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There is only one thing stopping me from using Linux, hassle free hardware support. I want sleep/wake, video card, etc, etc, etc to simply work. And please don'

by jshen 14y ago

There is only one thing stopping me from using Linux, hassle free hardware support. I want sleep/wake, video card, etc, etc, etc to simply work. And please don't pretend this is true already.

rrmm 14y ago
All that stuff works, if you choose your hardware carefully. I've used both apple laptops and now netbooks with linux with great success. The proliferation of hardware using PVR based video chips has been a pain though. No denying hardware support is a pain.
subsection1h 14y ago
Have you tried Ubuntu Certified hardware and encountered problems? Everything works fine on my Ubuntu Certified hardware: a ThinkPad and an OptiPlex desktop that both have Intel GPUs.
- jshen 14y ago
  I had an optiplex desktop that did not work well. It was a giant pain in the ass to get video working properly, and it would often not wake from sleep.
  - pyre 14y ago
    OptiPlex covers a large number of models and hardware, just like "ThinkPad" does. I'd imagine that the Ubuntu Certified Hardware list specifies models that are known to work well.
    - jshen 14y ago
      1) It was the computer my employer gave me, I didn't have much choice (well, I could have requested a mac). 2) I don't want to spend $500 to find out if certified really means everything works.
tikhonj 14y ago
I've found that, with my last two laptops anyhow, most of the hardware problems only came up at install time. After I got the right packages (drivers and stuff), things worked well enough. Getting that set up was tricky, sure, but after it was configured correctly it worked. So the simplest solution is not to install Linux yourself! You can buy a computer that has Linux on it already. I guess you could also get a friend to install it for you :P. The advantage with getting preinstalled Linux is that not only won't you have to figure everything out yourself, but you also will have hardware chosen explicitly for Linux.
natrius 14y ago
It was trivial for me to choose a computer that would work well with Ubuntu out of the box. http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/desktop/ http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/desktop/

by jshen 14y ago

There is only one thing stopping me from using Linux, hassle free hardware support. I want sleep/wake, video card, etc, etc, etc to simply work. And please don't pretend this is true already.

rrmm 14y ago

All that stuff works, if you choose your hardware carefully. I've used both apple laptops and now netbooks with linux with great success. The proliferation of hardware using PVR based video chips has been a pain though. No denying hardware support is a pain.

subsection1h 14y ago

Have you tried Ubuntu Certified hardware and encountered problems? Everything works fine on my Ubuntu Certified hardware: a ThinkPad and an OptiPlex desktop that both have Intel GPUs.

jshen 14y ago
I had an optiplex desktop that did not work well. It was a giant pain in the ass to get video working properly, and it would often not wake from sleep.
- pyre 14y ago
  OptiPlex covers a large number of models and hardware, just like "ThinkPad" does. I'd imagine that the Ubuntu Certified Hardware list specifies models that are known to work well.
  - jshen 14y ago
    1) It was the computer my employer gave me, I didn't have much choice (well, I could have requested a mac). 2) I don't want to spend $500 to find out if certified really means everything works.

tikhonj 14y ago

I've found that, with my last two laptops anyhow, most of the hardware problems only came up at install time. After I got the right packages (drivers and stuff), things worked well enough. Getting that set up was tricky, sure, but after it was configured correctly it worked. So the simplest solution is not to install Linux yourself! You can buy a computer that has Linux on it already. I guess you could also get a friend to install it for you :P. The advantage with getting preinstalled Linux is that not only won't you have to figure everything out yourself, but you also will have hardware chosen explicitly for Linux.

natrius 14y ago

It was trivial for me to choose a computer that would work well with Ubuntu out of the box. http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/desktop/ http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/desktop/