Choosing a laptop for linux

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TinkerPhil

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Hi
I want to replace my aging HP AMD based laptop running Ubuntu with something newer
I think I want an i3 I don't need an i5,i7 etc - this is just web based stuff and a little
(When I originally got the AMD one it was a pain to get compatible stuff for a while so I think Intel is the way forward - I'm probably wrong)

But my head goes into a spin when choosing a laptop

8Gb RAM minimum and 512Gb SSD are easy requirements to identify
a 15" screen - easy(ish) - though some are slightly bigger/smaller 14.9" or 15.2" etc
The spec on the screen - Ux<super-double-plus>VGA++ anyone? I don't need anything special to watch YouTube videos
i3? I have no idea about the different versions - I don't want an old one - dare there people out there who know each of the architectures?

My point is that just buying a laptop is already a nightmare of choices and comparisons

But then you have to check for Linux compatability

Then Boom! My head explodes and I have to walk away for a while

I realise that Linux is a community thing and I'm probably asking way too much for guidance on which half decent 15" reasonable quality screen, 8Gb with a 512Gb SSD Linux (Ubuntu) compatible notebook I should buy...

but here goes...

Can anyone suggest a half decent.... ?

My budget is around £400 - preferably less
(Preferably new too)

Failing that, is there a "method" I can follow or resource I can use to track down this elusive (for me) item?

Thanks
Philk
 
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G'day Phil, Welcome to Linux.org

It may be a shorter route to make a list of which laptops NOT to buy

I dont use a laptop, and probably never will......but I note that there are forever laptops on here giving dramas of one sort or another.

The ones I see mentioned as being reasonably Linux friendly are dell, lenovo and hp

The 'friendly' bit can be as simple as disabling secure boot and fast boot in the bios.....accessing the bios and disabling those settings can apparently be a huge pain.

Sorry I cant be more help
 
I have this joke that you can beat someone to death with a (business line) thinkpad and it will still turn on.

I'd recommend to go for a thinkpad. They are very much unbreakable. Unless you want gaming (then you need sth else because they are not build for that). They are targeted at businesses, so they are build for reliability.

Used thinkpads are quite affordable and if I would'nt run qubes, which needs about 256 TB (not a typo) RAM and an i90 processor (also not a typo), I would buy used as well.

Do you want 13", 14" or 15/16"?
 
I have a modern MSI that just worked. I didn't even have to install any drivers.
 
Things to remember when buying a new [or new to you pre-used] laptop for linux,
new cutting edge components can cause compatibility problems, as it can take up to a year for the boys and girls who write the divers to back engineer them,
Intel or AMD doesn't matter to Linux, both brands have their own following, most users don't care.
most makes can be made to work with Linux but some cause more work than others, the consensus seems to be Dell or Lenovo have the least problems. Just avoid bottom line entry level machines.if you can afford to, and Chromebooks,
 
Thanks all - particularly for taking it in such a relaxed way

Sadly it has to be a laptop/notebook - (and 15" @KGill) - its not actually for me its for my wife who has happily used linux on the HP she has for years - but now wants something "new" - and I really think she wants new - she also wants to keep the price down which dumps me in the cheap laptops - which are usually not very compatible - sigh

If I choose, say, a "thinkpad" I then have to identify the model to get the CPU I want - only then can I start looking to buy it

The Ubuntu hardware compatibility page is just a list of models - so I then need to work out which of those is reasonably recent - then I can go see it costs £700 - so back to square one

I despair - and I know its not really anyone's fault - who, after all, wants to give up their free time to collate a list of laptops - I know I don't!

I'd have thought Ubuntu might have invested a little more in this - but seems not

Thanks all - I'm going back in my hole
 
Haha - I just checked the Ubuntu compatibility page - everything on it seems to cost around £1000

I need to think of another strategy - maybe take a linux usb stick into the local PC World (do they still exist) and see if it works!
 
