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On Linux Laptops 139

Posted by CmdrTaco from the stuff-to-read dept.
KuRL wrote in to tell us that Salon has a piece by Andrew Leonard on Linux Laptops and why they haven't caught on. Talks a lot about the cursed WinModems, mentions that VAIOs are yummy, and more on the subject. Its probably stuff that the average Slashdot reader already knows, but its a nice piece.
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On Linux Laptops More

On Linux Laptops

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  • I've been running linux on a Fujitsu Lifebook E330 ever since I got it. I installed RH5.2 and then 6.0 on it without a problem. There was some problems when I needed to use the RH rescue disk to redo lilo when I upgraded my mini win98 partition (need this partition for the winmodem). The laptop did not want to boot the RH rescue disk. I had to use a slackware boot disk to get back into my linux partition. Other than that everything worked great. Got X and the soundcard working on the first shot. The only problem is that I can't use the winmodem and the IR.

    I can see why some people would be turned off to using linux on a latop if they can't use all of the hardware (winmodem/IR/etc.). If somebody spends the money for a laptop, they are going to want to be able to use all of it's features. Also no company seems to make sure their linux disto works on a laptop. I've heard stories from people who couldn't even get their laptops to boot the install disks.

    There is a Linux Laptop Volunteer Support Database [utexas.edu] and a Linux on Laptops [utexas.edu] that contain large amounts of info on getting linux up and going on a laptop.
  • Speaking of the Sony VAIO, does anyone know how well Linux runs on those tiny ones, with the integrated CCD camera. That computer would be a real treat, small enough to take with you, big enough to run Linux (and have a keyboard.) It's like a really big Palm. Kinda like my old Gateway 2000 Handbook from days of yore.
  • Can I get a hell yeah?

    Personally, I'd love to have a little linux box to do network troubleshooting. Take it wherever I go, run a tcpdump, look for odd stuff. It'd be ridiculously useful. I could even run sendmail off of it to demonstrate to my more annoying clients that their firewalls were misconfigured. (In general, they assume that it's a routing problem before they look at their own logfiles.)

  • Re:When? (Score:1)

    by De ( 39631 )
    I believe late fall was their target date. Dell makes good stuff btw, I know (and am) one happy Dell owner.
  • I talked to a guy at the Linux Expo in Raleigh who said he worked for IBM, and that they were infact very interested in porting the drivers. He told me that they had to just take care of legal issues, and then he was expecting his superiors to give him the go ahead to rewrite the drivers. He also mentioned it shouldn't be dificult. I obviously don't have any confirmation on this, so take it as you will.

    Erik

  • Well, apart from the really IE-specific crap that most Office programs will spit out, when I use that "Save as HTML" menus, they seem to be quite nice.

    Unless of course you want to re-open the thing in Emacs or another editor and actually change something later. All that used for alignment are just too scary for me to touch...

    Using Emacs to edit HTML and open it later in some Office program has worked just fine though. Plus, Emacs supports my CVS at home, which no Office-suite has ever dreamed of working with -- at least, not until now.

    Just my $.2

  • Yep.. That's how I first found out that it can happen. My father-in-law had gotten a brandy new speaker, and I started to crank in some medium res RealVideo stuff thru the 56k modem, and it all started beeping like MAD.. ;-P
  • Yeah, i've seen this at some models with external floppy drive. They desperately want to talk to a floppy at a boot time IF it is connected. Simply disconnect the floppy drive at boot and it will boot from disk.
  • The article does mention that the new Vaios come with WinModems. D'oh!
  • vmware. its slow, but a ctrl alt f'ing around is way faster than a reboot into another os. nt 4 wouldnt support my pcmcia ether cards, but vm encapsulates em - they look like amd pci's

    amaze your friends. use windoze masquerading to get your linux boxxen on aol's net. feeling misanthropic - dos attack yourself. flaunt your a.d.d. and use microsoft tcp/ip printing instead of reading a printer howto. snarf up more than your fair share of dhcp leases.

    oh yeah... ms office and visio works. audio catalyst cd ripping (mp3 encoding works) is about the only thing ive found that will make vm fall down and go bewm.

  • I have RH6.0 running on a couple of Dell Latitudes here at work and don't have any boot problems.

  • So to all you out there drooling for a Vaio, just remember you may need to by a PCMIA modem anyway, and oh yeah, as far as I can see the Vaio only had one PCMIA slot (if I recall correctly). ... and also bear in mind the Vaio does not have the CDROM drive built-in -- it's external.

    It actually depends on the model of the sony vaio
    I have a PCG-F250 (celery 366)
    it comes with a cdrom drive as far as the modem I didn't bother with it cause I was pretty sure it was winmodem but other than that
    the modem and sound are only linux problems I've ever had on it.
    of course I've only used SuSE but I'm going back to old slackie 4.0 this very minute to see how things are.
  • i love mine. i have had it (PCG 505fx) since this past christmas. it's flown 55,000 miles with me and gone everywhere. it studied with me. it did my website with me. it was my glorified walkman. it's my absolute favorite toy, and i LOVE the fact that it's so small! my only complaint: more battery life.
  • I've been happily using an (older) HP Omnibook 800 (P133) for a few months now. Saw some mentions of it on /. and found one on e-bay for a fairly good price. Runs Linux very well. There are a few good pages on the idiosyncracies of the notebook (which are annoying rather than show-stopping).

    My only disappointment is the small video memory. Ah well. It was cheap, and it does its work well -- ssh terminal, portforwarder from the SMB network at work to the one at home, carries data back and forth, etc etc.

    --

  • If I had a laptop then I'm sure I'd have Linux running on it for sure. I don't have much use for a laptop right now though. Everywhere I go when I need to use a computer there's always a workstation right next to me. This is a definate plus of being at a university though. There are labs all over the place.

    Even in the dorms most rooms have a box of some sort connected to the network. From there I can just SSH to my box and do whatever it is I need to do.

    A wireless networkable handheld would be what would make my life easier.. something to do email from... scheduling, etc... That's what I need.

