Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

System76 and LVFS

blog.system76.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 84 posts

Re: System76 and LVFS

#41

Post by djsumdog »

JepZ wrote: post #22

Btw. regarding the Dell XPS advice found in the original post: Three years ago I bought an Dell XPS 15. After a few month the touchscreen was broken (did not respond to any input). As I didn't really need it, it took me a few weeks before I contacted Dell. Their support tried to fix the devices remotely for nearly an hour (flashing firmware updates), the touchscreen was still broken. So they send a technician who tri…

I had similar issues with an XPS 15. The battery started swelling and popped up the touchpad (I think that's covered under warrant with a recall; just need to take it in). The speakers have no over current protection and blew out (to be fair HPs don't have hardware protection either and can do the same thing).

I've also had a lot of cooling and throttling issues. I use to really like Dells and have had other really good Dell laptops. Maybe I just got a bad release and I probably shouldn't swear them off, but I'm probably going to avoid them for a while.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#42

Post by BadassFractal »

I personally dislike their hardware (I've owned Clevo / Sager for close to 15 years now, they've always felt cheap and plasticky), but I think their PPA and support are great.

The problem is that it's not clear what exactly is better out there for Linux enthusiasts who want a MacBook Pro-like experience out of the box. They're the least worst solution on the market as far as I can tell.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#43

Post by smacktoward »

slededit wrote: post #35
smacktoward wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who uses Linux on a laptop (ThinkPad) and would love to support a Linux-first laptop vendor, the question I've always had about System76 specifically is: what value exactly do they add? System76's pitch is that they add value by ironing out all the compatibility issues Linux can have on laptops, so they "just work" the way macOS does on MacBooks and Windows does on ThinkPads and Dell XPSes. But they're mad…

Don't you find it a little ironic posting this in reply to a blog where they mention exactly what they are doing to make open source firmware work better? You can say they aren't working on the right things - or that they aren't doing enough. All fair - but clearly they aren't just installing Linux on OEM laptops.

No, not really. I was talking about the stuff you see when you go to buy a System76 laptop, i.e. https://system76.com/laptops.

And as an outsider to this particular corner of the Linux world, what I've seen following this back-and-forth is a fight between System76 and someone from GNOME who says System76 is making his life more difficult. As someone who uses GNOME on all his machines, that is not the kind of relationship between a hardware vendor and the GNOME project that would encourage me to buy their hardware.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#44

Post by slededit »

smacktoward wrote: post #43
slededit wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't you find it a little ironic posting this in reply to a blog where they mention exactly what they are doing to make open source firmware work better? You can say they aren't working on the right things - or that they aren't doing enough. All fair - but clearly they aren't just installing Linux on OEM laptops.

No, not really. I was talking about the stuff you see when you go to buy a System76 laptop, i.e. https://system76.com/laptops . And as an outsider to this particular corner of the Linux world, what I've seen following this back-and-forth is a fight between System76 and someone from GNOME who says System76 is making his life more difficult. As someone who uses GNOME on all his machines, that is not the kind of relatio…

Bug lists don't sell laptops. I can't see them changing their marketing. For the people who want more technical information they have their blog. Although as seen here its a bit of a mixed blessing for them.

But I'm more upset with the people who say just go buy a Clevo that they OEM. A company spends time and money to bring good Linux support and people want to end run around them to save a few bucks. This is why Linux doesn't have great laptop support - nobody will pay for it.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#45

Post by jessaustin »

iodiniemetra wrote: post #32
iel99 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hyperbole Dozens of projects have gone this way and the open source community still exists It’s almost as if the notion of one size fits all is a utilitarian idea to simplify production of physical goods We need to maybe look at why we keep trynna force that on more ephemeral ideas I’m not obliged to speak English any one why. Why bother with making sure everyone runs the same code or manages only one or two key proj…

Not hyperbole, a real problem that leads to interop issues. For example, the hellish filesystem wars of the mid 2000s. Most distros STILL ship ext4 despite there being better options.

