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Comment by dontbenebby | Hacker News Reader

What's a good Linux friendly laptop which uses AMD?

My recommendation here is to wait a couple of months until Ryzen 3 comes out in laptops. While an IPC boost is nice (rumors are between 10% - 20%) the real reason I say this is because the new 7nm process should net a significant reduction in energy consumption. AMDs demo of Zen 3 in January showed their 8c/16t CPU performed almost identical to Intel's 9900k with 1/3 less the power consumption.

Ryzen Mobile 3000-Series was already launched at CES, it's already available in certain models. It's also worth mentioning that these are 12nm chips based on Zen+, not 7nm and Zen 2 (the new architecture launching in a couple of weeks).

Yep. The 7nm is coming in Q3/Q4 as the Ryzen 3000 for desktop, the mobile ones based on 7nm aren't even on the roadmap yet, and if, would be the mobile Ryzen 4000 series.

Mobile AMD chips are always lagging around one year behind the desktop ones. So mobile Zen 2 (7nm) will come out next year probably.

Thanks for the detailed reply. If I don’t game does it still apply? I run VMs sometimes but usually have no issues since I tend to stock up on RAM.

If your VMs consume CPU, as opposed to mostly waiting, many cores with low power consumption are beneficial.

If all the VMs do is waiting for a network packet 99.9% of time, then not so much.

It's not anything super resource intensive beyond the inherent need for the resources of the VM + host. I just got sick of dealing with some of macOS's idiosynchacies in it's Very Special Epiosde of BSD that is their CLI interface, so I spin up an Xbuntu or Debian image when I have a project. (That + snapshots makes it a lot less painful to try interesting things)

My 2 cents as someone looking to get a new (mid-range gaming) laptop this year: The new ones coming out currently and within the next few months. You'll find the amount of AMD Ryzen in mobiles has skyrocketed the last two years.

We now have AMD Ryzen CPUs combined with nVidia dGPU solutions, unthinkable just a year ago. I'm still waiting for the Ryzen 3750Hs to hit the (German) market, but if I had to buy tomorrow, I'd presently opt for the Asus FX505DT-EB73. This one has an NV dGPU, there's also an arguably Linux friendlier AMD RX 560 of that laptop available, too.

I personally would also prefer an AMD dGPU solution, but the RX 560/580 is already old and I don't think AMD has a solution anytime soon either, unfortunately...

I'd say only go with NV GPU on Linux if you really need CUDA. Otherwise it's just pain, at least if you plan on using Wayland.

Yeah, if you even need dedicated GPUs at all, as usually it's Gamers who are looking for those and they're usually on Windows systems anyways (really looking forward to installing Windows 7 on the laptop I mentioned if I do get it this year - kinda mean that both ironic and not-ironic...).

The built-in Radeon Vega 8 or 10 solutions on all mobile Ryzens are usually better and more efficient than current Intel counterparts, so if you don't need a dGPU, then that's one more reason to root for Team Green.

EDIT: In case anyone reading isn't aware, nVidia is a biaaatch when it comes to drivers for Linux. Anyone looking for powerful GPUs in Linux machines, no matter desktop or laptop, has an easier life with AMD solutions. That's the reason there's an infamous photo of Linus showing the finger to nVidia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVpOyKCNZYw

Nvidia works for me. Works for amazon (https://docs.aws.amazon.com/dlami/latest/devguide/gpu.html) and others as well.

Yeah, but you're referring to "super-computing" situations, where the OS of choice is Linux and nVidia would be shooting themselves in the foot if they only developed drivers for Windows.

When it comes to normal consumer hardware, it seems that nVidia drivers for Linux in 2019 are still a hit and miss:

https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/bhfjnb/nvidia...

https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/bol5uo/nvidia...

EDIT: Maybe my formulation of "powerful GPUs" led you on to that. Though I did say "no matter desktop or laptop" to clarify that...

> Maybe my formulation of "powerful GPUs" led you on to that.

No, "nvidia is a biaaatch" led me. I just stated that my experience is different. How about you share your actual experience?

I might be biased as I used GPUs for scientific computations and Nvidia reached level where it "just" works on Linux many years ago.

Also: * Steam and few games I have on my laptop (ubuntu) with nvidia mobile graphics work fine.

* My home workstation (gentoo) and workstation at work (ubuntu) also work fine.

AMD "just works" even without installing the binary blob from the vendor.

as a matter of fact, there is no need to install said binary as its most likely already upstreamed to your distribution of choice.

but nvidia still reigns supreme if we're talking actual performance ... at least after you've installed said binary blob ;)

and i can say from personal experience that the nvidia 10x0 drivers were terrible in the first ~6 month after their release. fan kept jumping between 10-80% for example. Haven't had any issues in at least a year though, but i'd expect the same kind of issues on any new chipset by nvidia, as they havent open sourced their drivers

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Radeon-V...

Is there a decent thin-and-light AMD laptop? Looking to buy the successor to my Dell XPS 13 and would strongly prefer AMD if I can find something ultrabook-like with a QHD or above resolution screen

>looking to get a new (mid-range gaming) laptop this year

If you can, build a gaming PC instead; you'll have a more powerful and more upgradeable machine for a fraction of the money (as low as $600[0]). And it'll likely work. In my experience, gaming laptops don't work. Laptops in general don't work, but especially gaming ones and especially for gaming. Ironically, this gets truer the more expensive a laptop is, which is the opposite for PCs.

0: https://youtu.be/e9aRzfF4WCw?t=162

I already have a gaming PC, and her R9 280 is being replaced by an RX580 this week... :)

And yes, it really needs to be a gaming laptop, I travel for work, and I have had good experiences gaming on the go. It's still a relief to get back home to the desktop, no doubt, but I'm often gone for two days to two weeks, and I'd still like to be able to pull a few frags in that time... :D

I'm currently using an Intel 4702MQ with a GTX 760M in an Acer package, she used to be fine to play CSGO, but that's no longer the case either...

Some model numbers you might be interested in googling:

- Older models: Acer Swift 3, HP Envy x360 and Lenovo IdeaPad 720S, Thinkpad e585

- Newer models: Thinkpad T495 (and T495s), Lenovo Flex 14, Asus VivoBook F512, Honor Magic Book 2019 Ryzen

I've had great linux experiences with Asus and Thinkpads in particular. Mixed but recently better with HP and Acer. No experience with Huawei/Honor.

I've had a fair experience with Lenovos, in particular my Ideapad Y700 (few years now) and my wife's Thinkpad A485.

I'm looking forward to the upcoming T495s that drop the A moniker to replace my y700.

Don't know about the A485, but the E585 _still_ needs kernel command line changes to boot. Lenovo refuse to make a simple patch to the BIOS :(

Dell Latitude 5495. Ryzen 2700U. Great machine! I use one daily and it is standard for my company.

System76 might be a place to look. I think they have a few AMD models.

I can only find Intel laptops on their site. AMD only seems to be available in their desktops. The laptop, mini, and server lineups only have Intel CPUs.

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