  • Against a wall? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I'm not slagging the article.. it was written okay. The fact that he mentions that Perhaps linux & free software developers have hit a 'wall' when it comes to supporting brand-new hardware is untrue. This is not an unforseen wall, but a problem that we have had since day one. 90% of the problem is manufacturers/vendors who refuse to release technical specs so we can write drivers. Technical support depts that don't know what kind of hardware is in the laptop, because all they know is what driver to use in windows. Windows has made the world stop asking for hardware standards. Now that is changing.
  • I've been using a Tecra (730CDT) for almost three years now. It's a phenomenal machine. I've dropped it numerous times (early on in its lifetime) and never had a problem. Only recently have I had some issues with the keyboard and hard drive, but since its still under warranty, Toshiba replaced both parts. I couldn't have dreamed up a better portable. If only I could get X to display in 16-bit color (which the machine supports). Now I'm looking to get one of those Tecra 8000s!
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I've been running linux on my laptop for months, its great. a metricom wireless modem makes it ideal. the biggest hassle was getting NT/98/linux to work with the boot loader but that was really the only hurdle.
  • If only I could get X to display in 16-bit color

    I did this with my 730, but it's been a year since I traded up to a T8000...

    Now I'm looking to get one of those Tecra 8000s!

    Linux works great on this machine. I haven't tried Cardbus-anything on it, but the display is nice in X, and it flies.

    --

  • I use both Win95/RH Linux on 1 HD. 2 Partitions.. At the win95 Boot menu select "Command Prompt" then run "linux.bat"... (loadlin baby, oh yeah...)

    Since im using X windows alot, Linux is my choice for this. Also connection to serial ports on sun boxes. But then, im back into windows for Exchange, Word, and Excel. (If I only had a linux version!)

    Only thing I dont have working in linux is my Wireless Sierra CDPD cards. (Sitting in my yard, reading my exchange mail!)

    If you want a linux laptop, with a painless install try Dell latitudes..
    Network Card is a 3Com Fast Etherlink PCcard. Modem is a USR 56K PCcard. (Simply Awesome)
  • Are the modems on the VAIOs also compatible with Linux? I'll be in the market for a Linux-friendly notebook in a little while, and it would be handy to have a modem in it that functions well with something other than Windows.

    Linux DVD player + VAIO laptop with 14" LCD and DVD == Total Action Satisifaction:)
  • Bargin laptops are the antichrist to anyone who has ever worked IT. Not to long ago, a company I worked for got in a bunch of Toshibas and Compaq laptops who's Windows 98 installs where horked. I mean the sound was not quite SB compliant, the Video was detected at 512Kb or ram when I can *see* both megs on the board. I won't even start on the built in ether. The truth is, these laptops aren't that well put together. SuperProbe would probably throw an absolute fit trying to determine what the Video was doing. The ethernet, which was supposedly NE2000 compliant ended up being a derivative of the 3C509.

    What it boils down to is these machines shouldn't even be marketed as x86 compatible. Since I have never tried to install Linux on anything other than a lame laptop, I can't speak for the "good ones". I sincerely hope they are better.

    And to leave you with a question, who actually makes this lame hardware? The company who printed those boards ought to be smacked with a wet salmon.

    Mike

  • Re:Linux on PPC laptops (Score:4)

    by sterwill ( 972 ) on Tuesday September 07, 1999 @07:12AM (#1697614) Homepage
    Let me second this notion! I too have a Lombard G3 (333 MHz PowerBook), and it runs Linux beautifully! The Debian install wasn't too bad, either. LinuxPPC seems to offer a graphical install, if you're a fan of a Red Hat-style distribution.

    X runs accelerated (through the ATI framebuffer) at 1024x768 at 32bpp on a 14.1 inch screen, I have a 3 button Logitech USB mouse installed, the 10/100 Mbit ethernet is great (I plug in at home, at work, wherever). The built in modem works great; I get 5.1 KB/sec over local phone lines. It's even got external SCSI connector, built-in CD-ROM. I can pull 6 hours off the internal battery while doing the odd compile work in X. You can fill the second media bay with a battery and pull more than 10 (or so Apple says, I'd believe them).

    If this reads like an endorsement for the G3 laptops and Linux, it is! The thing's nice and fast, and getting Linux installed in place of MacOS is simple. It's unfortunate that my purchase "included MacOS", but I'd rather funnel money back into a company doing great things with hardware.


    --

  • not just 200 users (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Of course, to an $87 billion-a-year company like IBM, 200 names don't add up to all that much. Tom Figgatt, Linux segment executive for the IBM Netfinity Servers group, says that while "we have certainly heard demand from segments of the laptop community, I would say that it is not coming from the broad business user." Wake up IBM!! You're not talking about 200 of your average users. These 200 users are leaders in technology. One of them could be the IT decision maker for a corporation that is need of 2,000 or more new laptops. Even if they are not initially loading a Linux desktop, they may want to purchase equipment that will be Linux "compatible" for future Linux deployment. 200 users wanting to run Linux on your hardware could result in tens of thousands of units sold. Which of these HTML tag thingies will insert a blank line?
  • Let's hear it for laptops running the ARM chip!
    Why couldn't Corel computers have made my day with
    one of these?

    Low power consumption, low heat chip designs are nonexistant in full-fledged laptops today.
    Ever have a PII laptop start your lap on fire?

    ARM chips must be great for long lasting, small laptops, not web servers!

    //Pauly
  • I have a PCG-C1 (picture book) and it works like a dream. Yes the modem is compatible with linux, as is everything else except the built in camera (which uses firewire, not yet supported under linux, but getting there). I use it for everything, I even have a external DVD drive (the laptop is not much bigger then a VHS tape when closed, no room for internal drive) with software decoder that I use under Windoze (small partition on the 4.3 gigdrive) that works at probably 28 frames per second. Even Linus has one of these babys! Highly reccomend one.

