On 09/19/2009 09:18 AM, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 9:15:55 am scrapo wrote:

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Thanks, Lynus

acer offers laptops with linux os.

not any more - M$ has fixed them

Actually, I've seen and heard conflicting stories. I have myself /seen/ linux laptops (from acer, samsung, hcl and IIRC HP) in various stores in Pune (including Croma, Landmark, House of Laptops and various 'computer stores'). In any case, I would recommend doing research online for the *hardware* configuration you seek and then walk into a local vendor to buy the laptop.

The chances are local vendors, such as your friendly neighborhood 'registered [ACER|HCL|SAMSUNG] distributor' would be more likely to offer you customization (at a better price too) than online shops or large retailers.

IMHO, it makes more sense to buy a decent configuration that addresses your requirements and installing linux on it (believe me, most hardware works out of the box these days, and if it doesn't, it will in a couple of months[*]), than obsessing about having to pay the M$ tax.

Not to say that you shouldn't care about that part at all, it's just that you shouldn't make pre-loaded linux a hard requirement. My reasons for this are:

a. Generally linux laptops are sold by vendors to address the cost factor, and I've seen that while they do bring down the cost by pre-loading a free or cheap OS, software is not the only place where they cut costs.

b. The pre-installed OSs are useless from a productivity or support perspective. 100% of the people I know who bought a linux pre-loaded laptop/netbook have replaced the OS it came with.

c. In the long run, you'd hopefully end up contributing more to the FOSS eco-system with a laptop that suits your needs rather than one that you place artificial 'pre-loaded with linux' requirements on.

...but those are just my reasons.

hth, cheers, - steve

[*] or you could see this as an opportunity to contribute to the community by filing bugs and testing drivers as they get written !! :)

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 9:15 AM, scrapo scrapo@saswatabanerjee.com wrote:

Lynus Vaz wrote:

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Hi All,

I'm looking to buy a linux laptop. Since my friends recommended Dell, I had a look at their options (the India site). None of them seem to come with linux. Also, I had heard about zareason. I sent them a mail asking whether they delivered to India, but they haven't replied yet.

Does anyone know where to look for a laptop, preferably with linux or even without an installed OS?

Thanks, Lynus

acer offers laptops with linux os. dell also offers it, but you have to go for customisation option

regards saswata -- http://mm.glug-bom.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxers

you can also follow some good links to buy linux-laptop but still acer has comprehensive range for linux-laptop. 1. http://www.linux-laptop.net/ 2. http://www.linux.org/hardware/laptop.html with regds rajnish

On Sat, 2009-09-19 at 09:17 +0530, Kenneth Gonsalves wrote:

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 9:09:35 am Lynus Vaz wrote:

...

I'm looking to buy a linux laptop. Since my friends recommended Dell, I had a look at their options (the India site). None of them seem to come with linux. Also, I had heard about zareason. I sent them a mail asking whether they delivered to India, but they haven't replied yet.

Does anyone know where to look for a laptop, preferably with linux or even without an installed OS?

only samsung ships with freedos - but plays nicely with linux

Lenovo thinkpad (and *not* idea pad) still comes with with free dos. I use a thinkpad and off late more 5 of my colligues and friends purchased thinkpad/. Search for r61 or if you can get r60. There are a few hp compacq laptops which work very well with linux as well.

Contact me off list and I will try and give you contacts of some shops which will give you the proper laptop for linux.

Happy hacking. Krishnakant.

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 9:17 AM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.org wrote:

only samsung ships with freedos - but plays nicely with linux

I have a Lenovo and two Compaqs that came with FreeDos -- the last Compaq being only a few months old. That said, all their high end notebooks (don't know why they call it that; the "low end" ones work well enough) come with Windows pre-installed. I had heard rumours that Lenovo will let you order a custom laptop without an OS if you have the patience to call them and bug them about it. I haven't tried that though.

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 2:10:08 pm Mehul Ved wrote:

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 9:09 AM, Lynus Vaz lynusvaz@gmail.com wrote:

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Does anyone know where to look for a laptop, preferably with linux or even without an installed OS?

