Given that the state of laptops in 2018 an 2019 have increased in both performance and quality there are a lot more options in the market for a lot of users. So what would the most compatible laptops be for the following categories since quality between companies differ by a large margin. With that I have yet to see many people do linux reviews on laptops mainly because of either difficulty of setup or because people don’t care. So if anyone has any reviews of their laptop configuration that would be awesome to see and hear given the low state of reviews for these devices.
As for the categories why not have it be…
ultrabooks
gaming
work laptops
2-in-1’s
Full desktop replacements
I wish I had something to contribute to this but I’m also currently looking for one of these to be the next laptop I purchase. However the information might be value-able to all users.
As it stands, linux is only marginally compatible with most current laptops.
On the AMD side, you must run newer kernels and they can be a tricky beast. I know of only one person with one (of the people I talk to) and they ran into issues with lockups. Definitely not ideal.
On the intel/nvidia side, well… If you run only intel you’re in the green and most everything is supported without issue… If you run nvidia too, GG no re. Optimus is supported by bumblebee currently but isnt exactly plug and play so, not what I would call compatible. If you can live with crappier performance or battery life then nouveau or the proprietary driver are the way to go.
As far as other drivers and what not, I dont know of any issues not solved by running something modern. Compatibility is generally pretty good minus the things I just mentioned.
I recently got a clevo p960ed that I have yet to test linux on but I wouldnt expect that anything it has would be incompatible.
The keyboard is meh, the software to control is also meh but neither is as bad as the gigabyte aero 15x I bought before and returned. If you were to install linux you would want to first install windows to configure the keyboard backlighting color (if you pick one that has that). The battery is bearable, almost 4 hours with the screen as low as it will go and just doing light browsing. I have yet to undervolt or choke the frequency on it. Mine has had LM applied to CPU and GPU courtesy of:
I would recommend the clevo if you’re trying to get a lot of power in a small footprint and for less money than anyone else.
Speaking of optimus though, apparently nvidia was developing drivers to get it working in linux soon™.
jeez 4 hours? how about the MSI gs65 or gs75? also by software control do you mean like rgb and stuff like or other features that would be microsoft exclusive? How soon™ are we talking bout?
This Ryzen-based Dell 2-in-1 requires certain kernel boot parameters in order to boot properly under Linux. Once they’re added, things seem to Just Work™.
The clevo has a 62WH battery, versus the GS65 82WH so probably another hour. If you went something like the thinkpad x1 carbon or xps you would have much more.
Part of the problem is the one I got is the 6 core intel 8750h and RTX2060. If you go lighter on the hardware the battery isnt that small at all. With some tweaks for longevity I could probably squeeze 5 hours out of it.
Looking at my source of info for the drivers, it seems like they had a beta driver and then dropped it. Cant seem to find any more info. Looks like Im a liar
I saw one that was a desktop part, Id imagine it was wholly impractical as a laptop but probably a great desktop replacement. No real knowledge of whats going on with them for mobile chips though.
zen2 is soon but laptop parts probably wont be seen or talked about even until the end of the year I bet.
Also, watch out for laptops have that both intel integrated graphics and a dedicated gpu. There are workarounds, but it isn’t as ‘clean’ when switching between the two processors.
Kernel development always trails the latest bleeding edge hardware, especially laptops. If you positively need the latest hardware, I would suggest purchasing something from System76 (Clevo?), or one of the Dell Developer models which come with Linux pre-installed.
If you don’t need the latest bleeding edge silicon, I’ve never had an issue with T-series ThinkPads. In my experience, Linux support for them has always been brilliant.
