I heard installing linux on laptops can cause alot of compatability problems and usually not work very well, is this true?

I am running linux on a gateway 233MHz laptop right now, it works great!



But (hee hee yes there is a but)

laptop hardware is usually a bit different. For example, in my laptop, the video card and sound card are combined. Video works perfectly, but sound configuration requires the open sound system from opensound.com (About $20. That's why I don't have sound right at the moment.)

Linux will work in most cases, just to varying degrees and not all components may work correctly.

I have an averatec 3120v and everything works on it. Modem, dvd, I van plug in a monitor and use xinerama or mergedfb. It has 3d acceleration(not fast though) and the built in netowrk card. I use wireless cards with it with no problem and a usb mouse. I installed Slackware linux on it and I have a 2.6.7 kernel running on it and all the acpi stuff seems to work on it.

It appears to me that both Mandrake and Fedora Core work very well with laptops. More and more Linux distros are packaged with suites of software targeted at laptops.

How does SuSE work?

I tried suse 9.1 pro on my averatec for a short time it worked ok. I find Slackware a lot better though. I have always found it easier to set up and get everything running. It is usually much faster and stable

I have a dell inspiron 5150 running slackware and it works great. I tried mandrake but the free download version didnt have the right driver for my nvidia geforcefx go5200 video card. I also tried mepis 2004 but the install locked up 1/2 way. I plan on trying a few more distros as i havnt found one I really like yet. I have only been using linux for a few weeks so I dont know too much yet but I would try slackware on a laptop. its real easy to install and runs great.

Well the reason behind this, was I am getting ready to buy a new laptop, and wasn't sure if I should buy one from linuxcertified, so I know linux will be good on it, or if I should buy one from ibuypower.com and install linux on it myself..

iluzion,

I have a Toshiba M10-S405, it has centrino and a winmodem. The intel wireless is slowly being hacked without any hardware info from intel. I have had no success with the modem at all and from searching the web that seems to be close to the rule for this particular laptop. It did come with windows so I just keep it as a dual boot.

My advice is to find some reseller who claims that all of the hardware works under Linux and then either try to find out from them what specific laptop it is or just buy one from them. Or if you buy one already loaded with windows just get enough hard drive for multibooting in case you can't get all of the hardware working in Linux.

Both http://tuxmobil.org/ and http://www.linux-laptop.net/ have lots of info on people's experiences with different laptops.

I would look through the forums and find a laptop that works well with Linux. I was just over at linuxcertified and their laptops are quite expensive, especially when you calculate that they don't have the added cost of windows xp. It's probably because that they have to use linux compatible parts that are more expensive and they target a very niche market, but a name brand laptop with linux would be cheaper. Look around and send some e-mails, because if your planning on ONLY using Linux you might be able to strike a deal with a computer manufacturer about getting a laptop without an OS pre-installed.Then you can just get your favorite flavor of linux and install it.

I've run Mandrake 10.x, and Fedora Core 2 on my Dell Inspiron 5000 with no problems as far as finding and configuring everything just fine. I did have a minor annoyance with Mandrake 9.x, I found that if I installed with the touchpad, i could not use an external mouse, and vice versa. Of course that problem was fixed with 10.x. I have yet to try Slackware, but as soon as I get Windoze transferred over to the new drive I bought (60G), that will free up the 40G for me to try it out. (Of course, I'm just happily 'Slackin' away" on my desktop box! ) Other people have reported great success with "Slacktops", but I still need to find some time to play "musical drives" so I can try it.

The first thing you should do is pay attention to the links flysideways posted above,, both of those sites are bursting with peoples experiences both good and bad with linux on damn near all brands of laptop.

This should help you decide which laptop to buy,
dont rush in and buy the first laptop you find or you might end up with squib.
spend a few days reading and then decide on your distro and the notebook to put it on.

PS Im running Slackware 10 on an HP ze5354 laptop with no problems everything I need to work does work, and works well.

Good Luck
Scott

Well I am buying an ibuypower.com laptop if not one from linuxcertified, for the performance i want/need its by far the cheapest. And its not listed on there.

If you are currently running Mandrake, I would stick with that on the laptop (go with 10.x). My Dell isn't supposed to be Linux certified, either, but Mandrake and Fedora both work just fine on it.

I plan on using suse. I installed it on my computer which is dual boot with severel other partitions and it caused alot of problems trying to be put into an already existing partition scheme like this so I took it off after using it for like an hour. I liked it more then mandrake actually.