Acer Aspire series come with preinstalled Linpus Linux

check their website - no longer is this true. I have one bought with linpus and it is working ok with FC11

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 3:33:29 pm Mehul Ved wrote:

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 3:25 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.org

wrote:

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check their website - no longer is this true. I have one bought with linpus and it is working ok with FC11

Checked the link I have given it mentions both Windows and Linpus Linux. And I checked at Lamington Road last week. It does come with Linpus Linux and for 32K

if so good buy

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 3:42 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.org wrote:

I do not see Linpus: http://www.acer.co.in/acer/product.do?link=oln85e.redirect&changedAlts=&...

Go to acer.co.in -> Products -> Notebooks -> Aspire 4736 -> Technical Specifications

-----xxxxx----- Operating System: Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Linpus™ Linux® -----xxxxx-----

Some more information from my visit to Lamington Road today

Model OS Cost 4736 Linpus 32.5K 5738 Linpus 33.5K 5536 Linpus 26.5K

The prices are from Yoku Computers. I confirmed with them, hardware warranty is still valid irrespective of the OS you use on these machines. So, you can install your favourite distro on it without worrying about warranty. 5738 looks like a good deal, and considering that ubuntu worked out of the box for my friend on 4736 and it not being too different from 5738, the latter sounds like a good deal.

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 6:44:43 pm Mehul Ved wrote:

5738 looks like a good deal, and considering that ubuntu worked out of the box for my friend on 4736 and it not being too different from 5738, the latter sounds like a good deal.

what does the 'Z' in model names imply?

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 3:51:49 pm Mehul Ved wrote:

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 3:42 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.org

wrote:

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I do not see Linpus: http://www.acer.co.in/acer/product.do?link=oln85e.redirect&changedAlts=&... cond48e.c2att101=-1&CRC=2759084358#wrAjaxHistory=0

Go to acer.co.in -> Products -> Notebooks -> Aspire 4736 -> Technical Specifications

-----xxxxx----- Operating System: Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Linpus™ Linux®

now I see it - I was looking at 4736Z

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 4:27:56 pm narendra sisodiya wrote:

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 4:04 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.orgwrote:

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-----xxxxx----- Operating System: Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Linpus™ Linux®

now I see it - I was looking at 4736Z

It is a very good laptop. - http://sisodiya.blogspot.com/2009/06/my-first-laptop.html There is a AMD version too (I forget number) F11 worked great. Only problem that you will not be able to set brightness. brightness applet do not work on this laptop. Also screen sometime gets blank but that is a minor issue which you should not worry much.

please stick to the point - this thread is on what type of laptop comes with linux on it - not 'what is a very good laptop'. Please read the archives and respond to the point. So did your 4736Z come with linux on it?

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 5:08:35 pm Krishnakant wrote:

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please stick to the point - this thread is on what type of laptop comes with linux on it - not 'what is a very good laptop'. Please read the archives and respond to the point. So did your 4736Z come with linux on it?

Probably he already asumed that the user would also like to know that if linux comes pre-installed on a certain laptop, how good will linux work on it. And I think his asumtion is right because just having linux on a machine is not sufficient. Probably the original poster also wanted to know the information about the issues with a given laptop provided linux is installed. So while technically or verbaly the point is about laptops coming with linux, it is no harm to tell how good it will work, so that the original person who pposted the question gets a good idea.

here we go again! 'I think', 'probably he assumes'. Narendra is a nice sincere guy but he never bothers to read the context of mails - sees a keyword and off he goes diverting the topic. You are doing the same. Why are you 'thinking' and 'assuming'? Instead of wasting time speculating, go check what the OP wanted. Or read the subject line. He wants Linux laptop. A laptop that comes with linux. And Mehul did research to find an acer model that comes *with* linux - the question then was that the best low-end model of Acer is the 4736Z, which apparently does *not* come with linux, unlike the 4736 which does. So the question boils down to - is the 4376 good enough? Or should the OP give up the idea and buy doze, remove it and put linux so that he can get the 4736Z - which is good enough.

