[ltp] question for the list

[Tod Harter]

On the subject of which manufacturers machines are "most linux friendly", its 
not really an easy question to answer. Manufacturers don't build machines for 
Linux compatibility (though there are a couple of specialty laptop houses 
that do specialize in linux laptops), so what you find is that no one machine 
is 100% supported, and no manufacturer is consistent across models of their 
line.

That being said, IBM's machines seem to be very consistently well supported. 
IBM tends to use very common hardware and adds few oddball features or 
bizarre hacks to their machines. 

I have a 380ED and an A20p both running Mandrake. There are a few minor 
features I've never gotten around to sorting out, like the video processing 
features of the A20p. 

I'd also have to say that even with the hard work of zillions of people that 
Linux as a desktop/laptop OS is still behind the curve compared to windows. 
You simply cannot expect it to work as smoothly. That being said, when 
windows goes bad its usually pretty ugly. At least you CAN try to fix Linux, 
though thats small consolation when the fix takes 300 hours to code and debug!

As far as doing OSS development work, it really depends on what you are 
doing. Perl, Apache, and MySQL work perfectly on windows, so if you are doing 
some webapp development you hardly NEED Linux (though its convenient for 
sure), and in some ways windows is an easier system to use. For other work it 
may still be easier to use windows as a client machine and have Linux on a 
server. 

On Thursday 04 April 2002 22:46, Robert Munro wrote:
> A couple of years ago I had a 770X that I got working under Linux
> (hacked the XFree86 config file to work somehow, posted it here).
>
> Time has passed and I worked for IBM for awhile but didn't install
> Linux on IBM's T21 loaded with Win2K.  Now I can use your help.
>
> Is there any easiest model IBM Thinkpad for working under Linux?
>
> I've been following the list desultorily, and it appears most models
> (especially rather old and very new ones) have various difficulties,
> including hibernate/suspend, video drivers, sound, networking, etc.
>
> Are there other vendors' notebooks that are more friendly to Linux?
>
> I mean, I've learned to love IBM Thinkpads in a way, but the Linux
> question seems relevant.  Acer, Asus, Micron, even Dell, Toshiba?
> (But, I realize this might be the wrong place for asking about this.)
>
> The reason I ask is that I've gotten involved in an OSS/FS startup -
> in a consulting capacity, so I don't think using any Win2K notebook
> will cut it.  Best case is a notebook that runs Mandrake or RedHat.
> I can of course dual-boot, but I'd rather use only Linux for this work.
>
> Best regards,
> Robert Munro
>
> Principal
> Olliance Consulting Group
> http://www.olliancegroup.com
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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