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Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen3 Review – with Linux

ernestas.me

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Re: Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen3 Review – with Linux

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're talking about Intel, of course laptops with those are unpleasant. You should try and compare a M1 Mac with your Carbon X1. Most likely yours runs much hotter.

> You should try and compare a M1 Mac with your Carbon X1. Most likely yours runs much hotter. Unless I'm mistaken, the material of the M1 Macs seems to be the same as before? If the machine runs at 100% resource usage, does the underside of the body no longer get so hot you can't have it in your lap?

> If the machine runs at 100% resource usage, does the underside of the body no longer get so hot you can't have it in your lap?

Nope, never. That's not to say that if you run a Wii emulator for hours it doesn't get very warm, it's simply not intolerably hot. That's without fans. I'd expect a fan-equipped model to at most remain warm.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen3 Review – with Linux

#183
post #159

I've been holding off on purchasing a new Lenovo laptop. Shortly Lenovo will start shipping latops with the new generation AMD Ryzen mobile chips that have RDNA 2 GPUs. [0][1] This is a real game changer. The amount of power and open source VULKAN friendliness is going to be incredible. I look forward to being able to do container work, and emulate Gamecube games all on a single Linux machine. [0] https://www.aroged.…

I have an AMD Thinkpad (X13 AMD 2nd gen) and it's one of the most frustrating devices I've had in years. Linux support is superficially fine, but in continuous use lots of tiny, annoying incompatibilities (and sometimes pretty significant impairments) show up. There's a set of known hardware issues (e.g. unable to resume from suspend, USB ports stop working until hardware reset is performed through the pinhole, ...)…

Seconded. As much as I like rooting for the underdog and was really hyped by AMDs success after so many years of failure, my laptops always have been and will continue to be Intel based. I actually tried a few times, last time with second gen Ryzen, and as the parent comment says, it's always random little things that sometimes don't work.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen3 Review – with Linux

#184
I have a model from this series. I find the trackpad to work great and I don't see the problem the author is having with it. Dragging works just fine, assuming you use the correct drag gesture (quick double tap, then drag, like usual).

Compatibility wise, my experience has been slowly degrading. I've had to force the Intel GPU driver to use DRI 2 or X11 wouldn't work (this might have something to do with the manual config in the sound system I needed to get the sound working when I bought the laptop because Intel hadn't released proper drivers yet).

I'd use Wayland, but that just doesn't work with the Nvidia GPU (even though it should in modern drivers). A recent kernel update broke sleep for me, it now no longer goes to sleep and immediately wakes up.

I also occasionally get full system freezes whenever GDM tries to load the login screen, either on boot or when switching users. Those have been becoming more rare lately but it's still happening every now and then. Just a black screen, the computer slowly heating up and nothing.

Lastly, for firmware updates you just need to boot Windows every now and then. Some firmware updates come through fwupdmgr, but others need to be installed manually or through a Windows install.

Perhaps I need a reinstall Linux, perhaps I need to switch distros. It works fine with it works: touchpad is nice and responsive, has full multi finger gesture support in Wayland, the keyboard is good and the palm rejection is a pain when trying to game on the touchpad but it works great for normal typing. I've also found it a lot quieter and longer lasting on Linux than on Windows, where the CPU and GPU either underclock dramatically or the fan spins up constantly.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen3 Review – with Linux

#188
post #49

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…

ok so how is the battery life though?

Not amazing, not bad. Probably around 5-6 hours using intellij and Chrome.

Re: Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen3 Review – with Linux

#190
post #173

Trackpad is one of the most important features of a notebook. There is only one brand provides great trackpad. You know the answer.

Agreed, the only good trackpad is the one by that company that can simulate different materials, touch depths and types of resistance through ultrasound. The trackpad themselves are tiny and super expensive, but it's the best trackpad you can possibly buy.

Unless you mean Apple. I don't get the obsession with Apple's trackpads. My experience with them hasn't been great. They do integrate very nicely with the OS and they are pretty nice and big, but I don't really see or feel the difference between a Thinkpad or a Probook with Windows precision drivers and a Macbook.

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