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A portable notebook that has good Linux HW Support

post #1 of 3
1/13/06 at 8:50am
Thread Starter 
I'm looking for a portable notebook, with good battery life, who's hardware is supported in Linux.

13.3" or smaller screen
Built-in wireless.

Any suggestions?
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post #2 of 3
1/13/06 at 10:39am
don't know on laptop models, but here is a brief list of hardware you might look at.

1 - aim for nVidia...ati is ok, but nVidia + Linux play better together.
2 - Atheros wireless (intel is your 2nd choice...stay away from broadcom)
3 - 5400 or 7200rpm hdd (nobody likes to wait for stuff to load)

and just generally make sure it uses a common chipset and all taht stuff so you know you at least have a chance to get it up and running.

that said, Toshiba, Sony and IBM have their own packages for linux that configure the special features....worth looking into IMO.
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post #3 of 3
1/13/06 at 8:28pm
Dell D600 (not the D610). It's a bit flimsy but everything works. Mine has the 1350 wireless (broadcom)... I use ndiswrapper, no problems using SUSE 9.2/9.3. Can suspend to disk. Accelerated Radeon graphics (I hear that there are variances on what Radeon you might get though). It's not a gamer laptop, but decent enough, small and I know I've used it for over 4 hours without a charge.

I picked mine up refurbed from Dell with a multi-year complete care warranty. First day I had it, the mb had major issues... Dell came out the very next day and replaced it. Haven't had a problem since. We've had it for over a year. Apart from the flimsy case, it's a winner.

The new Dells are better build quality. I own a M70... it rocks.. but is perhaps too large and it only gets a little over 2 hours per charge.
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