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What are good linux laptops for 2018?

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Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#41

Post by bhouston »

stevesimmons wrote: post #33

I bought the new Dell XPS15 with 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD, and Nvidia GPU the week it was released, and straightaway installed Ubuntu 18.04. It is powerful enough to last me three years and the price was good. I am mostly happy with it - superfast, great screen. The two problems I had were when installing the Nvidia drivers, plus the fans stay on more than I think they should. Rather than waste hours trying to solve these,…

I love the Dell XPS 15 9570 with 32GB and a 1TB SSD. I have a docking station (TB16, although the D6000 looks okay too) and I run two 4K 32" monitors with a wireless keyboard from it as my work desktop.

It is thin, light, long battery and I feel like I am not making any performance sacrifices.

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#42

Post by lykr0n »

stevesimmons wrote: post #33

I bought the new Dell XPS15 with 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD, and Nvidia GPU the week it was released, and straightaway installed Ubuntu 18.04. It is powerful enough to last me three years and the price was good. I am mostly happy with it - superfast, great screen. The two problems I had were when installing the Nvidia drivers, plus the fans stay on more than I think they should. Rather than waste hours trying to solve these,…

I would try Fedora 28, or if you are a bit more technical- Arch. I'm running Arch on a 13" and it works flawlessly. I've had a lot better experiences using Fedora when compared to Ubuntu.

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#43

Post by bhouston »

nvr219 wrote: post #40
stevesimmons wrote: post #33

I bought the new Dell XPS15 with 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD, and Nvidia GPU the week it was released, and straightaway installed Ubuntu 18.04. It is powerful enough to last me three years and the price was good. I am mostly happy with it - superfast, great screen. The two problems I had were when installing the Nvidia drivers, plus the fans stay on more than I think they should. Rather than waste hours trying to solve these,…

I went from Latitude E7200 series to XPS15. I love it except for: 1. The webcam placement is terrible. If I'm taking notes during a call, everyone else gets a great shot of my fingernails. 2. I have to carry dongles for Ethernet and HDMI.

You can get a combined dongle like the Dell DA300 that combines Ethernet with VGA, HMDI, and DP (if you are doing customer presentations you need all three unfortunately.) That is what I use rather than carrying around a couple different dongles.

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#44

Post by BobAndSons »

frankensteins wrote: post #3

Here's my experience. If you develop everything locally, get a decent laptop with Ubuntu or Windows 10 Pro. Windows 10 Pro Edition comes with WSL, a Linux subsystem which is pretty decent for my deep learning implementation and small scale test. With Xming, I can do some visualization as well. There will be downsides. If you get a laptop that just comes with Ubuntu or any Linux distro, you are good to go. If your dev…

In addition to some newer models supporting Linux containers, many older Intel-based chromebooks run smoothly using GalliumOS. It's a spin of Xubuntu designed specifically for chromebooks, and I've been using it for about 8 months now with zero issues.

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#45

Post by eat_veggies »

spleeder wrote: post #37
eat_veggies wrote: post #8

I put linux on my x1 carbon (gen 5) and it works well enough. Some notes, in no particular order: * great keyboard * kind of shit trackpad * trackpoint is pretty nice at least * hidpi is a pain in the ass to set up ..* looks great once you get it working ..* some apps like Zoom refuse to scale up, so the buttons are tiny * light weight * really long battery

Setting the QT_SCALE_FACTOR=2 env var does the trick for Zoom on my end.

Thanks, I'll try this out next time I need to video call!

edit: good stuff, it works!

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#46

Post by tamrix »

meguest wrote: post #2

I have a Dell XPS 15 and to be frank I would advise against it. Good points: - Strong hardware - Looks nice Bad points: - M2 SSD requires changing some BIOS preferences to work on Linux - Nvidia graphics card is a pain on Ubuntu. Do a Google search for nouveau.modeset - The fans are on most of the time, even during idle. The machine isn't hot either - it just likes to run the fans - The 1920x1080 screen isn't that gr…

It's not a good laptop but for none of those reasons.

Thermals are shit. Even after a repaste, throttles a lot. Many people at my work have had hardware issues. My batteries are clean dead after a year of use.

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#47

Post by bhouston »

meguest wrote: post #2

I have a Dell XPS 15 and to be frank I would advise against it. Good points: - Strong hardware - Looks nice Bad points: - M2 SSD requires changing some BIOS preferences to work on Linux - Nvidia graphics card is a pain on Ubuntu. Do a Google search for nouveau.modeset - The fans are on most of the time, even during idle. The machine isn't hot either - it just likes to run the fans - The 1920x1080 screen isn't that gr…

I am not sure these points of yours are fully valid:

> M2 SSD requires changing some BIOS preferences to work on Linux

I never had to do this. That is weird.

> Nvidia graphics card is a pain on Ubuntu. Do a Google search for nouveau.modeset

This is true but it affects all computers Ubuntu with NVIDIA and Intel integrated graphics and is not unique to Dell laptops. This screws up our desktops at work that have integrated graphics.

> The fans are on most of the time, even during idle. The machine isn't hot either - it just likes to run the fans

I think you do not have the power mode drivers setup properly. Mine doesn't do that.

> No Ethernet port unlike a T470. You need a USB adapter

I use a USB-C docking station at my desks. Once you get a docking station that connects everything, including power via a single small USB-C you never go back. You just need a dongle when traveling.

Re: What are good linux laptops for 2018?

#48

Post by Shelnutt2 »

Lordarminius wrote: post #20

They hardly get any credit, bit HP laptops are cheap, sturdy and play very well with Linux (or at least Ubuntu)

I just got a HP x360 15z, AMD Ryzen 7 (2700U), Vega 10 GPU, 16GB ram, 256gb SSD and its working great so far. You'll need ubuntu 18.10 or some other distro with kernel 4.16 or newer for GPU support. Wifi is in kernel 4.14 LTS. I've got gentoo running with sway and its quite swell.

I have a very minor cosmetic defect from manufacturing, but HP is allowing me to send it off for repair or get a complete replacement. I choose a repair since it can be done in under a week compared to 2-3 weeks lead time on a replacement.

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