    Dan-
  • Then there are the manufacturers that change the internals of a product on a whim.... (eg: how many have purchaced an Adaptec 2930 thinking they were getting the 2930U, but instead got the 2930cU) Note that the external box for each is exactly the same....

    or NIC makers that switched from a "real" dec chip to a PNIC chip...



    https://www.mav.net/teddyr/syousif/ [mav.net]
  • I have a WinBook that I took on the road doing rock tours with. It ran RedHat and was handy to have. My biggest mistake at the time was buying a Megahertz nic/modem card. Be SURE that the exact model you are getting is fully supported for both functions. For the longest time only the nic function was supported in mine and I had to drag an external Sportster around with me to dialup.

    If I had it to do again I'd go with the cheaper two card solution and buy a seperate modem card and nic card. This way you could use both if you wanted at once, save some cash and some trouble with configuring. The Megahertz card is really expensive compared with a pair of generic single function cards.

    As an interesting aside...I found KDE to be really handy to have on a laptop. I don't run it often on this box but on the laptop the layout made getting around with the (shudder) touchpad much easier. Also mine was a dualscan display and the default colors of KDE just looked better. Kppp is really handy when you have a different dialup number all the time while traveling. Don't forget a nice 25' phone cable to have too you'll thank me later.

    Another quick laptop tip. Get a personal 800 number from ATT and setup mgetty if you have a cable or dsl connect at home. The rates are cheaper than many isp's 800 access rates and of course you can have your home system POP'ng your mail etc in crontabs via your cable or xDSL connect. Much quicker to just snag the mail or read it via the home box over one's own private dialup or an ssh session via a net connect.
  • Fast and powerful, thats why. Fully linux compatible ..
  • Problem I hate about the 56k Winmodems, is that if you're doing alot of things, it will CRC error, becouse the friggen DRIVER doesn't get enough CPU time.. ;-P
  • I upgraded the memory to 48M, added an external battery for 5 hours of fun and a cell modem for TCP/IP everywhere. The cell modem didn't support Linux, but thanks to a web pages out there and some judicious reading from manuals, I have wireless IP for $25/month flat rate. All of this in a 2 pound package. Yummy.
  • i've got a toshiba satallite 4000cdt and it works great. works with out of the box redhat and caldera just fine. only trouble is getting this shitty pcmcia nic working with the dhcp server. but it works eventually.
  • A Funny thing about the first MWave modems: I used to do tech support for a national ISP, and when IBM first released the MWave they had the sound part and the modem sharing an IRQ, so that whenever your computer tried to play a sound when you were online, it would temporarily disconnect the modem to access the sound card. The author's referring to the MWave as "advanced" gave me a little chuckle.
  • One of the nicest things I found about linux on laptops it you can hotswap pcmcia cards. I could never get this to work on Win95, 98 or NT, hard enough trying to get a card to work _once_ let alone after a reboot, and don't dare remove it.
    I think I gave up, and I never use windows anyway, now when you insert a card it will either lock up or tell you to reboot.
    I could even just about get away hot swapping the CD-ROM and floppy drive, which share a bay. (it ofcourse tells you this is not possible in the manual)
  • I would agree that used laptops are an excellent alternative for many of us, even those of us who probably could afford a fancy laptop if we wanted to, but would rather spend money on something else.

    I have an old ThinkPad 355Cs (33MHz 486SX) which I run Linux on. It has a few setup quirks (goofy floppy drive, wonky video chip, etc), but once set up it works pretty well except for the MWave sound/modem, which I've been told only does 9600bps on the modem side anyway. I use a 3Com MegaHertz (Gateway labeled) combo 10b2 Ethernet/33.6 modem PCMCIA card, which works great (I picked it up cheap as a closeout when the 100bT/56k models came out).

    Its not a screamer, but I added 32M of memory (taking it to 36M total) and replaced the original 250M hard drive with a 2.1G drive (no problems, the ThinkPad found the geometry automatically). It is a workable, luggable machine for about a third of what a decent new laptop would have cost me.

    If anyone is interested in details on how to get one of these things running, let me know. BTW, most members of the ThinkPad 355, 360, 750 & 755 families are very similar hardware wise, so the same info that works on my 355Cs will also work on a lot of those models.

  • >, as is everything else except the built in
    >camera (which uses firewire, not yet supported
    >under linux, but getting there).

    I'd been wondering about that, actually...

    Is there firewire support for *any* "alternative" OS? I really want a picturebook, but I'd like to at least have a choice of operating systems.

    I run 98 on my home machine (I play a lot of games, sue me) and work-assigned laptop (haven't gotten around to dividing up the drive), but if I'm gonna shell out 2k of my own money for something like this, I'd at least like the option of Linux or a BSD. If one of the primary goodies of the laptop doesn't work, this kinda limits the appeal to me...

    -LjM

  • Linux problems symptomatic of larger problems (Score:3)

    by Hrunting ( 2191 ) on Tuesday September 07, 1999 @08:05AM (#1697630) Homepage
    What the article briefly touches on and then doesn't explore is the proprietary nature of laptop technology in general (and I'm not just talking about Windows laptops either). The confined spaces of a laptop have poised unique problems to computer manufacturers and the solutions have been, well, unique. IBM's MWave is only one such solution. Because you can't just plug in the components that you need, laptops tend to have funky motherboards, peripherals, and input devices. PCMCIA is one solution, but the article points out it's not elegant.

    I suspect that as the size of computer components continues to shrink, we'll see laptops approaching a more standards-compliant state of being (and we'll see desktops shrink, too). That is, if Intel can figure out a way to quit making mondo processing chips.
  • I've heard very little about winmodems. About all I know is that they are software driven and dont work under Linux. What are the advantages and disadvantages (apart from not working under Linux) of having a winmodem ? There must be some great advantage to make the CPU useage worthwhile (I guess they use quite a bit).
  • >What are the advantages and disadvantages (apart
    >from not working under Linux) of having a
    >winmodem ?

    The advantages:
    Cheap

    The disadvantages:
    Relies on Windows
    Easy to corrupt drivers and/or settings
    Hard to reinstall drivers
    High CPU utilization

    -LjM

  • >No bs you just plug it in and go. For some
    >reason a great many of you don't want that :(

    If MacOS is the cost... no, you're right, I don't.