TinkerPhil said:
maybe take a linux usb stick into the local PC World
Click to expand...
I tried that [well similar] some 10 years or more back, I was looking for a new printer that was linux compatible, when i asked they had no idea, so I took along my netbook running [i think] mint 9, it was still a struggle to let me test out a printer, after a bit of curfuffle, their senior tech took me over to the repair section he plugged in the printer to my netbook and asked how to load the drivers as it had no disc drive, I just said don't worry, is there a printer icon in the bottom left of the bar..yes came the reply, i said open it and tell me what it says, and he read out the printer model etc, so I said fine I will take the printer, I was there another 20 minutes or so trying to explain that if you choose the right product , then Linux doesn't need extra drivers as it comes with its own for most peripherals.
Point of my historic blurb...over 10 years on and my local PCW still have no clue that Linux even exists
 
I got all kinds of flavors installed on MSI Titan GT80. It's a gaming machine.

No issues running Xubuntu on Dell 7720 and 7750. Go for i7 CPU and 16GB of RAM, there is no advantage to i3 price-wise.

I got a Dell 7570 with i5 and it's cheap, with 16GB of RAM. It flies with an SSD. Also running Buntu.
 
Salutations,

The OP's title suits me fine but my selection criterias differ. For example the risk of turning an expensive device into a brick because of a BiOS/uEFi configuration and/or corruption error doesn't appeal to me.

Recently i discovered YUMi-exFAT which only very few Linux .iSO images appeared to fully support so far. My test machine was difficult to accomodate bacause of its 32/64 bits hybrid bootload expecting to find 'bootia32.efi' installed and ready, which most installers just failed: it had to be "patched" manually, an ugly nightmare ruining my fun. In any case i manage to fix Sparky while MX rebooted successfully as it, but toying with secure boot paved the way to incidents and sure enough i fell for it too, after so many others before - like it's a low priority. Anyway i was fed up and destroyed the offending machine, with no regrets i must add!

But i found replacement ain't going to be as easy as pie and remembering the BiOS episode i'm now wondering, given the choice is there a latop that will take me by the hand when too close to the precipice and never allow the brick thing to occur again?

My Hardware requirements are much more humble and yet i was able to verify for a long while that my 4-cores Atom CherryTrail sufficed to perform the main function i bought it for in 2017 or so: a wireless iP-TV. For this i figure live memory was tight at 2 GB, so maybe i need 4 GB instead, to keep the cost low if still applicable... On another hand the drop of peripherals as the media (flash) card complicates shopping a great deal, while even if iP-TV content is only 1920x720 at best most of the time i'd feel safer to aim for FHD 1920x1080 anyway - not to mention availability of a direct HDMi connection for an eventual larger screen. Besides that BlueTooth is paramount as it's meant for wireless earphones, and for this i must say the bone conduction type is perfect.

It's not an issue to find portables/tablets around 700 $ Cdn, but my old tablet was only 300 $ at the time so perhaps less than 500 $ should suffice for an upgrade; i've got another machine as workstation...

Ah, and i've collected plenty of HardInfo (0.6 & 2) reports with my favourite aplications running, as VLC with the BT earphones on. It was supposed to easy comparisons trying to evaluate comparable things, live reports with live reports mostly, because it wasn' trivial installing a new Linux flavour just for the testing and that was going to be my final criteria: it's got to reboot successfully after a fresh installation.

Good day, have fun!! :cool:
 
TinkerPhil said:
Hi
I want to replace my aging HP AMD based laptop running Ubuntu with something newer
I think I want an i3 I don't need an i5,i7 etc - this is just web based stuff and a little
(When I originally got the AMD one it was a pain to get compatible stuff for a while so I think Intel is the way forward - I'm probably wrong)

But my head goes into a spin when choosing a laptop

8Gb RAM minimum and 512Gb SSD are easy requirements to identify
a 15" screen - easy(ish) - though some are slightly bigger/smaller 14.9" or 15.2" etc
The spec on the screen - Ux<super-double-plus>VGA++ anyone? I don't need anything special to watch YouTube videos
i3? I have no idea about the different versions - I don't want an old one - dare there people out there who know each of the architectures?

My point is that just buying a laptop is already a nightmare of choices and comparisons

But then you have to check for Linux compatability

Then Boom! My head explodes and I have to walk away for a while

I realise that Linux is a community thing and I'm probably asking way too much for guidance on which half decent 15" reasonable quality screen, 8Gb with a 512Gb SSD Linux (Ubuntu) compatible notebook I should buy...

but here goes...

Can anyone suggest a half decent.... ?

My budget is around £400 - preferably less
(Preferably new too)

Failing that, is there a "method" I can follow or resource I can use to track down this elusive (for me) item?

