Linux-friendly laptops

[J. L.]

On 14.07.2017 00:56, Doug wrote:
> 
> On 07/13/2017 03:34 PM, J. L. wrote:
>> On 24.06.2017 17:24, MR ZenWiz wrote:
>>> I'm looking at getting (yet anothre) replacement laptop and this time
>>> I'd like to buy one that works well with Linux.
>>>
>>> Current options are:
>>>
>>> ASUS G751JT (2 of these, possibly 3)
>>> Dell M6700 Covet
>>>
>>> The Dell is slightly more expensive, but I'm leaning toward it because
>>> I'm fairly familiar with Dells and they tend to be OS agnostic,
>>> durable and reliable.
>> Though i don't know the exact Dell-machine You're talking about i can
>> only encourage You to go with Dell without the slightest doubt in my
>> mind.
>>
>> I've been using some 10 Dell-laptops starting in 1999 with a Latitude
>> C800 (still running very well 24/7 as a Linux-based firewall after _18_
>> years in duty => very nice coming of age!!!); the latest being a
>> Latitude D830 and a Precision M4300; admittedly both are already quite
>> "old" but both are just doing what they ought to. So why should i
>> discard them? And i've got quite a lot of accessories of this
>> Latitude-series.
>>
>> At least my next laptop will most certainly be another Dell ...
>>
>> Cheers and good luck! :-)
>>
> This question came up a little while ago on one of the Linux
> threads--don't know which one.
> I have three(!) Dell laptops. (Don't ask!) Two of them have Broadcom
> wi-fi cards. I run
> PCLinuxOS (pclos) and while there is some driver software, it is a bitch
> to determine what
> you need to install, and download some of it from Broadcom, and get
> everything working,
> altho it can (could) be done. I believe that Broadcom has been bought
> out or taken over
> recently, and I have no idea whether the necessary software is still
> available. That being
> said, one of the Dells did NOT have Broadcom hardware, and worked
> easily. One of the
> Dells WITH Broadcom hardware was installed with MINT 17 LTS, and it
> worked right out of
> the box without installing anything! Since MINT is an offspring of
> Ubuntu, you could be lucky.
> Someone with explicit experience should reply to this note.

Hi!

Though i don't really understand Your question let me just explain, that
for the D830 / M4300 (except for graphics they are mostly identical
machines), at least here in Germany, You easily can buy original
DELL-WLAN-NICs from Broadcom as well as Intel-based ones on ebay for
some 6 - 15 € or $ respectively.

I've got both and luckily for me both work very fine. Some three or four
years ago i exchanged the one in the Precision from Intel to Broadcom to
be able to install and run Apple's OS X additionally (=> Hackintosh)
which just works very fine as well.

Perhaps i've had a lot of luck given that even my first Dell is still
running very well 24/7 after 18 years (PIII/850 MHz with 512 MB of RAM
running Fli4L (http://www.fli4l.de/ English-version:
http://www.fli4l.de/en/home/news/). The second one, a C810, is just a
standby for this first firewall. In the meantime i think i've even have
really some "liking" for these machines ... ;-)

So _my_ next laptop will most certainly be another Dell, at least
_at_the_moment_. And as i usually do not need the newest and sleekest
appliances for my purposes i most certainly will buy again a used one on
ebay or else. Only the C800 and C810 i bought directly from Dell. [btw.
for nearly 8.500 DM (Deutsch-Marks) at the time => some 4.500 $ Ouch!!!
;-) ]

Cheers and good luck to You too! :-)