[NBLUG/talk] OT: small notebooks

ME dugan at passwall.com
Sat Dec 13 02:52:01 PST 2003


Cameron Tully-Smith said:
> I'm looking for a small system, such as a Sony Vaio or Fujitsu LifeBook.
> Are there any systems other than these two that I should look at?
>
> Are there preferences either way re: HDD speed, etc.?
>
> I'm looking to do some all-around computing (some movies, some
> programming, some spreadsheet schoolwork, etc.).

I still have my IBM ThinkPad 560 and it is very old. Still works! Still
running Debian! It was very well supported. Their ThinkPad series was
small/thin but not as small and thin as many Sony Vaio.

My present "production laptop" is a Dell. I like the Dell line of business
computers. I am not as impressed with their home-series. Their business
class laptops are rather reliable and sturdy and use standard hardware
that is pretty good. Their home machines are not as good when it comes to
standard hardware that is well supported.

Dell, IBM and Fujitsu are on the top of my list when it comes to Linux.

Coming in 4th, would be Sony and their Vaio line.  They seem to work fine
(hardware-wise) but often use very modern and new hardware that is often
not immediatly supported in Linux. Custom LCD and odd resolutions (native)
for LCD can complicate setup of X. Beyond this, my biggest complaint with
the Sony Vaio series is how fragile they can be. Yes they are tight, and
compact, and small, and sleek, but all of thiscompaction can create heat
problems that cause the unit to step down the CPU speed from max
performance to save heat and power from the battery. Some of the Vaio have
very good battery life (when new.) Sony would be higher rated if they
chose to be more Linux friendly.

Try to avoid non-name brand laptops if you desire to have after-market
support. The larger the distribution of a model or series, the better the
chances are for batteries to be made by other vendors and the better your
chances for replacements to hardware to be available to you.

What you describe is possible with nearly any modern or recent laptop. One
thing to do is to look at laptops and see what you like. Choose some
models based on their name, reputation, look and feel and stats. Then take
your list of vendor, model number and whatnot and go to:
http://www.linux-laptop.net/

This is a list of laptops that people have tried to install Linux onto.
(If a laptop is not listed, that does not mean it won't work with Linux,
it just means nothing has been reported.)

This site is useful in that users who provide web pages on such things
will let you know (frequently) what kinds of problems (if any) they had in
getting hardware support to work for all devices.

For example, I helped a friend setup a Fujitsu Lifebook 790TX a *long*
time ago (when it was new, and no, this is not Kyle's laptop.. ;-) and
though my page has moved for the original site many years ago, the link on
the linux-laptop site was also moved to match it. (I have seen people sell
these on ebay and ref images on my site as well as specs and other data.
Yes, I look at my web logs.)

The biggest sticking point in most modern laptops includes optimized
support for video and getting the Modem to work.

Next, if you get a laptop to work, and were unable to find other
resources, why not make your own and then contact the people at
linux-laptop.net to let them know about your page. (Supporting open source
can be as easy as documenting stuff when you are unable to offer code,
patches and projects to the community.)

Even posting answers to this list is a kind of support to the OpenSource
community. Good stuff. :-)

-ME




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