    -LjM


  • Just to let you know,
    IBM Thinkpad 355's do not have MWave modems/soundcards. The first IBM Laptops that had MWave modems were the 755CE/CSE/CD models. The 355 does not have an integrated sound card at all. The 750/755C/CS have a cheap business sound card installed in them(that is not even SoundBlaster compatible).
  • Hmm... That's why my modem used to CRC so much. I just thought it was a crappy modem anyways. NT4 has an option to been on error and I used to turn that on when someone would walk in the room. Combine a beep every 3-6 seconds with 20 windows open on your screen and they think you're busy and leave you alone.
  • MSoft for once is actually releasing an upgrade without changing file formats. I have not tested this with Star Office, but I have had no trouble moving both spread sheets and word documents between Office 2000 and 97 (both directions).

  • G3/PPC laptops aren't that common, are they?

    Where can they be bought? I'm in the market for a new laptop, maybe this is a good solution for me...

    Details?

    j.

  • Well, in general, to set up any type of hardware under any operating system requires either that the OS in question include support for that device (whether it supports the device in its "native" mode, or because it can be run in a fashion compatible with a supported device), or that a driver exist that can be added to the OS; that's as true of non-plug-and-play device as of plug-and-play devices.

  • Do you have any links to getting a Toshiba Satellite working? I just got my 2060cds and I'm not quite brave enough yet to install linux until I'm sure the internal modem (an to a lesser extent the sound card) will work.

    Thanks... RRogers@naisp.net
  • Up to a point.

    I have managed to get an old P75 with 48M of RAM which I use occasionally but I find its too slow for what I tend to use Linux for now.

    Nowadays I'm running Gnome or KDE and various packages (e.g. StarOffice) are waaay too slow for realistic use on this. Even on my main machine (also a laptop, but a P233MMX with 128M RAM, 6.4G) I find StarOffice is sometimes frustratingly slow and Gnome is a noticeable performance hog.

    Still, yes, for some applications an old 486 laptop would be useful. Problem is most of the applications I really want on my laptop - so that I can 'do them anywhere' are more of your productivity ones, which tend to be X based.
  • Yes Dell announced awhile back that their Inspirion and their desktop lines would be available with linux installed. ATI lost their deal over more than their laptop boards, as none of their cards support 3d acceleration in linux. That's why dell is offering TNT and Voodoo based cards now.
  • Im not entirely sure, but I think that the Office 2000 file formats are exactly the same as the Office 95/97 file formats.

    So now we'll be calling it Office 95/97/00.....Oh, how I hate Office

    -Shane Stephens
  • I tried the "save as HTML" feature of Word 97 and was disappointed to find MS proprietary crap in the HTML file. There didn't seem to be any way to save a file in portable HTML format. I've heard that Office 2000 has the same problem.
  • With all the hype about craptops, I would definately recommend Dell.... My LCD went a little Nuts on me around 6 months ago,(prolly because of me trying to tweak out the little NM 2160 on it for X), but the tech talked me through some minor boot procedures, then said 'OK We'll have a Box for you there tomorrow, and We should have it back for you in 3-5 days' True to their word, I got my laptop back in 4 days all fixed and ready to rock (GRRR now If I only told them about the !@#%!$#@ soundcard problem I created YES I KNOW THIS ONE IS MY FAULT... Don't try running your laptop through a 32-channel Peavey powered mixer to encode your favourite jams in MP3 format... Word to the (un)Wise )
  • I don't have a notebook myself... but what video and audio chipsets is the 2595XDVD outfitted with? The NeoMagic chips (which many notebooks have used in the past) are supported as of XFree 3.3.3, afaik, and many of the ESS Technology audio chips used in notebooks are supported in Linux. (Not all, sadly, but it's being worked on.) So it might work better than you think, depending on what it's got.
  • Got mine from BestBuy (the real thing, not the www) at a very good price. The new models where getting out, so they had this one under heavy discount. Had to drive 1 hour to get to a store where it was available, but no problem. Very very happy with it, it is fast as hell, runs windows and linux perfectly, is very small and I use it everywhere. The 1024x768 screen is gorgeous. Online? Huh, no idea. :) Good luck, go for it, best laptop Ive had in 10 years, first one that lets me run linux as well as the box back home.
  • I recall hearing that (at least on IBM notebooks with the suspend-to-disk (what they refer to as Hibernation) feature) the first partition needed to be a DOS partition, at least big enough to hold the system-image file, and you just had to initialize it in DOS (don't know if you had to do it on each boot - if so, you'd probably hafta run the little init utility then use loadlin to jump to Linux, but if it only needs the file to be inited, then you could just use LILO). Dunno if that helps any, but this is what I recall from a webpage I came across once some time ago...
  • I think the most useful part of this article was the address of the Linux Mwave petition. If you haven't signed it, e-mail here [mailto]

    That petition info is on this [bm-soft.com] page.
  • Doesn't pretty much every word processor support HTML? I don't see why one couldn't be working in StarOffice or Emacs or whatever, save as HTML, and reopen in M$ Word as a regular .DOC file. Am I missing something?
  • I've been running linnux on my dell Lattitude since Febuary. My big problem with the instalation was waiting for the specs on the NeoMagic chipset to be released. For those of you who don't know NeoMagic made the first single chip graphics card and they did not want to release any specs for fear of loosing their trade secrets.

    My biggest complaint with the whole thing was the reaction I got from the rest of the linux community. Often when I told people that there was no driver I was told to write one. But, when I explained that the specs hadn't been released a few people told me (they were actualy serious) to reverse engineer the chip in a cleen-room. I don't know how many of you have cleen-rooms around but I sure don't have one set up in my living room if you know what I mean. Nor do I have the time to reverse engineer a graphics card on a single chip.

    Eventualy a driver was released and I thank all those who contributed to it. However, I still am troubled by the way non-laptop linux users don't support their fellow linux users in dealing with laptop OEMs and the OEMs' suppliers.

