311–320 of 492 posts
It is ok, but you do not get the yeah this machine feels "solidly awesome" like I got with older Thinkpads 420, 440P or older Dell's Precision lineup.
The real show stopper was that Lenovo used some no name Chinese made M2 SSD as the primary, leaving more respectable WD in a secondary slot.
The no name SSD failed without warning in a year.
So check your SSD makers.
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> Don't use Grub or any bootloader if you can avoid it. I haven't used Grub in 10 years. Load Linux directly as an EFI executable via the EFISTUB approach. I run Windows dual boot, since I need (native) Windows for certain work related tasks. > S3 suspend was removed as a default option by many hardware manufacturers. You will likely need to enter the BIOS to change this. It's on, S3 is not the problem > There is a b…
>But this is a $3000 professional laptop, which is supposed to have good Linux support. // That's a big fail by Lenovo then, so why didn't you return it? When the support guys logged in to your computer to fix it, what did they do -- just go "yeah, or product is crap" and usher you away?
Mostly because I had more important things to do at the time. Though not perfect, the computer does work, it does get the job done.
And also, I wouldn't know which other brand/model to get. I made my decision to buy the X1E based on the HN community recommending Lenovo as having one of the best support for Linux. So if I switch to a different brand, I might end up with an even worse Linux experience, so it wasn't worth the risk to me.
I recently acquired a ThinkBook 16p Gen 2, and while a different machine entirely to the ThinkPad, I must say that this is an _absolute beast_ of a machine. It's a total joy to use. It's the most fun I have had using a laptop since my first MacBook. Moving from the MBP to the ThinkBook has made me realize how... boring MacBooks are - not saying that's a bad thing. MacBooks do 'just work'. But the ThinkBook? The machi…
Not surprised your ThinkBook is beating the M1 MacBook since you crippled the Mac with 8GB of RAM.
I love the M1, it's a great work machine, I have very few complaints about it. I hardly ever hit 100% memory usage, and if I do - it's thanks to either Chrome/Spotify/Teams/Slack/Discord.
I think - and this might be a bit controversial - the ThinkBook is better... because it is. The M1 is a great chip, awesome thermals (no fan!), but the laptop booted into Windows is faster.
Hey, maybe it's the memory, who knows! It doesn't swap, so I don't think it is.
You can read my parent post for my reasons. You can't quite run Windows or a stable Linux on a MacBook now, can you? Can't quite remove a 4GB stick and replace it with a 32GB stick, right?
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This mindset is similar to what people with wired headphones think of Airpods et al. It's not an apparent benefit when you're in the bubble of thinking it's normal to have a wire going across your torso all day and hearing the thuds and bumps propagate through the wire to your ears. But when you buy a pair of wireless buds and have them for a week - you don't go back. You've discovered freedom. Likewise, with battery…
> This mindset is similar to what people with wired headphones think of Airpods et al. It's not an apparent benefit when you're in the bubble of thinking it's normal to have a wire going across your torso all day and hearing the thuds and bumps propagate through the wire to your ears. But when you buy a pair of wireless buds and have them for a week - you don't go back. You've discovered freedom. What is abnormal is…
I really don't like having a wire constantly tethering me to my desk. With my wireless headset, i can get up, walk around my office, throw something away, or walk out to the other room and grab a coke from the refrigerator; all without pausing my music or taking my headset off.
I charge it at night and it is good all day. no worries here.
> Lenovo is famous for their TrackPoint (that little red thing on the keyboard), but I am not sure if I’ll take the time to learn using it. Some say it’s far more precise and comfortable as you don’t have to lift your fingers from the keyboard. I might give it a shot sometime. Why buy a ThinkPad if you don't use its most important selling point?
(Similarly, I used a thumb trackball for a long time, and eventually my thumb started to have issues as well.)
For occasional use, these things are great. Long term under heavy use, I have my doubts. It's always better to use the bigger muscles and joints if you can.
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>But this is a $3000 professional laptop, which is supposed to have good Linux support. // That's a big fail by Lenovo then, so why didn't you return it? When the support guys logged in to your computer to fix it, what did they do -- just go "yeah, or product is crap" and usher you away?
> so why didn't you return it? Mostly because I had more important things to do at the time. Though not perfect, the computer does work, it does get the job done. And also, I wouldn't know which other brand/model to get. I made my decision to buy the X1E based on the HN community recommending Lenovo as having one of the best support for Linux. So if I switch to a different brand, I might end up with an even worse Lin…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Don't use Grub or any bootloader if you can avoid it. I haven't used Grub in 10 years. Load Linux directly as an EFI executable via the EFISTUB approach. I run Windows dual boot, since I need (native) Windows for certain work related tasks. > S3 suspend was removed as a default option by many hardware manufacturers. You will likely need to enter the BIOS to change this. It's on, S3 is not the problem > There is a b…
Yeah for the most part it's a "Linux on laptops works if you ...". At least that has been my experience. Although I have not run Linux on a laptop in years so maybe it's time to revisit that.
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Don't use Grub or any bootloader if you can avoid it. I haven't used Grub in 10 years. Load Linux directly as an EFI executable via the EFISTUB approach. You almost certainly only need to run two or three efibootmgr commands to accomplish this. For most people that means only the "Using UEFI directly" section is relevant. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/EFISTUB S3 suspend was removed as a default option by many hard…
I have used EFISTUB for 10 years but I wouldn't recommend it for the next install. The bootloader is the one arcane place that you don't want to be clever with and get reminded of its presence daily, because once it fails for some reason, it wastes much more time to find and read docs and diagnose than the time saved in boot speedup, because the knowledge to debug it is not something you would remember everyday. And…
I still wonder what could have been if IBM just kept the Thinkpad lines. Those IBM-designed Thinkpads were built like tanks. Industrial. Legendary keyboards. I really miss those machines. I had some of the best coding sessions on them and can’t help but think Thinkpads played a role in creating that experience.
The skeptic in me thinks that long lived, upgradable, serviceable, resellable laptops would never have survived long anyways. It’s far more profitable to sell new machines to people and businesses after 3 years. Those long lived tank laptops were actually just too good.