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Comment by ivanstegic | Hacker News Reader

All the more reason to buy a Lenovo and put Linux on it.

Agree. I use macs every day, but long has passed the time that all the mac hardware you bought was available to use however you wanted. Sorry if I sound bitter, but I've been burned by Apple arbitrarily stopping me from doing something with my own hardware too often to be happy about it.

I booted Ubuntu on my Lenovo about a week ago. The first thing I tried to do was adjust the acceleration on the trackpad. There is no GUI for this like in other operating systems, so I spent a good hour fiddling with config files before I gave up and switched back to my Macbook Pro.

I use my mouse considerably more often than I change my WiFi mac address.

I do agree that trackpad support on Linux isn't the greatest, but you could have used the GNOME Tweaks settings application (GUI) to change your mouse acceleration profile. Maybe next time :)

This is a great example of what has always bugged me about Tweaks, the discoverability is horrible. People look through the Settings app, don't find what they want to change, and then assume there is no easy way to change it. How the hell is the average user supposed to know that GNOME Tweaks even exists?

I agree the Linux desktop has a come a LONG way in recent years and it is soooo close. It is stupid stuff like this that holds it back - the last little small tweaks that make like easier. Tweaks should just be part of Gnome - period. Put it in Settings - at minimum put it under and "Advanced" settings.

> I agree the Linux desktop has a come a LONG way in recent years and it is soooo close.

I've been hearing that since the late 90s. The uncomfortable truth is that Linux will never be a suitable Desktop environment because the Linux community doesn't care about the Desktop market. Ubuntu, Red Hat and various open source funds have more than enough money to hire top notch UX designers. But, they don't.

KDE provides extensive configuration options for the track pad, see https://userbase.kde.org/System_Settings/Touchpad. Maybe try Kubuntu next time. Linux does not necessarily mean Ubuntu/GNOME.

Ah yes, the Linux experience.

Step 1. Find guide on where to find guides for linux distro

Step 2. Read guide on how to find guide for X Linux distro

Step 3. Read guide on X Linux distro

Step 4. Install X Linux Distro

Step 5. ???

Step 6. Find out Linux distro doesn't have Y feature

Step 7. Repeat 1 to 6 indefinitely through the universe of NIH syndrome filled Linux

Or just install ubuntu LTS

Have you ever used Linux? What kind of features do some distros have that others don’t? You can run anything you want to.

Step 4b. Realize that the distro doesn't matter at all and actually read the guide instead of blindly copy&pasting.

I wanted to paint the walls of my apartment but could only find a guide for other apartments, so I torched the whole place and moved into another building with the right colored walls, but now my nice kitchen is gone.

I've been using linux on and off since 1999. Which guide am I supposed to read? The one that's only 1 year out of date, but no longer applies to Ubuntu? Or a guide clearly meant for a different distro with a different mix of pre-installed packages?

Why should I waste my time on any of it when there are two other perfectly good operating systems that can do this out of the box and don't require me to faf around for hours.

Take any you like, they all work.

> different mix of pre-installed packages

Like it matters.

> Why should I waste my time on any of it when there are two other perfectly good operating systems that can do this out of the box

Same argument for why I don't like to use windows. It comes with basically nothing out of the box, still has no proper package management and basic things like proper keyboard layouts, ctrlcaps, installing latex, browsers, email clients, text editors etc. take hours of faffing around. And then when things invariably don't quite work, troubleshooting is really annoyingly opaque. Why would I waste my time on that?

Simply restating my argument and pretending it applies to Windows equally doesn't fly with me. But thanks for re-affirming that the Linux community isn't worth dealing with.

Misrepresenting what I said and then hurling insults. Yeah, I think this discussion is over.

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Mouse_acceleration

Alternately, all the more reason to carry a travel router and only have that MAC talk to the upstream. (Added benefit is that it can auto VPN all traffic, and also you don’t have to configure your other wi-fi devices (phone, tablet(s), watch, second computer, et c) with whatever local temp wi-fi you are using that day.)

SIP on osx is way more user-friendly than selinux.

What's a good example of a travel router?

Something like the GL.iNet (sic) AR750 does the trick.

I carry a GL.iNet GL-MT300N-V2 (Mango) with my own build of openWRT on it. Allows for all sorts of network hackery. Powers right from the usb port on my laptop. I never connect "bare" to a public network without it.