    Which brings me to my seccond point:
    It's not just laptops!!
    Linux always lags behind other OSs in hardware support. Usualy this is due to some manufacturer not supplying drivers or worse still not releasing any information about the hardware. But other times it's just because we are slow. USB is a perfect example. The specifications are all open yet there's no linux drivers for USB stuff.

    One of the great selling points of the open development model is that it can addapt quickly (e.g. IPv6) but it always seems to lag in hardware support.

  • Yeah they look nice, and Linus and Rasterman use them, so they are porbably pretty good.

    However, why don't they let you customize them to any significant degree? their web page at http://vaiodirect.sel.sony.com/ allows some customization, but when you go with the lower processor (always the way to save money, put the $ in memory instead!), it only lets you go up to 96 MB of RAM. Then is says in the details section that RAM is expandable to 160 MB, but they apparently won't let you buy it when you purchase the machine. Nor could you upgrade to a 14 inch screen if you stick with the celery processor.

    I think I will instead go with a Dell Insrpiron 3500 instead, where you can pick exactly what you want!
  • I got a Dell Inspiron 3500 about a month ago and it runs linux quite well. The only problem is the damned winmodem they put in it... The sound works, my Linksys 10/100 PCCard ethernet also works and is how I am connected to slashdot. I love it, and would recomend it to anybody interested in a nice linux laptop with all the trimmings for just over $2000
  • I have/had a laptop running linux. it was a Compaq, but the only prob was that it had a WinModem, so no net for me.. tsk-tsk. other than that, I never really had probs with it.. yay linux!!

    If/when I get another one, i'm going to make sure it has NO winmodem....
  • Running open linux on my 4015 cds. Everything works. Sound, X, PCMCIA modem (sorta) Only thing that doesnt work is my CBE10/100 ethernet card and theres work in progress on that.
    The newer distributions install very easily. It took me 20 minutes to run the installation when I installed Calderas Open Linux, but I played Tetris for 2 hrs. The truth is, if I can do the install, anybody can.
    I almost bought a Viao but decided to keep the extra 500$. The Satellite is a little heavier but every one knows computer geeks need the exercise anyway.


  • store.apple.com [apple.com] is where I bought mine. I got a custom build; 333 MHz G3 model but with 6 GB disk, 128 MB ram. The 333 MHz model starts at $2,499. I bought a 3-button USB Logitech mouse at Best Buy for an extra $30. :)

    --
  • http://www.illusionary.com/~dglidden/4015CDS.html

  • CardBus flies, I use the 3Com/Megahertz 10/100 (3CCFE575BT) without issues. The Tecra 8K is a great platform for Linux. Also, all the apm stuff works better than in W2K.
  • I forgot to mention that my laptop has NEVER crashed while running Linux. When I had win98 installed it crashed every single stinking time I turned it on.

  • I have had 4 laptops in my life (Ok 6 but a Tandy model 100 and a Zenith Supersport dont count)
    all of which have run linux well.. I have gotten 16 bit color on all displays, gotten sound to work on all, and have only ran into a handful of pcmcia cards that I couldn't get to work (I have found that the cheapest off-brands work well while the name brands fight the whole way when it comes to pcmcia) Toshiba satelites work (Including the IRDA) great, CANNON innova-books worked well (the screens stink though) and the VIAO screams... my favorite was a GRID ruggedized laptop... ran Linux without a hiccup..

    the only problem is that laptop users are usually (78% of the time) brain-dead executives that carry a laptop for "status" and couldnt turn one on let alone figure out how to install an OS. (can you tell that I am impressed with corperate america?)

    The laptop isn't the choice for people... it's the choice for the road-warrior/exec that needs lotus notes, and the silly pripetary windows programs (try giving a secretary a RTF document... she'll say "it's not word, I cant read that... no matter how many times you explain that word will read it.)


  • That's the funny part... they're suposed to be cheaper but they never are.
    I can get hardware modems at the same price or less than a "winmodem"..

    I just tell people that winmodems are a scam, they are designed to make the consumer buy low-grade products for a premium price because the manufacturer knows that they arent smart enough to tell the difference...."remember the yugo?" that usually get's them to buy a real modem...and isn't very far from the truth.


    Now: where the heck can I get a Zytel modem in the States?
  • <BABBLING IDIOT MODE>

    i luvs my linux TP560

    It was a painless RH6.0 install (via PCMCIA ethernet and DSL to ftp.cdrom.com) and most everything works great. Except I have major problems with hibernation mode working consistently.

    I love throwing up my ricochet antannae in a public place, which usualy attracts a latent (or blatant) geek or two and then watching their eyebrows raise up when they see it's a linux box.

    My buddy has the same setup except on a TP600 which means he has the processor speed to really show off (like running "klaser.kss -inroot"). Only problems with the TP600 is that there isn't stable support for DVD or USB yet. Not sure about his hibernation mode status.

    Linux also seems to give better bandwidth over the ricochet wireless than running W95 on the same machine (the 600 is a dual boot).

    Just today I bought a PC Card adapter for my digital camera memory so now I can xfer images directly to Linux. Totally painless. Wrote a script to automatically mount the flashcard and copy the images into a jpeg directory. Other scripts automatically create thumbnails and html pages for them.

    In the morning I can jack into the DSL, use wget to slurp wired news, slashdot and freshmeat and then read them on my train commute to work (ricochet doesn't work in the subway). It was so easy to set up in Linux and would have been a bitch in W95 or MacOS.

    I'm looking forward to messing around with the Linux Infrared support when I get the chance. ...There's so much available for a developer in the Linux environment! It's like a never-ending playground, I wouldn't want a laptop with any other OS again.

    </BABBLING IDIOT MODE>

  • I found out the hard way that I have a WinModem in my Hewlett Packard Pavilion 6418. I had to do some research for an assignment and the modem died. It has just been replaced but I still had great difficulty with the telco getting online again. Tell me more about WinModems, I'm new to the game.
  • Well I think Toshiba is doing a pretty good job. I don't have experience with them, but I read they are going to support Linux fully. I just wish I could pay for a neat linux machine for in my lap.
  • You may be perfectly right. I recently bought an old 486 laptop (a DX, 100MHz) for about $250, and everything works fine: network (UTP 10MBit), 14K4 modem, 800MB harddisk, 10" TFT-display.

