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System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

forbes.com

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Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#71

Post by hardwaresofton »

Popping in to note that if anyone is on the fence about the Oryx Pro, it's a fantastic machine, I love mine! System76 was a fantastic company to deal with.

After some initial troubles with the cooling system (I sent the laptop back and it was serviced under warranty), I've been chugging along the last few months.

I should note that the fans can get pretty loud (from what I read on reviews other laptops like the Lenovo X1 Extreme are even louder), so while it is portable, it might be a little bit intense to use at a coffee shop/coworking space.

For those interested, shameless plug to where I rambled about the experience, and getting Arch installed (which isn't an officially supported OS but worked fantastic): https://vadosware.io/post/starting-my-journey-with-the-syste...

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#72

Post by ChuckMcM »

xxpor wrote: post #62
ChuckMcM wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better performance for the same footprint as x86. Sadly they would not save much money as the POWER support ecosystem is manufactured in lower volumes so it costs more per chip.

I've heard the power requirements for POWER make it not feasible for a laptop though?

As with all processors you can underclock it to reduce power demand. And since power is proportional to the square of the frequency you don't have to underclock it very much to get a good benefit in terms of power.

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#73

Post by chao- »

isantop wrote: post #53
basilgohar wrote: post #19

I love the concept of System76, full stop. What has kept me from seriously considering them, however, is the absence of AMD-powered systems from them. I understand the ubiquity of Intel-based hardware, but I don't full get why not even an option of an AMD-based system is available. If they're going to go their own way in terms of hardware design, I would hope that they at least opened a line of dialog with AMD to exp…

System76 developer here. We do offer several AMD option on our Thelio line (and they're less expensive than the corresponding Intel options, generally speaking).

I completely understand how the current AMD APU chips are not necessarily competitive in compute or in energy efficiency (as mroche points out).

Almost all of my company's engineers develop in Linux, and several have requested System76 laptops. The frequent clunkiness and caveats around switchable graphics that we've experienced from other OEMs has led us to purchase those laptops without dedicated/switchable graphics just to avoid potential headaches.

Just to put a thought out there: If the upcoming Renoir APU line is as performance-competitive as it is hoped to be (Zen 2 plus slightly-upgraded Radeon Vega graphics), we would likely make future laptop purchases seeking that hardware. It would be great to be able to still purchase them from System76, but I do understand that is several years away.

Either way, you guys are fantastic. Please keep fighting the good fight!

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#74

Post by beatgammit »

MikusR wrote: post #52
basilgohar wrote: post #19

I love the concept of System76, full stop. What has kept me from seriously considering them, however, is the absence of AMD-powered systems from them. I understand the ubiquity of Intel-based hardware, but I don't full get why not even an option of an AMD-based system is available. If they're going to go their own way in terms of hardware design, I would hope that they at least opened a line of dialog with AMD to exp…

AMD currently does not make competitive laptop CPUs.

Yes they do. I got a Thinkpad recently with a Ryzen 3500U and it's quite competitive to the competition from Intel. Yes, it's more power hungry than Intel, but the iGPU is much better than Intel's and I don't need to fuss with a dedicated card on Linux. I play games, compile software, etc, and it's a great machine, with my only complaint being poor microphone support (fixable in software).

I buy AMD for compute power and cores, and my laptop works far better for CPU intensive tasks than a comparable Intel based laptop. My main complaint is that I wish I could buy something with an extra battery (Lenovo T series used to have a second battery option) and more than 4 cores in a 14" form factor.

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#75

Post by beatgammit »

I just want a decent keyboard, non-soldered RAM, and a second battery with a quality 14" screen where everything works reasonably well out of the box on Linux. I don't care if it's a bit heavy or thick, I just want to have a good typing experience with high performance CPU options that don't get thermally throttled too bad.

Building a sleek laptop is all the rage these days, and everyone seems intent on convincing us that you can have a good keyboard in a thin package. Go the opposite way and make the best working experience possible and then work out how to make it easy to carry. As long as it's not ridiculously heavy (say, <5lbs or so), I'd consider buying it if it had a better typing experience.

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#76

Post by panpanna »

cartoonworld wrote: post #14
panpanna wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is, now there is yet another distro out there as its own island, stealing resources and not contributing to the rest of the community (including Ubuntu)

So-called "Stealing" by creating a derivative work is specifically allowed, encouraged, and part and parcel of the nature of this kind of Open Source, community developed software. I'll bet upstream is more-or-less welcoming of an additional (well funded?) stakeholder. The bug reports alone might be worth the effort, especially if System76 is triaging some.

I think you misunderstood me. Note my use of the word "resources"...

The number of FOSS contributers is not infitine. At some point we need to start working together instead of forking yet another marginally different copy.

I understand some diversity is good, but what popos adds could have been added to vanilla Ubuntu (or Debian, if you feel that way) and benefitted many more.

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#77

Post by mcv »

smacktoward wrote: post #33
basilgohar wrote: post #19

I love the concept of System76, full stop. What has kept me from seriously considering them, however, is the absence of AMD-powered systems from them. I understand the ubiquity of Intel-based hardware, but I don't full get why not even an option of an AMD-based system is available. If they're going to go their own way in terms of hardware design, I would hope that they at least opened a line of dialog with AMD to exp…

> I don't full get why not even an option of an AMD-based system is available. Intel has been mired in an anti-trust lawsuit in the EU for a decade now, on charges that they offer deep discounts to OEMs on the condition that they don't ship products from competitors (read: AMD) in volume. Such a program would put substantial pressure on OEMs to avoid AMD, since they'd still need to ship a large number of Intel-based…

> "AMD's clear superiority in the latest generation."

IS that true even for laptops? For my new desktop I did indeed get an AMD, also because of Intel's recent technical problems and backdoors, but for a laptop I could really not find anything good that used AMD, and I was lead to understand that for laptops, Intel is still best for some reason. (Do AMDs run too hot? I don't know.)

Re: System76 Will Start Designing and Building Its Own Linux Laptops in January 2020

#80

Post by Fire-Dragon-DoL »

hardwaresofton wrote: post #71

Popping in to note that if anyone is on the fence about the Oryx Pro, it's a fantastic machine, I love mine! System76 was a fantastic company to deal with. After some initial troubles with the cooling system (I sent the laptop back and it was serviced under warranty), I've been chugging along the last few months. I should note that the fans can get pretty loud (from what I read on reviews other laptops like the Lenov…

What problem did you have with cooling? Mine has been working fine, but i can't help but feel terrified when looking at temperatures while gaming. It's been holding for 2 years though, so i guess it's fine...
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