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System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

blog.system76.com

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Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#111

Post by v_lisivka »

baroffoos wrote: post #84
jaabe wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't have any obsession with distros. I want one that works. This is why I became a Mac user. After 15 years of Linux I was just done with all the bullshit, but I guess I could look into Pop!_OS.

I have found fedora to be the just works distro as long as you pick the right hardware to start. A dell XPS + fedora has been the most productive setup I have ever had.

Yeah, Dell XPS + Fedora works great together. I actually started to use Bluetooth with Dell. It just works.

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#112

Post by scandox »

Fnoord wrote: post #106
dxxvi wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lucky you because there's an OS that tweaks everything to your liking. The fact that Pop!_OS is not a rolling distro might be a big - for many people.

Rolling distributions simply do not provide the stability for serious production environments.

Is a desktop a production environment?

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#113

Post by Intermernet »

scandox wrote: post #112
Fnoord wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rolling distributions simply do not provide the stability for serious production environments.

Is a desktop a production environment?

If you make your money using your desktop, then yes it is.

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#114

Post by bwat49 »

deanclatworthy wrote: post #98
tonysickpony wrote: post #63

I love Pop!_OS. I have used Gentoo, Ubuntu and Arch in the past 10 years. I ended up with Antergos packaged version of Arch with a bunch of personal tweaks. I tried different distro every now and then but always ended disappointed. My only needs for distros are to install softwares I use and run them. It turns out to be significantly hard, none of the distros do that without glitches, screen tearing and inconsistency…

Forgive me for asking, but what is different about this than Ubuntu 19.04? I looked through the POP!_OS (terrible name btw) promo page [1] and the majority of the things it's talking about are basic Gnome features shipped with Ubuntu? [1] https://system76.com/pop

https://github.com/pop-os/docs/blob/master/docs/difference-b...

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#116

Post by pimeys »

wyclif wrote: post #86
wpietri wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Have you purchased a Lenovo lately? I've not had good luck with them. Same. My Thinkpad 25 has already been back twice. And both their field service and their factory service have really gone downhill. As much as I love the keyboard, this may be my last Thinkpad.

But where can you go from there? Who makes a better PC laptop?

Kind of funny, but you might consider getting a refurbished ThinkPad from a couple of years ago. If you're ready to replace some parts, a T440p will be fast and good for years to come.

I got my X230 and it's so fast I really question the need for the new CPU generations...

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#117

Post by jaabe »

craigsmansion wrote: post #107
jaabe wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The touchbar is crap, and being a Danish programmer hitting those {} keys really sucks on a mac keyboard. Everything else has been miles better than Linux though. I mean, when I left fedora 21 for a Mac I had close to a hundred scripts for modifications to make it tolerable. On my Mac I have 0.

If I understand you correctly, over the course of 15 years of upgrades on Linux you ended up with almost a hundred scripts to make your DE on Fedora "tolerable", but then you bought a mac and everything has been perfect from the beginning even in between updates with zero regressions in usability for you personally? If so, good for you, but that doesn't make a non "one size fits all" approach "bullshit".

I agree, configuration was just part of the “bullshit”.

I had to manually disable the dedicated graphics card in my laptop or it would get ridiculously hot while idle. This is probably not an issue if you buy a laptop with preinstalled Linux.

I do a lot of presentations. Getting Linux to work with various projectors wasn’t great. Maybe that’s better in 2019, but it’s never been an issue with my Mac. The lack of ports have, but buying a converter solves that.

Updates broke my software and I had to spend a lot of time sorting it out. A more stable Linux distro might have been better.

My external displays never really worked without problems.

Having used a MacBook trackpad makes it really hard to use non-MacBook trackpads.

It’s a range of stuff like that.

I’m sure you could get Linux to be better, even for me, but I don’t want to use a single second on making it happen. I did when I was younger, that’s why I turned to Linux in the first place. I’ve spent my time building gentoo, but the older I get the more I want things to work out of the box so I can spend my time on other things.