    And: It is perfect for running X remotely (I'm typing this message on a Netscape running on my faster desktop computer, but everything is displayed on the laptop!). That works pretty fast....

    So, after I bought a ~100ft UTP-cable, I can now relax in the garden while surfing the net :-)
  • Okay, this is probably more appropriate for an "ask slashdot" piece, but I think it fits here too.

    I'm getting a new laptop in 2 days, and it's going to have NT 4 installed on it. It's a very nice machine (esp. compared to anything I've had before), with a Celeron 466 (the use the desktop processors!) 128 megs of RAM, and a pretty nice video card, and other neat things. What I was wondering was, how hard would it be to get everything up in running with linux? I'm most likely going to want a dual-boot environment as well... and I have a 3COM PCMCIA 10/100 +56k Modem card... will that work alright? Just looking for general ideas and opinions as to the possibilities I'll have with this. Thanks.

  • Isn't one of the biggest problems in hoping that Linux Laptops will catch on the old problem of M$ Office compatibility? Lots of people that have laptops are business types who don't want to get stuck without their computer, and they aren't going to start using Linux on their laptops any time soon if they can't copy their M$ Word documents straight back onto their desktop when they get back to the office...

  • I predict a huge market for linux laptops.. (Score:3)

    by HSinclair ( 64082 ) on Tuesday September 07, 1999 @05:51AM (#1697670) Homepage
    Yes, a huge market for linux laptops - but for old 486's.

    Why? 486's run Linux great, but Windows 9X really, really lousy. Both 486's and Linux do what you need them to do, seems a perfect match for me. They're in the right price range for younger geeks still in school, and they're old, so hardware is more likely to be supported, and they're (for the most part) pre-winmmodems.

    I know I just got ahold of a Compaq 486/75 and I'm going to put linux on it and use it for my C++ coding at school.

  • Before I'm flamed, I used to use a WinModem, now I have a real, proper, external modem (and am no longer limited to just Windows, too).

    When I did use a WinModem, I was able to use it for some time, but upon returning from a trip I found I simply could not connect. I blamed the modem.. and I was partly right.

    After replacing the WinModem with real, proper hardware I did some digging and found the local telco had "upgraded" its equipment. I dug because my then new 33.6 was never getting above 26.4 or so. A few days and several calls later I had 28.8+ connections.

    What irked me was not merely the telco, they perhaps hadn't known the effect they would have. What irked me was that while the 'real' modem wound up connecting slowly, but connecting, the WinModem simply failed. Even with Windows and its pet drivers. I played by the rules set, and got burned anyway. Now I have a modem that 'Just Works'.

  • I've used laptops as my primary computing platform for most of my career, and I've run into the same sorts of problems mentioned in the article running anything that wasn't Windows 3.1 (in the early days), or Window 95. Even as of a couple years ago, one had a limited set of options if one wanted to purchase a laptop on which NT was officially supported. (It is probably still the same).

    The problem is not only the WinModem evil: Laptop hardware seems to be such a custom beast, that sound and video drivers need to be custom written. I remember trying to get NT 3.5 and 3.51 to run on one of the first Pentium laptops: that was a worse configuration effort than anything I have seen with Linux. Beta this, alpha that, to get any sound, and to get anything other than the lowest resolution.

    My primary computing platform is an older Tecra running RH 6.0. I had to tweak some XF86Config options to get proper resolution, and compile a kernel to use the proper sound card settings, but it was all standard Linux. By contrast, to get NT working, I would have to download a set of custom video and sound drivers from Toshiba. So Linux is actually in a better situation than NT here.

  • My other Net Admin and I have been running RH on our Dell Inspiron Laptops for the past year.
    Recently "the Admiral" has turned his laptop into an FTP/Network Monitoring server that not only our techies, but Cu's can use to get software updates.
    Aside from the initial NeoMagic Chipset problems with RH 5.1 where I had to tweak out the XF86Config file, we really haven't had much problems getting these little badboys working and staying running. He's got somewhere around 79+ day uptime. ( and that's only because of rebooting for quotas).. My laptop I've been using as a workstation for remote access to my servers, checking connectivity problems at remote locations with a variety of modems ( my Fave being the Megahertz 56K from 3Com which works even with the quirky 3.9b12 from Livingston*cough*/lucent)
    Why haven't they caught on???? mayhaps people are just too happy *cough,cough* leaving 'Doze on em and using netterm/hyperterm to connext

    yeah yeah -1 me allready

  • Re:Linux on a Laptop (Score:3)

    by nosilA ( 8112 ) on Tuesday September 07, 1999 @06:01AM (#1697674)
    I'm assuming that you've installed linux before, on your desktop or something, so the basics aren't new to you.

    Dual Boot: no problem there, Install NT first (already done I guess), use fips or Partition Magic to shrink the NT partition and create some empty space for linux, don't let linux install lilo on the mbr, instead to the beginning of the partition linux is on, then dd the bootsector to a file (dd if=/dev/hdxn of="bootsect.lin" bs=521 n=1) where x is the drive letter, n is the partition number, probably /dev/hda5)

    3Com 10/100+56K I've had great luck with this card, although the modem and the ethernet won't work at the same time all that well.

    Video is going to be your biggest problem, and I suggest just going out and doing a web search on altavista or something for your notebook name and linux and X or something like that. Someone probably already has a working XF86Config file for you.

    Installing linux is tricky on machines with PCMCIA floppy drives, but I'm assuming this computer has a built in floppy drive, so it should be okay.

    -nosilA
  • After I just posted above, I realized a little quirky thing that is happening to my Dell 233MMX with 144MB running RH6.0
    I HAVE to press Enter during LILO, or else I get a Kernel Panic when VFS tries to open the root partition, anyone have any kinda nifty tricks that I have missed? (I tried lowering the Timeout, that didn't work, Ran Disk Druid and Re-Partitioned the hda5 which Root resides, that didn't work) It's not a MAJOR problem, just a PITA when I go to get a cup of coffee and forget to hit Enter :)
  • I do all my business on a Compaq 1900T (400 Celeron, 128 MB RAM, 10 GB disk, 1024x768x16bit at 13.3"). I am a Java/CORBA/Web/cool stuff consultant.