I'd give up a considerable amount of battery capacity to have it built in to the laptop.

Can you run OpenWRT in a VM and have the laptop connect to the VM and the VM to the network?

How do you use it to login to captive WiFi portals?

Normally captive portals are just keyed on MAC and done through DNS redirect. In this case, just using a browser though the Mango in NAT Lan->Wifi works fine. This is nice because your Mango can then share that authenticated connection amongst many local devices (like my phone).

In rare cases where broadcast is required or even more diabolical network asshattery is afoot, I create a bridge on the Mango Lan<->Wifi with brctl. Of course, then your laptops ethernet MAC is exposed to the Wifi on the other side of your Mango. Even then, I've got a pretty snazzy etables filter to keep that hot mess under control.

What value does this provide, exactly?

Firewall and VPN for all your devices, no limit to the number of devices, no need to re-join and re-enter your hotel info periodically, and my favorite: use a chromecast dongle on the hotel TV.

The most immediate value is that once the mango knows it can see the internet, it routes everything behind it over openVPN out through my colo server neatly sidestepping any dns chicanery or malicious mitm attempts and instantly connects all of my devices straight through to my internal network.

Did I have any trouble at all with pandora on my phone or netflix on my ipad while I was in Europe or Australia? Nope. Never even gave it a second thought.

Even with the stock firmware, you just turn it on (USB-powered), connect to its WiFi network, connect to the hotel/captive network within its UI, and you’re done. Join all your devices to your own network. It even runs a VPN client you can activate with a little external switch.

You can use a USB wi-fi device passed through to a linux VM. It’s not quite the same but getting there.

I do this with a raspberry pi and a Ubiquiti Unifi Lite access point. You could also swap the Unifi with a second wireless adapter in the Pi to be more compact (I only do it that way because that's what I had laying around in my office closet.)

I imagine I am eventually going to end up with a rpi (built-in dualband wi-fi serving as AP) and a usb battery pack and a 4/5G modem strapped to my lower leg whenever I leave the house, backup pistol style, as smartphones become less and less able to be configured to preserve privacy.

Turns out I need to have root on my dns server and iptables/wireguard on my NAT router. It’s slowly becoming non-negotiable.

I have a P1 Thinkpad and absolutely love it, but Lenovo isn't necessarily a saint either. Really though, who is anymore.

For XCode, you can easily run macOS in QEMU with GPU passthrough. Linux is the best general purpose OS unless you're technically illiterate.

https://github.com/foxlet/macOS-Simple-KVM

Wouldn’t that be quite slow?

If it's fast enough to run triple A video games at an accecptable stable framerate, it should be fast enough to run an IDE.

The key here is GPU passthrough, giving it real graphics hardware means that it's near native (there's still overhead, but it's on the order of 5% compared to completely native).

Works on my machine. There's virtually no difference between bare metal. Of course you need enough cores and dynamic memory (GPU memory too) to run your host OS and macOS. No benchmarks but it feels snappier than my 2017 MBP.

Other links that may be helpful:

https://github.com/kholia/OSX-KVM

https://collaboradev.com/2018/10/19/arch-linux-running-osx-h...

Note that this violates the macOS licensing conditions unless you're running on Apple hardware.

Be careful which one you buy, my X1 Yoga did not do well at all with it. Typing this on a Purism Librem 13

Bought an X1C7 and the only thing I can’t use is my Fibocom LTE modem and finger print scanner. Works great OOTB.

Arch has the most complete compatibility info out there: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Lenovo_ThinkPad_X1_Carb...

Might be. Stick to T series Thinkpads or X1 Carbon and there aren't any problems. I personally think the X1 Carbon is a PERFECT replacement for a macbook. The only thing lagging is the trackpad. Its not bad but no PC trackpad is quite as good as the macbook one. Plus the X1 Carbon keyboard is a luxury to type on - esp compared to the current macbook keyboards.

However it is not enough of a burden these days (to me) to make it worth going to a macbook pro these days...

What about E series Thinkpads? I'm looking at buying one.

I havent tried E series - might be worth hitting think pad subreddit (or something equivalent) and asking about it. The ones I mentioned are from personal exp so I'm pretty confident about those.

