4 ms·

In this form, Canonical overstates an appropriate objective in the tips: support more hardware? How about supporting any, thoroughly? I have done my best to bu

by fdr 14y ago

In this form, Canonical overstates an appropriate objective in the tips: support more hardware? How about supporting any, thoroughly? I have done my best to buy hardware that I thought was to be well supported (on the desktop! because I thought power management would be "too hard", so I've given up on laptops), but as far as I can tell, nobody is home doing the QA and holding back releases (or, by any other means, making sure they work) because of regressions, specifically in the area of hardware/driver issues. I don't need more half-broken crap. I need at least one thing that does work, all the time, across several releases, for three years at a stretch. I will pay for it. This is not represented among any of their available choices: even the one saying "support more hardware" suggests there is any level of support that is adequate. There is no such thing in end-user Linux-land (and I mean the kernel quite specifically) right now. That's not to fault Linux (although it may deserve it): nobody is withholding releases on the basis of quality on any one integration of hardware. As much as I despise their corporate philosophical direction, Apple does this very well. I say these things as a long time Ubuntu user (and still using it) who was pleased with the strides they were making in the mid-2000s, and still thinks they are the only Operating System seriously doing something about about omnibus Free-software usability today. I still have two Ubuntu workstations that are my primary sites of use, but now use it in begrudging concession to my professional needs and personal philosophy: not out of preference in any other dimension, least of which would be "quality." This makes me sad, but I'm getting too old and impatient to put up with this.

morsch 14y ago
I know how you feel. I'm afraid rock solid QA regarding hardware support seems almost impossible unless you get the manufacturers on board. Apple obviously has it easy in this regard. For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure the support for laptops is more dependable than the support for desktops, especially if you go for an unexciting configuration with Intel graphics etc.
- fdr 14y ago
  Microsoft has it the easiest, and the result has been mediocrity in reliability (largely on account of bottom-dollar driver authorship), even given its monopoly power in the OEM market. Clearly, "just" locking up the entire OEM market is not enough to Achieve Results. Hence, the signed-driver certification programs we're seeing in recent years, although I have no idea how effective they are. Apple does a crapload of work to make sure that the one, tiny blessed subset of integrated hardware they select every so often works well during the span of its useful life. Sure, they lean on driver authors of suppliers pretty hard, something which few can do, but they are not nearly as hands-off as Microsoft: the buck stops with them, and a bad integration is Their Fault. And, on the flip side, if you are not an Apple supplier you don't give even two bits about supporting their operating system, for obvious reasons. If there was a Dell distro and it Did Not Suck, I'd seriously consider it. I consider Ubuntu good-enough, so it could be Ubuntu but carefully tested and with divergent kernel and driver releases when appropriate. > For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure the support for laptops is more dependable than the support for desktops, especially if you go for an unexciting configuration with Intel graphics etc. Doubtful, having not long ago possessing such a laptop and sitting next to a colleague in the current-day who has kept with the faith, although with increased grousing. He was, of course, careful with his hardware purchase, buying an ostensibly well-supported Thinkpad. The monitor on his desk still sits unused. There is so much more to go wrong in common use cases that are eliminated on a desktop (because you can't even do some of them, or wouldn't want to). Wireless chipsets, power management, suspension and hibernation, fiddly bits like special softkeys, hot plugging displays, you name it. The weakest link on the desktop side is the video card, and this has proven to be bad enough for me -- crashes have come and gone for me with each Ubuntu release on a pretty plain-jane NVIDIA card.
k_bx 14y ago
System76 notebooks?
- fdr 14y ago
  They don't have the power to block a release if a three year old laptop is broken. Hence, not nearly good enough. If there was a System76 distro and it wasn't terrible in other dimensions then we'd be talking about something interesting.
  - k_bx 14y ago
    Well, I agree that they don't have such power right now, but I don't think it's currently biggest bottleneck (linux doesn't break that often, + LTS releases get more and more usable, for example 12.04 is already good). The bigger thing currently is to simply buy something and know it will 100% work with at least current Ubuntu. That's unfortune, but it's true.

by fdr 14y ago

morsch 14y ago

I know how you feel. I'm afraid rock solid QA regarding hardware support seems almost impossible unless you get the manufacturers on board. Apple obviously has it easy in this regard. For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure the support for laptops is more dependable than the support for desktops, especially if you go for an unexciting configuration with Intel graphics etc.

fdr 14y ago
Microsoft has it the easiest, and the result has been mediocrity in reliability (largely on account of bottom-dollar driver authorship), even given its monopoly power in the OEM market. Clearly, "just" locking up the entire OEM market is not enough to Achieve Results. Hence, the signed-driver certification programs we're seeing in recent years, although I have no idea how effective they are. Apple does a crapload of work to make sure that the one, tiny blessed subset of integrated hardware they select every so often works well during the span of its useful life. Sure, they lean on driver authors of suppliers pretty hard, something which few can do, but they are not nearly as hands-off as Microsoft: the buck stops with them, and a bad integration is Their Fault. And, on the flip side, if you are not an Apple supplier you don't give even two bits about supporting their operating system, for obvious reasons. If there was a Dell distro and it Did Not Suck, I'd seriously consider it. I consider Ubuntu good-enough, so it could be Ubuntu but carefully tested and with divergent kernel and driver releases when appropriate. > For what it's worth, I'm pretty sure the support for laptops is more dependable than the support for desktops, especially if you go for an unexciting configuration with Intel graphics etc. Doubtful, having not long ago possessing such a laptop and sitting next to a colleague in the current-day who has kept with the faith, although with increased grousing. He was, of course, careful with his hardware purchase, buying an ostensibly well-supported Thinkpad. The monitor on his desk still sits unused. There is so much more to go wrong in common use cases that are eliminated on a desktop (because you can't even do some of them, or wouldn't want to). Wireless chipsets, power management, suspension and hibernation, fiddly bits like special softkeys, hot plugging displays, you name it. The weakest link on the desktop side is the video card, and this has proven to be bad enough for me -- crashes have come and gone for me with each Ubuntu release on a pretty plain-jane NVIDIA card.

k_bx 14y ago

System76 notebooks?

fdr 14y ago
They don't have the power to block a release if a three year old laptop is broken. Hence, not nearly good enough. If there was a System76 distro and it wasn't terrible in other dimensions then we'd be talking about something interesting.
- k_bx 14y ago
  Well, I agree that they don't have such power right now, but I don't think it's currently biggest bottleneck (linux doesn't break that often, + LTS releases get more and more usable, for example 12.04 is already good). The bigger thing currently is to simply buy something and know it will 100% work with at least current Ubuntu. That's unfortune, but it's true.