Hi forum,
not entirely sure if this is the right forum to post my question.
I've been using Slackware on quite old desktop PC since last year, never had a problem.
Now I'm ready for the big step. I'm planning to buy the Dell precision M6500 laptop and I'd like to run Slackware (or an alternative powerful, flexible and stable distro) on it.
Should I expect problems? Anybody has reliable information about the Linux compatibility of this notebook?
Thanks for any help you can give me!

I've been running Slackware on my M6300 for several years now without any major issues. In fact it has gotten easier over time. I've got an NVidia 1600M graphics card so I've been using the proprietary NVidia drivers, but other than that everything has worked pretty well. I would make sure your wireless card is NOT a Broadcom chipset (mine is an Intel).

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Thanks for your advice, I'll definitely customize my order choosing the Intel wireless card. By the way, there are various contradictory opinions about nvidia vs. ati, the M6500 can be assembled with NVIDIA Quadro FX 3800M or ATI FirePro M7820: which one is better (exclusively from the compatibility point of view) in your opinion?

I don't have either of those cards in any of my machines, but I do have both Nvidia (the 1600M in my laptop) and ATI cards (a 4850HD in my desktop). To be honest, they are both about an equal level of pain/reward. In both cases I use the proprietary drivers as I haven't had particularly good results with the open source ones. If you go the Slackware route, there are slackbuild scripts at slackbuilds.org for both sets of drivers. However in my case, the ATI slackbuild didn't work. However, the ATI software CAN build Slackware packages and that worked just fine. I know ATI has come under criticism for cutting off support for older cards, but I don't think the ones you're looking at would fall under that problem.

Basically, my experience is that as long as you're using the proprietary drivers, the choice between the two doesn't make that much difference.

Oh, one more thing....

My M6300 was a major factor in getting a netbook (a Dell Mini 9). To put it bluntly, the M6300 is a boat anchor, and traveling with it was a royal pain. If you get a substantial bag for it, it doesn't fit under airplane seats (at least not in cattle class) and lugging it around the airports put the hurt on my shoulder. I love it as my main work computer, but now I treat it more like a desktop than a laptop. I lug it around the house and to business meetings if I"m driving. But if there is any serious travel underway, I take my Mini instead.

Yes, this is a known issue

This is exactly what I'm going to do.