Hello,
after a long time with my old Dell laptop I am choosing a new notebook to install Slackware 14.2 between:

• Dell Latitude 5000 with Intel Core i5-5200U (5th generation), Intel HD 5500 graphics
• Dell Latitude E5570 with Intel Core i5-6440HQ (6th generation), Intel HD 530 graphics

I would like to buy the more powerful i5-6440HQ CPU, but is the 6th generation CPU currently well supported on Linux (and Slackware 14.2) or is it better to stay on the safe side and buy the older i5-5200U?

See Skylake's power management under Linux is dreadful and you shouldn't buy one until it's fixed
What about the graphics card?

Thank you for your help.

Your posted link was interesting. Can you postpone your purchase?

I wouldn't advise you, but I wrote a 'note to self' not to go near Skylake CPUs until that's sorted out reading the posted link. You don't know what the fix is going to take - patches to linux, patches to intel microcode, hardware firmware fixes. Not everything like that is retrofittable.

A good thing would be to see if there's traffic on the LKML about it, or bugs, or anything. Search for filed bugs, or post. A lot of knowledgeable heads growl at each other on that list. You're sure to reach the relevant world expert.

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There's this thread already going on with Skylake's graphical issue with Slackware -current -

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...-a-4175576874/

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Skylake is problematic with the DDX driver. A few of the latest git pulls have been favorable but still not entirely useful for everyone. I'm trying to get some research done using modesetting as an alternative to load the egl driver here: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ng-4175577805/ if you'd like to participate.

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Phoronix had an article about this (skylake's power management) a week or two ago, and several people showed powertop dumps that claimed to include the levels mentioned as "not attainable". You might want to search for that and see if that helps your decision..

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Everything Matthew said is true. My own Skylake HQ laptop that is finally stable after many, many hours of experimentation plus tracking driver, graphics and kernel development at the bleeding edge. 90% of the what you hit in google is outdated, incorrect or even dangerous.

If you are not comfortable building kernels, driver software from git pulls, platform firmware updates, non-standard boot and configurations, and dealing with hybrid graphics, you may want to take the more established platform or wait a few more months.

Unfortunately skylake is not a divide and conquer space since all the pieces play together and not having a visible screen is hard stop. The 6QE took 230 boots to get stable, and its only 3 weeks old, and the nvidia graphics I need for digital photos is still not working.

That being said, there is much satisfaction from getting things stable enough to use without crashing, and you'll learn about the magic that happens at the hardware level.

Good luck,

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Thank you for all your replies. I finally decided to buy an Intel Core i7-5500U based notebook. Not high end but more than enough for my needs. Now it's just a matter of waiting for 14.2 :-)