Thanks
Philk
Click to expand...
Intel contains ME and my little backdoor friends, if Intel is the way forward, then this movement is directed backwards.
Any hardware even from 15 years ago will be legacy and you can work on it, in some aspects it will be better than the newfangled UEFI, but keep in mind that the Reds also have PSP since 2013, although I always sympathized with AMD for its ability to hide backdoors, unlike Intel /Nvidia, the main thing is to use a system without systemd, then your legacy hardware will work quickly and smooth :)
 
Egzoset said:
Salutations,

The OP's title suits me fine but my selection criterias differ. For example the risk of turning an expensive device into a brick because of a BiOS/uEFi configuration and/or corruption error doesn't appeal to me.

Recently i discovered YUMi-exFAT which only very few Linux .iSO images appeared to fully support so far. My test machine was difficult to accomodate bacause of its 32/64 bits hybrid bootload expecting to find 'bootia32.efi' installed and ready, which most installers just failed: it had to be "patched" manually, an ugly nightmare ruining my fun. In any case i manage to fix Sparky while MX rebooted successfully as it, but toying with secure boot paved the way to incidents and sure enough i fell for it too, after so many others before - like it's a low priority. Anyway i was fed up and destroyed the offending machine, with no regrets i must add!

But i found replacement ain't going to be as easy as pie and remembering the BiOS episode i'm now wondering, given the choice is there a latop that will take me by the hand when too close to the precipice and never allow the brick thing to occur again?

My Hardware requirements are much more humble and yet i was able to verify for a long while that my 4-cores Atom CherryTrail sufficed to perform the main function i bought it for in 2017 or so: a wireless iP-TV. For this i figure live memory was tight at 2 GB, so maybe i need 4 GB instead, to keep the cost low if still applicable... On another hand the drop of peripherals as the media (flash) card complicates shopping a great deal, while even if iP-TV content is only 1920x720 at best most of the time i'd feel safer to aim for FHD 1920x1080 anyway - not to mention availability of a direct HDMi connection for an eventual larger screen. Besides that BlueTooth is paramount as it's meant for wireless earphones, and for this i must say the bone conduction type is perfect.

It's not an issue to find portables/tablets around 700 $ Cdn, but my old tablet was only 300 $ at the time so perhaps less than 500 $ should suffice for an upgrade; i've got another machine as workstation...

Ah, and i've collected plenty of HardInfo (0.6 & 2) reports with my favourite aplications running, as VLC with the BT earphones on. It was supposed to easy comparisons trying to evaluate comparable things, live reports with live reports mostly, because it wasn' trivial installing a new Linux flavour just for the testing and that was going to be my final criteria: it's got to reboot successfully after a fresh installation.

Good day, have fun!! :cool:
Click to expand...
Intel is the way forward, then this movement is directed backwards.
Any hardware even from 15 years ago will be legacy and you can work on it, in some aspects it will be better than the newfangled UEFI, but keep in mind that the Reds also have PSP since 2013, although I always sympathized with AMD for its ability to hide backdoors, unlike Intel /Nvidia, the main thing is to use a system without systemd, then your legacy hardware will work quickly and smooth :)
 
nosystemdGUI said:
Intel is the way forward, then this movement is directed backwards.
Any hardware even from 15 years ago will be legacy and you can work on it, in some aspects it will be better than the newfangled UEFI, but keep in mind that the Reds also have PSP since 2013, although I always sympathized with AMD for its ability to hide backdoors, unlike Intel /Nvidia, the main thing is to use a system without systemd, then your legacy hardware will work quickly and smooth :)
Click to expand...

I feel almost ready to bet the CLI has you. :eek:

Too bad, i dunno about the OP's goal but mine boils down to a WiFi TV, e.g. i'd rather avoid a dull display for this specific application, not to mention weight would defeat its portability somewhat and i intend to carry it around including my balcony... Having a time-bomb BiOS/uEFi ain't more appealing neither and now that we've got Secure Boot maybe it's quite about time to benefit from it, unless two dozen Linux flavours won't suffice - but it doubt it.

:D
 
@TinkerPhil welcome to linux.org from DownUnder :)

I think it is a good idea if you and @Brickwizard exchange ideas, because you are both Brits, and so electrical outlets, retail chains and so on may factor into the equation, different to USA and Australia.

Good luck and let us know how you go.