    I use Applix for my reports (export to RTF) and my invoicing. Applix has read every document I've thrown at it pretty well. I haven't had any complains from folks using Word to read Applix either.

    I use javac, emacs, mysql, gcc, etc for "real" work.

    My book keeper does use Win95 for Quicken and I have to travel to a client site to use Rational Rose on NT.

    The Compaq 1900T has worked pretty well, except if I close 'er up on suspend, it gets hot, the fan kicks on, the battery goes dead, then it cools down. I would prefer that it stay cold or shutdown.

    Compaq offers no documentation on the sound system. Apparently it is part of the NEOMagic graphics chips. OSS offeres limited support (good enough for me).

    I don't, nor did I plan to use the built in modem. That isn't normally an issue; I'm either on site or at home, both of which have ethernet.

    Joe
  • I run Redhat 5.1 on a Wedge 1100 (OEM for Kapok) and love the seamless hot-swapping of my modem and Ethernet cards. Works as advertised, and even cooperates with APM. My only complaint is not really with Linux, but when I have to boot into win98 it seems to leave the PCMCIA controller in a screwed up state, so that Linux can't access it anymore upon reboot unless I turn off the power. Windows sucks.
  • For all you guys that have VAIO's, where are you getting 'em from? I'd like to start shopping for a laptop system, but I don't want to pay premium price for a system I'm going to end up re-installing the OS on - is there a better source for them online?

    j.
  • Quote from the article:
    A future in which everything "just works" might be a tad too utopian for everyone to believe in, but it's certainly worth working toward.

    I've been dreaming for years now for a simple, easy to use, reliable computer, notebook or desktop, that I can buy/build now and have running nicely 10 years from now. My needs are these: A very good word processor, ppp connection (oughtta still be around in 10 years I hope...), email ability, and mp3 or mp2 playback. I've almost become so disgusted with this multifacted OS, upgrade-itis, and reliability dilemna that I've started looking into getting myself a nice old portable typewriter. Alas, I would miss email terribly much though.
  • I'm running S.u.S.E. 6.2 with the 2.2.10 kernel on an Acer Extensa 390:

    Pentium 166
    64 MB RAM
    2 GB Harddrive

    It supposedly has a winmodem but the port been cemented over for European users, presumably so we don't injure ourselves. I'm dual-booting with the Win95 which came on the system, but I should mention that I assign partition space on a merit system every time I reinstall, and the Windows partition is shrinking.

    Anyways, I have a strange problem; no rather I have a strange solution. Up until recently I could never get suspend to disk to work. Everytime I upgraded the kernel or apm utilities, I tried it again and it didn't work. I had heard that if you boot up in Windows and then loadlin into Linux it could work, but I was always too lazy to get loadlin working. Anyways, recently I discovered purely by accident that suspend to disk works perfectly! As far as I can determine, this happened sometime between my upgrade from S.u.S.E. 6.0 (kernel 2.2.5) -> S.u.S.E. 6.1 (kernel 2.2.10). The thing is I didn't see any mention of apm changes in the relevant kernel changelogs, and I'm pretty sure the apm utilities are the same version. So I have two questions:

    - was there some change (relevant to suspend) of which I'm not aware?

    - which disk space is it using? If it's the Windows suspend space, should I be concerned about it the next time I shrink the Windows partition? (Windows has already earned some bad karma :7(

    Okay it was 3 questions.

    Anyone have some thoughts?

    Chris
  • Yeah, CDW isn't a favorite among many people...I bought a VAIO from them about a year ago when it was on sale. Got a decent price and the support is good too. Wait, no. That was a dream.

    DON'T BUY FROM CDW
  • I agree entirely. I have a NEC P-150 and the cheap network card that came with the machine worked fine, although at times a little flaky in linux. Popped it out, popped it back in -- everything is cool.

    NT has no such concept. If the card flaked out while I was working, the whole machine froze. Hard. Totally evil. I can't believe people say NT is better on laptops than Linux -- I never even got any decent error messages from NT about the card, whereas linux would tell me that it thought I'd just put in a memory card. Funky.

  • I've been thinking of throwing Linux on my laptop (Compaq 1220 - Celeron 200MHz, 32MB of RAM, 2 gig HD) for some time now, but held back because I wasn't sure about the video display. Now that I've found that other page about installing special drivers, I'm leaning heavily. There are just a couple of questions I've got, though:

    1. Are the volume control buttons supported under Linux? I'd hate to not be able to listen to anything (primarily because I use the laptop for a lot of MP3ing).

    2. There is no two.

    Alright, only one question. Sue me.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Re:IBM MWave is DSP (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    It's not as simple as releasing drivers, the mwave system is just a dsp chip - the modem and soundcard functions are done in software.
  • The IBM ThinkPads work really good with linux,
    I have ONLY good memmorys from my girlfriends mothers laptop (yeah she run linux and write in TeX she is cool!).

    It took me a while to figure out what type of soundcard and graphics device it was (all information from IBM sux). To your knowlage it
    is a crystal CS card and neomagic

    IMHO the Pentium233 is
    the most price-valued ThinkPads on the market, you could probaly get one for $1000 and it can without problem keep up with a PentiumII 233 (did a compile-the-kernel-test).
  • Office 2000 file formats are the same as Office 97. Except for Access. Word/Excel all come into staroffice just fine. (I dont know about powerpoint, since I am not a marketer or a manager )
  • A month ago I purchased a satellite, my first portable. The satellites were recomended to me by friends who managed to get linux running on them. I used to think that portables were expensive toys before I got my own! Now I love them, great for college. Now I can take my computer with me on trips, the bus etc.

