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Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

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Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#231

Post by ageofwant »

voltagex_ wrote: post #161
2bluesc wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you get the XPS and plan on Linux, plan to buy the Intel 7260 2x2 WiFi card. I tried the Dell DW1830 3x3 Broadcom WiFi and the driver support is rough for both WiFi and Bluetooth.

Does anyone have any idea if I could buy the Intel wifi and have Dell swap it in? I have whatever the highest non business warranty support is at the moment.

It takes 10 minutes to do it yourself. The Intel card costs about $15, consider getting the 8260, which is $5 extra and newer (Bluetooth 4.2). While your at it swap out the M.2 SSD for something bigger (1TB ~AU$600)

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#232

Post by wott »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #116
Xylakant wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So thickness and weight are the drivers for this: You can always build a laptop that has the same battery capacity with a detachable battery as you can with a non-detachable. It's just going to be thicker and heavier.

It'll also have a great deal of wasted space, more moving parts, more breakable components, less structural support, additional hardware and software validation requirements, and require some careful engineering to avoid having it fall over backward when you open the screen slightly past vertical (battery cells work nicely as a counterweight). All for a laptop that wouldn't sell as well because people do care about s…

Why would you open the laptop screen when there is no battery? The only time when you have no battery in the laptop is the few seconds it takes to replace one with another.

AFAIK, fixed batteries are located in the very same place as the removable ones: at the rear of the laptop. They are not spread everywhere, there is no hyper-advanced design is that respect, and they definitely do not occupy 60-80% of the chassis. They could be pulled away / inserted back from the rear is the design choice was such.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#233

Post by dumb-saint »

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #215
ronjouch wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FUD. I do use the features you are mentioning, but encounter none of the issues. Thinkpad + Arch user. We Linux users need to realize we are an island, and it's our duty to: - Either Linux-QA-check on our own / as a community the hardware we're buying before we buy, because the constructor isn't doing it (it's doing it for the actively supported OS, Windows). - Or buy {System76 / Thinkpad}, and get {a lot of / some}…

> FUD. That's a very disrespectful way of starting a post. In particular as you conclude that you largely agree with them. So which is it, they're spreading "Fear, uncertainty and doubt" or they're right? In either case, seems unconstructive.

For fuck's sake, grow a thicker skin.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#234

Post by therealmarv »

_0w8t wrote: post #205
mangecoeur wrote: post #190

As an ex-linux user and current mac user, I'm still frustrated by linux laptop hardware support. Ethernet ports that need to be re-plugged, suspend-to-disk not working... lots of glitches things that were already annoying 6-7 years ago but now are hard to justify compared with the polish you can expect from other systems. I could never go back from my macbook because I need everything to just work - no glitchy touchp…

In my experience Linux on Mac when the hardware is supported brings overall better experience for development than Mac OS. USB-to-anything dongles that just work without any driver installation, much better behaviour under memory pressure, container technologies that allows to run not-so-trusted software without overhead of VM, fancy networking setups for stimulating production setups. For that I tolerate ocasional (…

About drivers: You are right... but things get a lot lot more messy if your specific USB driver is not maintained in the Linux Kernel.

I have the opposite experience with memory pressure (speaking only about desktop here). macOS (& Windows) do memory compression by default and most of Linuxes I know don't do that by default. I also have the feeling that at least desktop Linux get's incredible slow when you run out of memory and swapping begins (never encountered similar amount of slowliness on Windows or macOS with low memory).

Regarding container technology and macOS. If you are into docker checkout latest dlite beta: https://github.com/nlf/dlite/releases It runs docker on Kernel virtualization level on macOS with xhyve without the need of VirtualBox etc.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#235

Post by jacek »

vegardx wrote: post #151

It would be so much easier to love my Thinkpad T460s if it wasn't for the touchpad. Coming to Thinkpad and Linux after many years as a Mac-user this was almost a deal breaker for me. The palm detection in synaptic driver is laughable. People installing Linux on the new Macbook Pros are going to have a blast with that gigantic touchpad. And I don't even think it's just a driver problem, as the touchpad can register a…

If you have a very poor touchpad experience you are probably using synaptics driver. Replace it with libinput for much, much better feel (some distros use it as default including Fedora).

I have the same problem with speakers though (X1 Yoga).

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#236

Post by sevensor »

brightball wrote: post #220
jclardy wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Similar story here. Used linux in my HS/early college years, but switched to Mac when the swapped to intel. Recently looked at the possibilities of using linux again, but haven't really found any hardware that "just works." There is that one dell ubuntu dev laptop, but that is a pretty expensive gamble at $1800. The best luck I've had for now is installing ubuntu on a crappy cheap Samsung Chromebook. Runs really well…

I've got a Dell dev laptop on order now. Hope to give a full report on how well it work soon. Dell has a 30 day return policy for what it's worth though.

I recently got the Precision 5500, which is great for the most part. The screen flicker is a trifle irritating, but I've had zero Linux compatibility problems. (I opted for Intel graphics.)

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#237

Post by mbrock »

voltagex_ wrote: post #161
2bluesc wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you get the XPS and plan on Linux, plan to buy the Intel 7260 2x2 WiFi card. I tried the Dell DW1830 3x3 Broadcom WiFi and the driver support is rough for both WiFi and Bluetooth.

Does anyone have any idea if I could buy the Intel wifi and have Dell swap it in? I have whatever the highest non business warranty support is at the moment.

I don't know, but I swapped it myself recently and it was easy, once I found a T5 screwdriver and a guitar pick.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#238

Post by forgotpwtomain »

mangecoeur wrote: post #190

As an ex-linux user and current mac user, I'm still frustrated by linux laptop hardware support. Ethernet ports that need to be re-plugged, suspend-to-disk not working... lots of glitches things that were already annoying 6-7 years ago but now are hard to justify compared with the polish you can expect from other systems. I could never go back from my macbook because I need everything to just work - no glitchy touchp…

> dodgy networking

Had recurring wifi issues on a Macbook Pro as well (as did many of my co-workers)... Not saying it's great on Linux but I would hardly call the alternatives much better...

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad T460 – A Good Linux Laptop for Development

#239

Post by ronjouch »

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #215
ronjouch wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FUD. I do use the features you are mentioning, but encounter none of the issues. Thinkpad + Arch user. We Linux users need to realize we are an island, and it's our duty to: - Either Linux-QA-check on our own / as a community the hardware we're buying before we buy, because the constructor isn't doing it (it's doing it for the actively supported OS, Windows). - Or buy {System76 / Thinkpad}, and get {a lot of / some}…

> FUD. That's a very disrespectful way of starting a post. In particular as you conclude that you largely agree with them. So which is it, they're spreading "Fear, uncertainty and doubt" or they're right? In either case, seems unconstructive.

> So which is it, they're spreading "Fear, uncertainty and doubt" or they're right?

They're spreading the FUD that Linux laptop hardware support is frustrating, no questions asked. It's FUD because it's a fear-inducing oversimplification of the current state of things, which is that Linux laptop hardware support is enjoyable -if you do your homework-.

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