How do you like the Purism Librem? I'm a long-time MacBook user but have been looking around (and holding onto my late-2013). I'm curious about the build quality of the Purism machines. I'm willing to spend quite a bit on my tools. And I still remember the issues that ThinkPad's had with backdoors... so, I'd love to find something that has a high build-quality and puts the user first.

My friend bought one recently (last month), it has absolute garbage wifi. I know it's about open fireware/baseband but the wifi card is old and has also shit reception.

You can easily change it but for a $1,400 laptop...

The build quality seems okay but definitely not Apple level. Still my friend complained a week ago about screen flickers.

So, the Purism Librem is a purpose-built laptop. It wants to first, respect your freedom, and second, provide excellent build quality. It succeeds on both of those goals.

Does it succeed at build quality better than Apple? It's arguable. The UX on Apple laptops is great, however the durability on the Librem is commanding. Does it respect your privacy more than Apple? 100% yes. There are hardware switches for wifi and microphone / video. It comes by default with a Debian-based, FSF-approved OS, which I personally replaced with Ubuntu for reasons. I consider it a fine laptop equal in build quality to everything but a late-model ThinkPad, especially since Apple's been screwing the pooch in that regard.

I've owned a System76 Galago Pro, not the current gen, and the Librem blows it out of the water in every single category. I buy a lot of System76 hardware, having purchased three machines in the past year. The Meerkat is a great little powerhouse. But their laptops just aren't as focused hardware-wise as Purism's offering. If you want that ultrabook experience in a durable package with curated hardware for Linux compatibility, there isn't anything else to buy, except perhaps the Dell XPS, but Purism.

That also said, if you're looking for a desktop replacement, the Librem won't be your cup of tea. System76 just came out with their Adder 4k which looks amazing and I've been resisting the urge to drop $4k on one for weeks. I dunno how the build quality compares but I don't think it can really touch the Librem in that regard. I'm thinking S76 is competing with Dell while Purism is competing with Apple. YMMV

If you do so don't get a T490 or if you do don't get an NVidia card. It'll destroy your battery life. The (Lenovo and others) forums have threads on these issue. For me idle time dropped from 11 to 3h.As someone else mentioned as well don't get the "best" WWAN Modem (850 something I believe ) as there are _no_ Linux drivers.

In other news: anyone wants to buy a lightly used lenovo T490?

It wont destroy your battery life. I have a t480s with the nvidia card. You need to turn the card off when booting linux and just use the cpu for display. Research a bit about bumblebee and bbswitch.

Wait, how is "it won't destroy your battery life" somehow supported by "you need to turn off the card when booting linux". It sounds like you're saying it will destroy the battery life if it's not turned off. Did I misread that?

Sorry, I should have been more clear. Do you have a reason to use the graphics card on battery in Linux? Most people don't, so turning it off makes sense. You didn't misread it.

The problem is that on the T490 you can't turn it off. It never enters power saving states on Linux and there's no UEFI option to disable it.

There's plenty of threads on the Lenovo forums about this.

Yep. I've used Macs since Apple's first Intel release because they were good, hackable x86 machines.

That's no longer the case, and I already use Ubuntu. The switch will be easy, and as an added bonus, it will be cheaper.

Or just buy Purism or System76 to help fund the Linux computer industry.

How does the WSL compare to full-blown Linux/macOS these days?

Can't run perf or docker in wsl1. wsl2 is a linux vm with better host integration than usual due to the guest tools from microsoft.

Not really a viable replacement if you rely on X11 or any GUI stuff. If you're content in a command shell you can do a lot though and it integrates nicely with the environment.

Text console is glitchy

and you still need to use windows filesystem, which was a dealbreaker for me.

It's a better alternative to Cygwin, but Cygwin wasn't all that useful before. There are just too many differences between Linux and Windows. You are better off using Windows as a thin client SSHing into a remote Linux session.

WSL2 might be better when it gets released in final form, but when I used WSL it was better than cygwin etc but still a PITA to deal with.

Personally I think Linux (Fedora or Ubuntu) on Lenovo Thinkpads - esp X1 Carbons is the best option.

Sorry, but Linux desktop environments are still 10+ years behind both Windows and macOS.

I'm not looking forward to the ads and spyware I'll get in 10+ years.

Yep, Xcode is pretty much the only reason for me to have a Mac these days.

https://github.com/foxlet/macOS-Simple-KVM

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