• [gentoo-user] OT: whats a good laptop for gentoo these days?

    From William Kenworthy@21:1/5 to All on Sun Jan 9 13:50:01 2022
    My MS surface pro4 has died (swelling battery has popped the screen -
    known problem) so I am looking for a better replacement. I bought it new
    years ago but it only got good Linux support (touchscreen etc.) in the
    last couple of years so its been a bit frustrating.

    So the question is - whats a good replacement?  Criteria is good battery
    life, can dual boot windows (this is my only windows machine these days
    and there are still some cases - Logitech harmony remote for one) and
    gentoo with everything working/supported.  I do like the tablet with detachable physical keyboard design but I mostly use it with keyboard attached.  And non-microsoft hardware is preferred (the sp4 failure is a design issue for which MS suffered a class action lawsuit to get them to
    honour the warranty - I don't want a repeat)

    BillK

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  • From Wols Lists@21:1/5 to William Kenworthy on Sun Jan 9 14:50:02 2022
    On 09/01/2022 12:49, William Kenworthy wrote:
    My MS surface pro4 has died (swelling battery has popped the screen -
    known problem) so I am looking for a better replacement. I bought it new years ago but it only got good Linux support (touchscreen etc.) in the
    last couple of years so its been a bit frustrating.

    So the question is - whats a good replacement?  Criteria is good battery life, can dual boot windows (this is my only windows machine these days
    and there are still some cases - Logitech harmony remote for one) and
    gentoo with everything working/supported.  I do like the tablet with detachable physical keyboard design but I mostly use it with keyboard attached.  And non-microsoft hardware is preferred (the sp4 failure is a design issue for which MS suffered a class action lawsuit to get them to honour the warranty - I don't want a repeat)

    BillK

    I've bought a laptop off these people ...


    https://junocomputers.com/product-category/laptops/

    They're UK or US but I guess they probably can ship to you. I bought the
    NyX 14 v2 or similar for my wife (weight was the primary concern, at
    1.2kg her previous laptop was heavy, this added 2" on the screen for
    100g but was the lightest I could find that wasn't an astronomic price).

    I'm looking at the NyX 15 AMD v2 for me, I want AMD and don't want more
    than a 15" screen. I've had a 17" - it's too big for a laptop. Luggable,
    maybe ... :-)

    You can get a Windows Pro OEM licence pretty cheap off Amazon or
    wherever, I configured my wife's laptop as dual boot. However, it was
    some grief. Make sure you install linux first or you'll find the EFI
    partition is too small to multi-boot.

    And whatever you choose make sure you investigate upping the spec, I
    think the difference between a 256GB or 512GB m2 was about £10 ...

    Cheers,
    Wol

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  • From Jack@21:1/5 to William Kenworthy on Sun Jan 9 17:30:01 2022
    On 1/9/22 07:49, William Kenworthy wrote:
    My MS surface pro4 has died (swelling battery has popped the screen -
    known problem) so I am looking for a better replacement. I bought it
    new years ago but it only got good Linux support (touchscreen etc.) in
    the last couple of years so its been a bit frustrating.

    So the question is - whats a good replacement?  Criteria is good
    battery life, can dual boot windows (this is my only windows machine
    these days and there are still some cases - Logitech harmony remote
    for one) and gentoo with everything working/supported.  I do like the
    tablet with detachable physical keyboard design but I mostly use it
    with keyboard attached.  And non-microsoft hardware is preferred (the
    sp4 failure is a design issue for which MS suffered a class action
    lawsuit to get them to honour the warranty - I don't want a repeat)

    BillK

    Do you really need/want dual boot, or would Windows in a VM work?

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Marco Rebhan@21:1/5 to All on Mon Jan 10 00:59:09 2022
    Take a look at the Framework laptop if you value repairability and customizability! I don't have one myself (yet, it's going to be my next
    laptop though), but there seems to be great Linux support and an active
    Linux support community.
    https://frame.work/blog/linux-on-the-framework-laptop

    -Marco
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  • From William Kenworthy@21:1/5 to Jack on Mon Jan 10 01:00:02 2022
    On 10/1/22 00:26, Jack wrote:
    On 1/9/22 07:49, William Kenworthy wrote:
    My MS surface pro4 has died (swelling battery has popped the screen -
    known problem) so I am looking for a better replacement. I bought it
    new years ago but it only got good Linux support (touchscreen etc.)
    in the last couple of years so its been a bit frustrating.

    So the question is - whats a good replacement?  Criteria is good
    battery life, can dual boot windows (this is my only windows machine
    these days and there are still some cases - Logitech harmony remote
    for one) and gentoo with everything working/supported.  I do like the
    tablet with detachable physical keyboard design but I mostly use it
    with keyboard attached.  And non-microsoft hardware is preferred (the
    sp4 failure is a design issue for which MS suffered a class action
    lawsuit to get them to honour the warranty - I don't want a repeat)

    BillK

    Do you really need/want dual boot, or would Windows in a VM work?

    No, has to be a hardware install.  Trying to do usb flashing using vm's
    (which I have) has not worked well. (logitech harmony, bluefin, ...)

    BillK

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    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Lee K@21:1/5 to Marco Rebhan on Mon Jan 10 08:00:02 2022
    On Mon, Jan 10, 2022 at 12:59:09AM +0100, Marco Rebhan wrote:
    Take a look at the Framework laptop if you value repairability and customizability! I don't have one myself (yet, it's going to be my next laptop though), but there seems to be great Linux support and an active
    Linux support community. https://frame.work/blog/linux-on-the-framework-laptop

    -Marco


    I've had a good experience with AVADirect. They also have very good online reviews. They will tell you if a particular laptop is compatible with linux, and will even install Ubuntu if you request. They use mainly rebranded
    Clevo's (made in Taiwan I believe).

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  • From Peter Humphrey@21:1/5 to All on Fri Jan 14 18:10:01 2022
    On Sunday, 9 January 2022 13:47:19 GMT Wols Lists wrote:

    I'm looking at the NyX 15 AMD v2 for me, I want AMD and don't want more
    than a 15" screen. I've had a 17" - it's too big for a laptop. Luggable, maybe ... :-)

    I'm looking at their Gemini 17", which you've found is too big. In my case, portability is less important than a big screen for my slowly, inexorably deteriorating vision (glaucoma, in case you were wondering). This workstation has a 27" curved screen at 1920x1020, which is very fine but it's upstairs :)

    The laptop may also stand in as a sort of superior tablet, especially if I can find a Kindle program to read books on it. I've seen the Kindle Cloud Reader suggested, but it may not be usable with all titles. Or I could boot Windows just for that purpose - I think I have a disc here somewhere...

    --
    Regards,
    Peter.

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