    When I was selecting a portable I took a number of features into consideration:
    1) price:
    Im a college student of Very Litte Money (tm). Every little bit counts.
    2) pointing device:
    On occasion I do use X and I *hate* *hate* those wretched touch pad pointing devices that I see on so many portables. The 2595 comes with an eraser head pointer. Easy to get used to and you dont have to worry about your hand rubbing on it by accident and moving the pointer where its not wanted.
    3) display:
    Since i spend > 10 hours a day in front of the computer I had to make a decision: get a large TFT display, or get glasses. The 2595xdvd comes with a 14.1" TFT display (X looks great at 1024x768 on it)
    4) SANE keyboard:
    I really *hate* *hate* keyboards with those anoying Windows(TM)(C)(R) keys. On a portable they are even worse. Keyboard space is limited. This really "helped" me select the satellite since the "Win keys" on the satellite are very tiny and in the upper right hand of the keyboard (out of the way of hands. yay!)
    5) Performance:
    Since I needed a portable to serve as my primary workstation, I needed something with an acceptable amount of power. The 2595 comes with 400mhz celeron, 64mb ram (upgradable). This is nore than enough for my needs.

    I am fairly satisfied with the 2595xdvd, except for the winmodem. The modem quality is questionable even in windows! The dvd drive wont see much use since its not supported by linux yet. Such is life on the bleeding edge I guess.

    At the time of purchase the video card wasnt supported by xfree86 (no idea if it is now) but I managed to get X running at 1024x768 16bpp by using a hacked X server.

    I managed to get a full screen console by recompiling the kernel with vesa frame buffer support (by default console is either a *tiny* window in the center of the screen or *ugly* stretch mode. I was very relieved when vesafb worked since I do most of my work in console). I havent been able to get both X and vesafb working at the same time. For some reason X wont start when i have vesafb enabled, so i have to choose between a pretty X environment or a pretty console.

    Has anyone with a 2595 got fullscreen console and X working at the same time?
    Is there any hope to get the infrared port working?
    I have not tried to get sound working under linux. Has anyone got the sound on this portable to work?
    Has anyone got a decent looking full screen console to work with the 2595xdvd without using vesafb?

    If anyone with a 2595xdvd needs help getting X or a sane console with vesafb working email me and i'll try my best to help you out.

    --
    intol
    intol@linux.nu

  • Linux might make the old cpus hum, but does it make the old screens any bigger? 10 inch passive matrix screens were the norm in the the 486 days. I am not a screen snob, but I couldn't code for very long on one of those.


    Laptops are pricey because a good LCD is pricey. A Celeron 400 CPU cost about a hundred bucks in quantity. A 14 inch screen is in the neighborhood of $800. And unlike anything else in computers, a good screen holds its value much longer.

    If your on a budget get a solid, cheap desktop system and a Palm. You'll be a lot happier.
  • It seem from the patches in 2.3.17 that PCMCIA support will get partially integrated in the Linux kernel. That mean that would probably solve the problem with the ones using PCMCIA floopy to install Linux. A great news.
  • How about just plain MWave support at all! As far as I can tell there is no more Mwave development going on. The latest 'integrated' TP's don't use MWave in lieu of the "ACP" modem and most other TP's use MWave for sound only and come with a 56k PCCard modem. This is because there is no implementation of MWave in a TP that runs @ 56k. You'd have to get an MWave card - the kind that installs in a desktop to do that. And there is no subsequent development going on with that as well.

    On the other hand MWave has always been kind of hinky and fragile. How many times have you blown out something and crash the machine. Don't forget too that with all MWaves on portable machines if you're using the modem above 28.8 then you have no sound at all.

    BTW MWave does not use a driver set in strict sense. Mwave operates via its own RTOS.
  • I'm also going to throw in support for running Linux on PPC laptops. I know MkLinux runs on anything from your old PB1400 to the PowerBook G3 series. The latest kernel also installs on the "Bronze" Powerbooks. As you've heard above, LinuxPPC is also a solid performer on Apple laptops. Why? Basically because Apple(for all the crap you want to say about them) builds their computers with solid components. Since they change the specs once every 3-6 months, their is usually a good number of laptops with the same specs/hardware from video to ethernet to sound to scsi. I think they have used basically the same 56k modem since the first PowerBook G3s came out about 18 months ago.

    They start about $2249 education and $2499 retail.

    http://www.mklinux.org

  • For my use Linux is easier than NT. (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I have a IBM 560x. I originally put NT on it, soon switched it to Linux. I find Linux to be a lot less annoying than NT on this 'lil machine.

    NT's major weaknesses:

    difficult install - this is partially because I am cheap an didn't buy a CD-ROM. Linux network installs are far superior to NT.

    Network config changes require reboot. This is a serious PITA when moving from home to work. With Linux I just use hibernation and hardly ever reboot - uptime is 18 days now... Cardctl schemes handle the network resets between home and work.

    I'm very happy with RedHat 6.0 on this machine, and the installation was a piece of cake using a PCMCIA ethernet card.

    Two advantages of the 560x for Linux: no winmodem (no modem at all :-) and NO WINDOWS KEYS!
  • I've gotten conflicting information on what models have MWave and which ones don't. There are just too damned many slightly variant ThinkPad models I think.
    The exact model I have is a 355Cs. If this model doesn't have MWave, I'd like to know what the heck the RJ11 jack with a phone/data icon next to it on the lower lefthand rear corner is. It sure doesn't look like a normal 16*50 UART based modem.
    IBM's web pages have (a tiny bit of) information about an updated 'Crystal' sound driver (for Windows probably) for the 355. If memory serves, 'Crystal' made a chipset used in some cheapo sound cards, which sounds similar to what you are talking about for the 750/755C/755Cs models.

  • Linux on PPC laptops (Score:3)

    by Mendenhall ( 32321 ) on Tuesday September 07, 1999 @06:22AM (#1697724)
    On the other side of the hardware world, I am running LinuxPPC on my 333 MHz PowerPC G3 laptop, and it works beautifully. 90+% of everything I try works (some oddnesses with hot-swapping devices in the media bay, e.g.). It is quite a nice machine for fast computation (running OpenDX and such).

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