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> 2. I need to authorize dock (Lenovo's thunderbolt dock) after every reboot.

If you're still facing this, there is UI for remembering the authorization https://christian.kellner.me/2018/04/23/the-state-of-thunder...

I'm on a AMD device right now so I can't test it myself, just sharing the link in case its useful :)

>4. I need to have pulse audio volume control window opened all the time, otherwise the laptop loses my external sound card after first call via browser, and I need to turn it off/on.

Sounds is really bad

To get sound on my headphones, I need to restart pulseaudio and ALSA, and unplug and replug the headphones

I was having huge flaky thunderbolt problems on my Linux T490 - even updating the laptop firmware didn't fix it despite Lenovo changelogs indicating a bunch of thunderbolt dock bugs fixed.

Then I swapped the Lenovo thunderbolt dock with another one at work and everything just worked fine. I run 3 monitors (2 external 2560x1440) at once, but no 4k.

Maybe it was dock firmware versions - the Lenovo dock updater software was Windows only, so I had never tried it.

    sudo fwupdmgr update

was finding updates for thunderbolt dock on linux

> 1. Carbon, due to it's intel chip, can not drive 4K and 2K external monitors via thunderbolt adapter.

Is this a Linux only issue? I saw people reporting on Reddit that they are using 4k @ 60hz external monitors. Was thinking of getting an X1C but not if it can't do 4k

I wouldn't be surprised if it was a thunderbolt linux issue. The dell "docking station" usb-c hubs don't really work well with anything else than dell windows machines. Same with some lenovo bluetooth mice.

I do remember however that contrary to macos my 2012 macbook air could drive higher resolution external monitors when running linux. So I'd put this into the Thunderbolt is a hackjob on linux box.

I think this might be issue with given laptop.

Some non-apple laptops sometimes reduce badwidth of thunderbold 3 (e.g. in mine t490s the bandwidth is halved, just because - this is hardware, not linux).

> can not drive 4K and 2K external monitors via thunderbolt adapter.

VGA ftw

> screen tearing sucks

it sure does. look into your os config for a compositor or drop the following into /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-intel.conf :

  Section "Device"
   Identifier "Intel Graphics"
   Driver     "intel"
   Option     "AccelMethod" "sna"
   Option     "TearFree"    "true"
  EndSection

Why does it have a ‘tearfree’ ‘false’ option?

From the man page

> Thus enabling TearFree requires more memory and is slower (reduced throughput) and introduces a small amount of output latency, but it should not impact input latency

However, TearFree does murder performance and lead to some horrible screen lag at times, and as an extra bonus AccelMethod sna is still crashy years after being introduced :(

edit: there's also the modesetting driver + a reasonable compositor, but this can come with it's own set of bugs and issues in my experience.

I've been interested in recording music using free software on Linux. The exchange above is similar to the cycle I've been in... encountering problems, finding magical incantations that fix things in some ways but often involve some sort of tradeoff, and making gradual progress toward being as productive as I am using Apple's Logic.

But I've been doing this three steps forward, two steps back routine for like three years now. I have most things working but it has really taken the full force of my frustration with Apple to keep returning to it and making progress.

It's exactly why I have mac laptops for work and personal use, although I also have a full time linux desktop (and also a windows one for gaming. still no real alternative there!).

I'm an easily frustrated person and I end up with enough pain points on linux for both work and personal use that I've never managed to make the switch full time.

Curious. If you had to buy tomorrow, what would you do? Given that M1 Pro won't be out till end of 21(?) and despite that, current Pros don't seem to come with a reduced price.

I have a 13” M1 pro, it’s easily the best computer I’ve owned (and I have a Ryzen 3600/Vega 10 desktop with 128GB of RAM that runs KDE Plasma very well, but there’s still no competition)

I haven't done my research recently. Thinkpad works fine with Windows, so, most likely, it'd be last gen Mac/Thinkpad Extreme or something in that league.

I had hopes that Microsoft will evolve Surface Books to normal processors, but it seems like the line is dying.

> 3. The screen tearing sucks.

Use Wayland instead of X11.

I was trying to make the Mac to Linux switch just like the author, mostly due to excitement around sway (wayland). But it was awful, none of the basic things I wanted to do seemed doable...I would research solutions and they wouldn’t work. So I tried switching to i3 in the hopes of at least having a more established ecosystem to rely on.

But similar story. Half-baked (or sometimes, overcooked) support, configs that we’re supposed to swap eg CapsLock with Escape not working as described or losing their effect after sleep, impossible to get my multi monitor high DPI setup to work without coloration or resolution issues, futzing around with sound and not able to get it working as hoped just like the last time I tried to do this in 2008...you know, all the things you want before you start doing actual work, but none of them function properly OOTB or, often, even after reading extensive documentation and advice.

I wish I could use i3, but my BetterTouchTool configuration gives me something that is close enough.

I might still try FreeBSD, but I totally feel twice-burned by Linux at this point.

> I was trying to make the Mac to Linux switch just like the author

I've tried a couple of times, but finally decided what's the point. Linux is amazing on all the servers I run and manage. It's lightweight, supported well, and does a great job. I also rarely have to tinker with it. For servers, it really does just work.

On the PC side not so much. I used to run linux in various flavors on the desktop side for years. It provided more power than windows IMO. Then OS X came out with actual unix underpinnings, a functional media system (UI, audio, video), and fully supported creative apps like Ps, MS Office, and later LR.

Against my better judgement I tried a final time move to desktop linux a couple of years ago, but multi-monitor mixes of hi and low dpi were just unworkable. I actually posted a question (it may have been here on HN - can't remember), and one of the responses was 'no one needs HiDPI screens'. Got it.