On Sat, 2009-09-19 at 19:15 +0530, Mehul Ved wrote:

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 5:34 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.org wrote:

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And Mehul did research to find an acer model that comes *with* linux - the question then was that the best low-end model of Acer is the 4736Z, which apparently does *not* come with linux, unlike the 4736 which does. So the question boils down to - is the 4376 good enough? Or should the OP give up the idea and buy doze, remove it and put linux so that he can get the 4736Z - which is good enough.

Ah, then comes the point where we will need to know how well linux will work.

Happy hacking. Krishnakant.

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 4:57 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves lawgon@au-kbc.orgwrote:

On Saturday 19 Sep 2009 4:27:56 pm narendra sisodiya wrote:

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On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 4:04 PM, Kenneth Gonsalves <lawgon@au-kbc.org wrote:

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-----xxxxx----- Operating System: Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Linpus™ Linux®

now I see it - I was looking at 4736Z

It is a very good laptop. - http://sisodiya.blogspot.com/2009/06/my-first-laptop.html There is a AMD version too (I forget number) F11 worked great. Only problem that you will not be able to set

brightness.

...

brightness applet do not work on this laptop. Also screen sometime gets blank but that is a minor issue which you should not worry much.

please stick to the point - this thread is on what type of laptop comes with linux on it - not 'what is a very good laptop'. Please read the archives and respond to the point. So did your 4736Z come with linux on it?

Yes. It was having some command line linux on It. I do not know the exact

name. I run command like fdisk . mount ect to test it while buying.

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 8:30 PM, Rony gnulinuxist@gmail.com wrote:

The website and reality are different.

Not sure whom that was directed to. If it was directed towards my email, then I have been to Lamington Road and checked it out myself. Plus, one of my friends has actually bought the laptop. Also, you can check my other emails where I have mentioned more about what I found out from my visit to Lamington Road today.

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 8:49 PM, Rony gnulinuxist@gmail.com wrote:

Hey no man. It was not directed at you. It was directed at Acer's website. The products/options you get in the market are not reflected properly on the site.

I would say that the details are quite accurate with what's available in the market. Even the linux loaded laptops are available on the shelf. Last week I had visited 2 shops and 1 shop today. All the three of them confirmed availability of Linux on 4736.

There are no laptops available with a full GUI Linux pre-installed in Mumbai. Some of the laptops that are pre-loaded with command line Linux are a joke. It does not guarantee that your hardware will completely run out of the box if you install a full Linux. There are always some loose ends that need to be fixed manually after installation or even wait a few months till you get the proper driver for that device.

The way to go about is to make a small list of laptops you like and google for user experiences in Linux for the same.

-- Regards,

Rony.

GNU/Linux ! No Viruses No Spyware Only Freedom.

-- http://mm.glug-bom.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxers

Thanks, all of you, for your help and advice. I was just looking to avoid paying for windows, which I'll never use, anyway. I'm basically looking for a good machine, and don't mind trying out the preloaded distro: it'll be replaced soon, anyway. I'll do some research online first, as you suggested before buying one.

Lynus

On Sun, 2009-09-20 at 00:06 +0530, Mehul Ved wrote:

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 11:52 PM, Lynus Vaz lynusvaz@gmail.com wrote:

...

Thanks, all of you, for your help and advice. I was just looking to avoid paying for windows, which I'll never use, anyway. I'm basically looking for a good machine, and don't mind trying out the preloaded distro: it'll be replaced soon, anyway. I'll do some research online first, as you suggested before buying one.

What are your requirements? Acer Aspire 4736 seems like a really good laptop to me especially at the price range. And that it supports ubuntu well would mean that most distros should work fine.

Also in general Thinkpads are good but that also depends on the budget. At the given price range and the respective specs which Mehul investigated, the one he suggestes would look very tempting to me at least.

Happy hacking. Krishnakant.

