Why do people still recommend Thinkpads for Linux when there are Linux-oriented manufacturers now?

M68040 , 10 months ago

I’ve always kinda wondered what System76’s stuff is like. Battery life’d be the main priority for my use case. (I really like my M2 Air for this)

raven , 10 months ago

Do any of these have:

• As nice a keyboard, that I don’t have to worry about spilling a cup of coffee on.
• Track point or similar.
• Ability to survive a fall down a flight of stairs.
• 4:3 or 16:10 aspect ratio.
• Ports.
  While being built with repairability in mind?

I day dream about stuffing the guts of a modern laptop inside with a USB hub and an enormous battery, but that’s a huge undertaking.

BobbyBandwidth , 10 months ago

Linux is DIY by nature. Buying a fancy, brand new laptop is not.

Not saying you can’t do both. I’m just saying the Linux ethos lends to more crafty people.

Quackdoc , 10 months ago

I literally threw a ThinkPad at a brick wall in rage a long time ago and it was fine a t-42 iirc. reccomended them ever since

owatnext , 10 months ago

I dropped my T420s down the steps by accident. No issues, but the disc drive managed to fly out haha.

Double_A , 10 months ago

Cost and availability.

Most of those laptops cost over 1000€ if not even closer to 2000. And they don’t seem to ship to all countries.

While you can get a good used Thinkpad for 500€ everywhere in the world.

drwho , 10 months ago

And that’s with shipping included.

Cpo , 10 months ago

And the CPU + RAM upgrade.

fakeman_pretendname , 10 months ago

I’m sure it’s not everyone’s reason, but mine was “Thinkpad still has physical left, right and middle mouse buttons”.

freagle , 10 months ago

Yes!

icdl , 10 months ago

I’ve gotten a lenovo legion 5 for something around 1600$, with a 3070 rtx on it. Before that I had another legion as well, with 2060. I’ve gotten intel both times, my friend got the amd one. Why? They are a bit cheaper than the competition and I don’t really understand why asus version of essentially the same hardware costs more. Why not a linux oriented company instead of lenovo? Well linux isn’t as out of reach as it was 10 or even 5 years ago. Almost every driver you need is available even if you do a clean arch install out of the box. So why get a device that you can’t easily sell later on, won’t get god warranty services overseas and might be hard to repair in a pinch?

All this to say, get whatever you like. I think even on a macbook you can get a perfectly fine linux setup. I hate it when people assume linux needs to run on something specific and is out of reach. Get what you like at whatever price range you want, you’d be hard pressed to run into an issue installing and using linux on it.

I’ve gamed, developed web and android apps, patched kernel on asus rog series, lenovo legion series, some random msi model and a base configuration acer model. Almost zero problems.

yoz , 10 months ago

Avoid purism at all costs. Watch Louis Rossman video on Purism mobile.

Venutianxspring , 10 months ago

They can be found cheap as shit. I got a great t480 for less than $150 and another $50 I upgraded my RAM and battery. It’s a really nice laptop and only cost me a couple hundred.

Zatujit , 10 months ago

Cost? Framework is not really “Linux oriented”.

jasondj , 10 months ago

Because most of these brands offer high-end laptops, the secondhand market is small and the new ones vastly exceed the needs of a lot of users.

Most people just browse the web, stream media, use productivity apps…these things don’t need much horsepower. The majority of people don’t need to run AAA games or graphics/video editing on their laptop.

Because of this, there is a great market for secondhand business laptops, and tons of great deals there. And of the big business brands (HP, Dell, and Lenovo), Lenovo tends to have the most compatible hardware (while also usually being very easily serviceable or upgraded).

I bought a Lenovo T470s with charger and a decent battery at a flea market on Father’s Day for $100 USD and he had a stack of them. Ordered some more memory and a bigger NVMe for $70, and now I have a very useful, practical, everyday laptop for less than $200, and it dual-boots a licensed Windows 10.

projectdp , 10 months ago

I agree with a bunch of the comments here but wanted to add that there’s a decades-long legacy of good FOSS/Linux support on Thinkpads. Before any of these companies existed, Linux was running pretty reliably on Thinkpads.

I do like the newer options with these newer manufacturers, but I won’t be getting rid of my Thinkpads any time soon. I’m running a Framework now too.

Frederic , 10 months ago

For me it’s Dell, when I bought my (used) Latitude E5470 there was even Ubuntu running officially on it IIRC at the time. I like the small Dell because there’s ton of them 3+ years old, parts available everywhere, they are pretty solid and made for corporate world, they are no toy like Asus. A $1500 model can be had for like $200-300 after a couple of years. I installed MX Linux on it, everything works perfectly without touching or configuring anything.

For instance now you can find a nice E7480 for 200-300$, with Core I7, 8GB or 16GB RAM, SSD, 1080p, NFC, fingerprint, USB-PD dock compatible, etc.

agent_flounder , 10 months ago

I’ve had good luck with Dell Latitudes* from work and personal purchase from several years ago. I would probably tend to get one again when I update. I had zero issues installing Mint on one of the E6410s.

We switched to HP at work and mine have been reliable also and a nice minimalist look and decently thin form factor. I’d consider those too.

Secret300 , 10 months ago

I got a thinkpad for $50 at goodwiil. Those linux laptops are so much more expensive. I do plan on buying one soon tho cause I just got a new job

gerdesj , 10 months ago

I tend to use other people’s cast-offs at work. Win 10 slow? JG gets an upgrade! I whip the SSD or M.2 or whatever I’m using out of the old one and pop it in the “new” one.