Laptops and Slackware...
 

I will be going to college in the coming months and I am required to purchase a laptop. I am wondering if there are any companies that make a laptop that is good for Slackware and/or companies laptops in which Slackware will not work with at all. Also, which hardware is good for a laptop? I know I should go for nVidia over ATi, but what about the other essentials? Thanks a lot.

I don't really think many laptops would be a problem with Slackware. You might check the HCL Laptop section to get a better understanding. I have an older DELL Latitude C600 and it is great with slackware. It uses the ATI Mobility 3 graphics card and I have no problem with it at all, just have to set it to use the r128 driver IIRC (been awhile since I installed slack on it). Just make sure you get a decent Wireless card in it, one that has good compatibility with Linux so you don't have to mess around with other driver programs.

Or if you don't want the hassle of setting up :

http://www.laclinux.com/en/Laptop

They offer laptops with your choice of distros installed.

I've a toshiba Tecra S1 and it's work like a charm..
Video work well (radeon 9000 M) but i dont know if Wireless card work (i've no access point to test it..)
Sound work well too..

hope this will help you..

and toshiba have nice guarantee on some models (mine is 3 years.. :P)

I will go for IBM Thinkpad, some of the series is Linux certified such as T41, of course the distro which certified them was RedHat and Suse. but it won't be a prob. Go for IBMs. Or maybe get a PowerBook G4 and use Mac Os X. :)

they make linux certified fully supported laptops at www.linuxcertified.com
non of them come with slackware, but other distros. But there is nothing keeping you from "upgrading".

I've a Compaq HP Presario X1000, and it works like a charm with both 2.4.29 and 2.6.10 kernels. It required a few tweaking here and there, but nothing difficault. 3D rendering even works.

Awesome, thanks for all the information! It's funny that you mention IBM Thinkpads because I am seriously considering a T42. But I am wondering if they will lose quality since IBM is going to send their laptop department to Lenovo, the Chinese company. What do you think?

I have an Asus Z9000. It works fantastic and I want/need nothing more. Intergrated wireless g, 1.6ghz pentium M, 60gh hdd, 1gb ram, 4 usb 2.0 ports, dvd/cdrw, firewire, pcmcia, and external video and mouse/keyboard and the other usual fixings. It's fairly cheap and they are handbuilt in the US with a brand motherboard I can actually pronounce! The biggest factor why I bought this over ibm/dell/gateway etc. is that the motherboard is a trusted name that WILL work. These cheapo laptops at bestbuy and circuit city have GREAT specs at a low price but there is 1 thing they don't tell you, the motherboard brand. After all, doesn't every part of your computer rely on your motherboard? Well i've gotten ahead of myself, but if your looking for a good laptop please look into the motherboard brand and give the asus z9000 (aka z9) a look. Also make sure the z9 your looking into is built in the US..mail me if you need a link.

Have fun in college!

--Gian

Sure, I would likea link, but I can't get your e-mail address and I can't contact you via a PM either...

Sorry about that. I don't think my preferences are set correctly. The link to the manufactor specs are at:

http://usa.asus.com/prog/spec.asp?m=...eries&langs=09

They are custom built so the specs have ranges in it. For example it accepts Pentium M -or- Celeron M up to 1.7ghz, up to 2gb ram, etc.

If you are interested I can send you the # where I bought mine, he is very reasonable and I know they build them by hand.

Good luck!

--Gian

Oops, my email is " gianspi at gsent dot org "

I'm running slack on an hp Pavillion ze4800, and it's flawless. I've also installed it on an old Toshiba, worked great. I have to suggest an HP for slack, works wonderfully.

Another vote for IBM from me.

I am a newb and my Thinkpad R51 is running Slack 10 fine, albeit on a self-compiled 2.6.7 kernel.

3d accel from the on-board Intel Extreme 2 is fine, wireless works, infra-red works, internal Win-modem works, and some ACPI bits (suspend to disk, cputemp, batt. monitor etc) are good, I just haven't the time to configure the rest, but I am sure they'll work once I have the time/smarts to set them up.

About IBM selling their PC section to China, I *think* mine was made in China anyway, or at least most of it was, so no sweat for me.

I've been buying electronics from the far east for years anyway :) knowingly or not.

Just my 2c.

mark

ps, the best thing was that I could buy it with no OS at all pre-installed, so no "tax" and no irritating "XP" sticker :D

How come I can't find any Online Retailers for that Notebook? I tried almost all the ones listed on ASUS's site and they don't have the Z9000.