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#118

Post by carlesfe »

pimeys wrote: post #97
NikolaNovak wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anything here will be Anecdata at best, but I've bought 3 refurb t420 and t420s; these are 8 years old now and still daily drivers for all my family members. The t420s in particular is my all-time favourite laptop of last 20 years, as it's thin and portable, but still modular (t420 is significantly thicker and more old-school portable), easy to upgrade and maintain, and with great keyboard with standard layout. I hav…

Same here. Although for work I prefer a workstation with enough cores for compilation. Just bought an X230, put OpenBSD in it and it is just perfect in the summer house. Put a SIM card in it and connect to the internet from everywhere. Superb keyboard, fast, small, durable, everything replaceable. I also have a T25 at home for development and can't say anything bad from that either, albeit a bit too big for carrying…

I also have an x230 with OpenBSD, can you share which tutorial did you use to get the SIM wlan working?

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#119

Post by pimeys »

carlesfe wrote: post #118
pimeys wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here. Although for work I prefer a workstation with enough cores for compilation. Just bought an X230, put OpenBSD in it and it is just perfect in the summer house. Put a SIM card in it and connect to the internet from everywhere. Superb keyboard, fast, small, durable, everything replaceable. I also have a T25 at home for development and can't say anything bad from that either, albeit a bit too big for carrying…

I also have an x230 with OpenBSD, can you share which tutorial did you use to get the SIM wlan working?

I have one of the supported cards[0], so it's quite straightforward:

Check the APN from your operator's settings.

- Try the card first in a phone. Preferably turn on the SIM lock and change the PIN code.

- Insert the card to the laptop, boot.

- `doas ifconfig umb0 apn your.apn.com`

- `doas ifconfig umb0 pin XXXX`

- `doas ifconfig umb0 up`

- Confirm the gateway from `ifconfig umb0` when it appears, should say inet and it's the second IP.

- When gateway is visible, `doas route add -ifp umb0 default XXX.XXX.XXX.XXX`

- Confirm the DNS works, but you should now be able to access internet.

Sometimes when you turn off the power or suspend, you might need to enter the PIN to the card, turn the device up and set the route again. A player automates this with a script. :)

You can store the settings to `/etc/hostname.umb0`.

[0] Lenovo H5321 gw

Re: System76 News: Coreboot and Linux Advances

#120

Post by yingw787 »

phren0logy wrote: post #62
yingw787 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have used System76 systems and I have to say I didn't enjoy the experience. Dell has Project Sputnik although when I tried it out, the OEM Ubuntu OS (a fork of Ubuntu) didn't factory reset correctly wiping out the ability to recognize the GPU. There's LAC Portland and they were super friendly, I might try to buy a computer from them if my computer dies (and ask for debian or something).

How recently did you buy the System76? It seems like most of the negative experiences were a few years ago; perhaps they have improved over time? Also, thanks for the heads up about LAC Portland.

My machine was early 2018, the Oryx Pro. It's the thick version. Suspend either suspends properly or NO-OPs. I stuck my laptop into my bag with some dry gym clothes and my books. Realized 30 minutes later the damn thing was running at full power and my bag was too hot to touch. Five more minutes and Caltrain would have been on fire.

They have the newer thinner versions of that laptop (we use them at work), but they have no enterprise-grade support and they all have different quirks (I mean at least have the same quirk, right...?!). If you're trying to replace a keyboard during business hours, and you're a high-level engineer charging hundreds of dollars per hour, and it takes a long time to change the keyboard and learn one skill one time, it will cost the business a pretty penny.

I'd get the Dell Precision 5530 or XPS 13 w/ Project Sputnik for a business setting. It's Dell, and it's the highest-level laptop they sell, so at least they'll take the machine back if it doesn't work (I believe the XPS/Precision line follow a special QA process from other commodity stuff), and I don't think Project Sputnik will disappear anytime soon (actually expanding IIRC).

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