On Sun, Sep 20, 2009 at 12:44 AM, santosh rao santoshrao99@gmail.com wrote:

I use HP Elitebook 6930p and i have tried both Fedora 11 32 / 64 distribution and apart from the wireless got everything to work right out of the box. Had to fiddle around a bit with the module for sound but was easy to get it to work.

What wireless card? Does it work now? And to be honest, i've heard enough horror stories from HP customers to make me want to stay away from them.

Krishnakant wrote:

On Sun, 2009-09-20 at 00:06 +0530, Mehul Ved wrote:

...

On Sat, Sep 19, 2009 at 11:52 PM, Lynus Vaz lynusvaz@gmail.com wrote:

...

Thanks, all of you, for your help and advice. I was just looking to avoid paying for windows, which I'll never use, anyway. I'm basically looking for a good machine, and don't mind trying out the preloaded distro: it'll be replaced soon, anyway. I'll do some research online first, as you suggested before buying one.

What are your requirements? Acer Aspire 4736 seems like a really good laptop to me especially at the price range. And that it supports ubuntu well would mean that most distros should work fine.

Also in general Thinkpads are good but that also depends on the budget. At the given price range and the respective specs which Mehul investigated, the one he suggestes would look very tempting to me at least.

Avoid Lenovo and Sony. Lenovo is no way near the old IBM quality.

Go for Acer if you want value for money. Dell Studio 15 if you want multimedia performance. HP Pavilion if you don't want Acer or Dell.

On Sat, 2009-09-19 at 23:52 +0530, Lynus Vaz wrote:

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There are no laptops available with a full GUI Linux pre-installed in Mumbai. Some of the laptops that are pre-loaded with command line Linux are a joke. It does not guarantee that your hardware will completely run

Very true. I remember the days when companies used to put Turbo linux.

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out of the box if you install a full Linux. There are always some loose ends that need to be fixed manually after installation or even wait a few months till you get the proper driver for that device.

Not totally true. There are many laptops which have no open ends to fix. Again. My personal experience with linovo thinkpads and as some member mentioned about idea pad s10E and the one laptop mentioned by Mehul are best examples. Infact I say it is always better to go for Linux specially on these machines. I remember one insidance where I had to purchase a laptop for my friend and he kept on persisting onkeeping the thinkpad as dual boot. It took 2 + hard hours for getting the windows OS up, installing all the drivers properly and bla bla bla. But Ubuntu just went painless. That friend of mine soon shifted to Ubuntu any ways. So some laptops really rock with gnu/linux. So it is not "always " true that linux won't work out-of-the-box While the problem of modules not being available for some hardware devices is true about a few sony laptops, and I saw one toshiba range which entirely did not support the sound card while running linux.

...

The way to go about is to make a small list of laptops you like and google for user experiences in Linux for the same.

Very good suggestion. The other alternatively which you can use at many places is to carry a live cd and run it on the laptop. This will be specially possible if you go to a showroom and get a chance to try your hands on the one you liked. Actually this is how I discovered the problem of Sony VIO and some toshiba laptops.

Happy hacking. Krishnakant.

Lynus Vaz wrote:

...

There are no laptops available with a full GUI Linux pre-installed in Mumbai. Some of the laptops that are pre-loaded with command line Linux are a joke. It does not guarantee that your hardware will completely run out of the box if you install a full Linux. There are always some loose ends that need to be fixed manually after installation or even wait a few months till you get the proper driver for that device.

The way to go about is to make a small list of laptops you like and google for user experiences in Linux for the same.

-- Regards,

Rony.

GNU/Linux ! No Viruses No Spyware Only Freedom.

-- http://mm.glug-bom.org/mailman/listinfo/linuxers

Thanks, all of you, for your help and advice. I was just looking to avoid paying for windows, which I'll never use, anyway. I'm basically looking for a good machine, and don't mind trying out the preloaded distro: it'll be replaced soon, anyway. I'll do some research online first, as you suggested before buying one.

If you are buying a laptop with doze pre-installed, don't remove it. Just keep it as a spare for testing doze specific hardware/applications.