wanted: suggestions for used Linux compatible notebooks

[Robert Heller]

At Thu, 7 Nov 2019 21:23:40 +0000 "Ubuntu user technical support,  not for general discussions" <ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com> wrote:

> 
> On 07/11/2019 15:56, M. Fioretti wrote:
> > On Thu, Nov 07, 2019 16:23:07 PM +0100, Liam Proven wrote:
> >> On Thu, 7 Nov 2019 at 14:37, Tom H <tomh0665 at gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >>> I've installed Linux on Dell, Lenovo (IdeaPad and ThinkPad), and
> >>> Toshiba laptops, so I don't see why/how you can be this categoric.
> >>
> > 
> > OK, speaking for me only, of course: [...] 
> > But in this period of my life I cannot afford to spend that kind of
> > time just to get to a login prompt. Not at all. Not even close. 
> 
> I'm in a similar position now but over the decades I've installed Linux 
> on lots of different machines. Most of them worked. Some didn't: Tosh 
> and Sony were the worst by far for proprietary stupidity (plus weirdos 
> like Windows ME boxes). IBM, Dell, and HP have always worked for me, but 
> nowadays it comes down to things which aren't in most playlists:
> 
> 1. Research wireless chipsets and video chipsets because they are THE 
> most difficult to work around. Stick with a brand and version KNOWN to work.

Intel for both. Only hardware vendor for either that actively supports *open
source* drivers. (nVidia provides drivers for Linux, but they are semi closed
source and break with kernel upgrades -- not worth the hassle.)

> 
> 2. High-end new features (fingerprint sensors) rarely work in Linux out 
> of the box: they need lots of specialist drivers and much fiddling.

Right.  *Never* buy a new Laptop.  Ever.  It is about as bad an idea as buying 
a new car (different reasons -- new cars are financially a bad idea, new 
laptops are bad due to bleeding edge unsupported tech).

> 
> 3. Keyboard. If you're going to use the system for writing (my job) a 
> usable keyboard is ESSENTIAL. Most manufacturers just slap in some 
> default clone keyboard fresh off the boat without even testing it.
> 
> [Dell used to have nice ones on laptops but their recent XPS keyboards 
> are unutterably HORRIBLE, so I have ditched Dell for HP Envy and it's 
> really nice to write with. But for my desktop, you will only get me off 
> my old IBM M-series clickety-clickety keyboard when you prise it from my 
> cold, dead fingers — and even then you'll have to fight my executors 
> because I have left it to someone.]
> 
> 4. Screen. My new laptop has some horrendously large resolution, which 
> means some Linux apps play sillybuggers with microscopic pointer sizes, 
> tiny window defaults, etc, making them unusable. Pointless to report 
> them: the developers would need to have my laptop to fix the problem.
> 
> 5. Disks have never given me a minute's problems, even with whole-disk 
> encryption (standard on all our systems).
> 
> Overall, Dell probably comes out on top for installability, but 
> definitely not recent ones for usability.
> 
> Peter
> 

-- 
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