Hellish? I was running linux back then (since 97 actually) and while there was a fair amount of confusion, it wasn't due to the many choices we had, and there was nothing hellish about it. The confusion was because we hadn't realized that the right way to handle file system issues is to keep backups and have automated rebuilds. In some tiny minority of cases you also need some flavor of RAID. Other than that, why worry about file systems?

Re: System76 and LVFS

#46

Post by theprotocol »

busterarm wrote: post #26
jackpot51 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The OEM hardware does not have our custom firmware, our WiFi and drive selection, our testing, or our support. Those things may not all be perfect, but they do make a big difference.

Aren't you the same fellow who suggested to me a few months ago that Redox was a realistic, superior alternative to running OpenBSD in production?

He made a simple statement that he believes his company provides additional value over the OEM machines.

You may or may not find it compelling, but I don't see the relevance of Redox.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#47

Post by Iolaum »

Since we are giving feedback to system76 I was shopping for a laptop 1+ year ago and was considering system76. When I inquired about buying an Oryx Pro they said that they would disable the onboard gpu and I could not use it. I ended up buying a laptop elsewhere. It took me ~ 6 months to find out how to properly use/switch_to the iGPU (spoiler: acpi_osi kernel parameter in grub) but now I do and can properly chose between battery endurance and performance. Ideally a linux vendor would fix these problems instead of limiting what one can do with the hardware. On the other hand requiring a user to change grub kernel loading parameters isn't a level of customer support that would get positive reviews. However a sizable number of linux users are "enthusiasts" (as people who don't use linux like to call us) and, personally, if I am to pay more for a linux laptop, I expect the manufacturer to facilitate tinkering to get the most out of it (ie allowing me to switch gpus or run any distro I want) instead of hindering that option.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#48

Post by chewbacha »

acomjean wrote: post #14

This is the whole open source community destroying (edit: maybe better term would be "damaging") itself. Basically it starts civilly about finding the one best way to do something. They agree to disagree. Then there 2 standards...Then 4, then 8 all not having the effort exerted to make each solution great. Then one party writes something like "don't buy this it not free/ doesn't do this". And in the end 99+% of peopl…

Reminds me of: https://xkcd.com/927/

Re: System76 and LVFS

#49

Post by sbov »

craftyguy wrote: post #12
kentt wrote: post #8

Just don't touch system76. They're just low quality rebranded Sager laptops with a crap version on Linux. You can just buy the same laptop and if you really like their horrible version of Linux, then put that on there.

Alternatively, there's Purism ( https://puri.sm ), who actually take security and build quality seriously. Edit: looks like the system76 downvote brigade is hitting this discussion.

I considered purism in my most recent laptop hunt, but with 4 core laptops going mainstream in Intel's latest update I couldn't justify it.

Re: System76 and LVFS

#50

Post by bluGill »

syntheticnature wrote: post #38
smacktoward wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who uses Linux on a laptop (ThinkPad) and would love to support a Linux-first laptop vendor, the question I've always had about System76 specifically is: what value exactly do they add? System76's pitch is that they add value by ironing out all the compatibility issues Linux can have on laptops, so they "just work" the way macOS does on MacBooks and Windows does on ThinkPads and Dell XPSes. But they're mad…

I suspect part of the issue here is that if they indicate which HW variants are better-supported under Linux explicitly, it suddenly becomes 'just buy that laptop configuration from Clevo/Sager/etc.' and they are back where they started. It's also possible the exact ordering combination is custom from Sager/Clevo and available only because they buy in larger bulk, or some parts are removed/replaced after the fact of…

They have stated that they spend a lot of time working with Clevo when a new laptop is in the design phase to ensure the hardware is compatible. That you can buy a linux compatible clevo laptop is in large part because they specified parts in the design phase that worked with linux.

(Be careful reading the above, sometimes there is something like a fingerprint sensor that is not compatible. Clevo tries to use the same model for many different customers and so sometimes not everybody can be perfectly satisfied)

Post reply on HN