'd pay Apple for a beefy Tower was not worth the degrading user experience i was receiving. In my past experiences a big frustration was configuring/debugging some random thing and ending up with a solution that - given 12 months of time - i needed to tweak and cannot remember what i did. Or worse, i upgrade software and something breaks. I identified that this effort was wasted if i couldn't roll back easily, or incrementally document my steps through the OS. To tackle this i chose to go with NixOS. It's got a lot of rough edges, but a few days of dedicated learning time was enough to make me feel mostly productive. I still have a lot of hanging questions, but with NixOS + Flakes + Home Manager i have a system that i feel confident about stability and my ability to roll back as needed. This softens the blow for me personally of needing to figure stuff out that i otherwise wouldn't of had to on OSX. Since my focus is building a beast PC (that i don't want to pay Apple for) i might still use Mac Laptops, and as a bonus my Nix setup can still be applied on Apple. From NixPkgs to Home Manager dotfiles i plan on using my setup on both Mac and NixOS. I switched fully ~4 weeks ago, and my only real complaints are (as a Linux Desktop beginner): 1. X11 seems awful. Notably i have one 4k Monitor and two 1080p Monitors and .. it's annoying to setup. I'm using XFCE because it was notably faster than KDE and especially GNOME, and so i set XFCE to 2x Window Scaling but that scales all 3 monitors. So i have to use xrandr to tweak the scalings, and that has been a chore. Lots of experimentation for a janky experience, but i've got it working good enough for me. Wayland will hopefully improve this, but that's a long ways out it seems. 2. Basic features like scaling seem hit or miss. On KDE i recall it working pretty well with all my normal windows. On XFCE if i set 2x Scaling, Spotify and Zoom don't recognize the scaling. Resulting in very small text. I'm willing to overlook a lot of the Mac "pretty" - but i really wish Desktop Environments would perfect the basics. 3. Discoverability on Linux (any distro, imo) is .. bad. We all know the trend of immediately going to Google for everything if you're unfamiliar with the toolset or the domain, but i feel like there's got to be a better way to navigate a OS from both CLI and UI. Linux has the same discoverability problem that Windows has, it's just easier to Google things.. and that feels bad. For a hacker friendly OS i think we could do better here. NixOS, while equally terrible on this front, strikes me as something uniquely fit to be discoverable - given that nearly the entire experience is immutably configured. All in all, so far i'm quite happy with my switch and looking forward to buying a Zen3 to build a new workstation. Hope this summary of my month long journey is of use to someone lol. It's far from over.