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz
 
wizardfromoz said:
...Brits... ...different to USA and Australia.
Click to expand...

Brickwizard sure makes sense, for example trying to get a working i2C flash drive on the atom actually felt like gambling, especially in the initial years while its touchscreen just NEVER came back to life with Windows removed. I figured evaluation of Linux was similar everywhere and so i happen to have a home-made label for that: « Fix Once, Break Many ». Because 1-time contributions rarely survive an « update » and we don't all have the time, energy & ressources for such commitment... To top it all i found memory alone could fail in sorting through 2 dozen OS installs, which was the main motive for insisting over something less subjective: 'HardInfo'. Too bad its development didn't include OS comparisons in the big picture, e.g. by providing a tool that helps to decide what OS matches the owner's needs best.
 
Ok, I had a look at the Ubuntu compatibility list again
I was told that Lenovos were too ugly
I decided that the model numbers of the HPs hurt my head too much
That left the Dells
I quickly realised that new meant that only Inspirons were an option - Latitude, Precision and XPS were way too pricey
I got acquainted with the model numbers wxyz not sure about w but the x was the x in "1x inch" - so I could get al the 15 inch ones
The y was roughly the year + 2020 - eg 1 was 2021
and the z was some random figure to differentiate within a particular model
I then went on Amazon and got some prices and I was happy ish
I still had to check the things would work with linux

Then I stumbled on this link

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-uk/drivers/supportedos/inspiron-15-3525-laptop

It told me that the Inspiron 15 inch 3525 model would support Ubuntu 20.04 LTS - which given that it was an xx2x machine (ie quite recent) meant it would probably support the later Ubuntu too

By modifying "inspiron-15-3525-laptop" (eg "latitude-5420-laptop") I could quickly get the linux compatibility quite quickly for most of the other laptops
(though I am unsure why the Inspiron requires the screen specified)

Its a shame that HP model numbers are so impenetrable!

This is the laptop I'm thinking of getting - please shout now if this is a bad idea :)


Phil
 
I have run dell Insperon lappies for some time, my current one is 14 yrs old in September none have ever been problems running Linux, HP on the other hand can be very challenging by comparison.

Wiz from oz mentioned you are in the UK , what part ? [bbc local tv region will be good enough]
 
Great!

Well, it turns out i started a file on it last week but then a detail prompted my BiOS-related question (and registration). The bright side of Dell's active linux/BiOs support is that owners can count at least on a most recent update, tagged « critical » i think:

BIOS 2024-Mar-19​

Do others provide this much proven user support for starters? ...

Then lets consider it's a Windows-7 machine and hence the Dell Inspiron 3520 is actually marked « End of Life », which is another 2-sides razor edge, because this isn't exactly new but those accumulated years must have served some good purpose judging by their present offer.

Personally i am reluctant about sudden technology jumps and yet the worse part of it probably resides in its non-IPS display and associated 80 degrees view angle, on my side of the Atlantic anyway. Or perhaps it's their HD (1280x720@30 fps) webcam and its 78.60 degrees capture angle that confused me about the variants

Anyway its WiFi supports a rate of 433 Mb/s apparently. USB v3.2 Gen 1 seems just fine, while i managed to find mention of some HDMI v1.4 outlet somewhere, so i suppose its screen was the trade-off to pay in exchange for the media-card slot i wished for:

SD 3.0 card​
Secure Digital (SD), Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC), Secure Digital Extended Capacity (SDXC)​

But as i dig further the topic of « fake » SD/uSD flash drives appeared to pose a significant risk to hardware which i yet had to hear of before! So, i'm tempted to conclude manufacturers drop that feature instead of trying to fix it...

Hummm... What else? oh, look around for a 12th gen. « Alder Lake » variant!

Also, it was nice to read about having a pair of M.2 sockets but couldn't verify if it's only SATA3 or full-fledged.

This file must have slept under my to-do pile because of that BiOS warning/critical update which i was uncertain what to conclude from - e.g. is it more of a good thing than a bad one? But i did take note the Inspiron ain't alone as these other lines are "affected" too: Latitude, Vostro, XPS, Fixed Workstations, XPS 13 L322X. So that tells me it's a systemic issue.

Now, how did the competitors react? Take pro-active measures or drop support silently?

Generally speaking the word « impenetrable » says it all indeed! o_O
 
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