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Comment by farmin | Hacker News Reader

I am giving my MacBook Air M2 15” to my wife and bought a Lenovo E16 with 120hz screen to run Kubuntu last night. She needed a new laptop and I am had enough of macOS and just need some stuff to work that will be easier on an intel and Linux. Also I do bookwork online so bigger screen and dedicated numpad will be nice. It reviews well and seems like good value for money with current holiday sales but I don’t expect the same hardware quality or portability just a little more freedom. I hope I’m not too disappointed. https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-E16-G3-Review-...

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If you're running desktop Linux, you will have a better experience with a rolling release than being stuck with whatever state the software that was frozen in Debian/Ubuntu is in, especially when it comes to multimedia, graphics, screen sharing, etc.

Modern desktop Linux relies on software that's being fixed and improving at a high velocity, and ironically, can be more stable than relying on a distro's fixed release cycles.

KDE Plasma, Wayland support, Pipewire, etc all have had recent fixes and improvements that you will not get to enjoy for another X months/years until Canonical pulls in those changes and freezes them for release.

Similarly, newer kernels are a must when using relatively recent hardware. Fixes and support for new hardware lands in new kernels, LTS releases might not have the best support for your newer hardware.

> can be more stable than relying on a distro's fixed release cycles

Stability for a distro means “doesn’t change” not “doesn’t crash”.

Debian/ubuntu are stable because they freeze versions so you can even create scripts to work around bugs and stuff and be sure that it will keep working throughout that entire release.

Arch Linux is not stable because you get updates every day or whatever. Maybe you had some script or patch to work around a bug and tomorrow it won’t work anymore.

This does not say _anything_ about crashing or bugs, except that if you find a bug/crash on a stable system then it is likely you can rely on this behaviour.

Agree. If you use a rolling release you definitely need a strategy for stability. I turn off automatic updates and schedule planned full updates that I can easily roll back from. I've had two breakages over the years that required snapper rollback. (Rolling back from a major distro upgrade isn't that easy)

It's a tradeoff that I'm happy with. I get to have a very up to date system.

> you will have a better experience with a rolling release than being stuck with whatever state the software that was frozen in Debian/Ubuntu is in

That's a wild statement!

That’s interesting comment. I didn’t think about that. I’ve only ever used Ubuntu flavours so I’ll search through what the popular rolling releases are out of interest.

I just upgrade Ubuntu every 6 months. To me that's a pretty good compromise between up to date packages and stability.

I would recommend Fedora KDE Edition over Kubuntu, but I guess it's a personal choice.

I’ve only ever used Ubuntu flavours but maybe I should give it a try. Thanks

Fedora also has ThinkPad compability program and a nice way to install/update Lenovo drivers.

The problem with Ubuntu, as other mentioned, is that you get ancient version of some packages. Fedora is nicely up to date.

Is this actually such a big point? I feel like (subjectively) on Ubuntu everything gets updated just as fast, and even if not, there's a new full release every 6 months. Or is this actually rather slow in comparison to Feroda?

I've also only used Debian based stuff my whole life and even moving from apt to dnf or whatever it was causes too much friction for me haha, though it's not that bad obviously, if I really would see the positives.

I guess it depends. I find it annoying when I read about some feature and then it turns out the package is several versions behind the newest one and I can't try it without jumping hoops to install it from some alternative source. That happened with GCC and ImageMagick to me on Ubuntu and I swiftly uninstalled it :)

I outfitted our 10 person team with the E16 g2 and it’s been great.

Two minor issues- it’s HEAVY compared to T models.

Because of the weight try not to walk around with the lid up and holding it from one of front corners. I’ve noticed one of them is kind of warped from walking around the office holding it that way.

That’s great news thanks. I got the gen 3 so maybe some improvements. Weight is ok as I really just move it around the house. I buy used Panasonics for the workshop.

Are you running windows?

> I’ve noticed one of them is kind of warped from walking around the office holding it that way.

That’s not at all reassuring.

Kubuntu is nice. Not sure why it's not more popular. Or maybe it's just a quieter user base?

Been a kubuntu user since .. 2006? 2007? Don't remember when kubuntu became a thing, but as soon as I tried Ubuntu, I went kubuntu. I believe it was 5.10 or 6.04 or something. :-)

Am growing tired of Ubuntu though. Just not sure where I should turn. I want a .deb based system. Ubuntu is pushing snaps too heavily for my liking.

So, Debian? No snaps and that’s my main motivation

I was a very long time debian user who got burned by Ubuntu and derivatives far too many times personally and professional. I moved to Fedora a few years back and it was a great decision. No regrets.

Just use Debian and switch it to Testing. Works amazingly well and you'll always have relatively current and generally stable software.

I liked Ubuntu and variants back when it first came out and I was newer to Linux but it didn't take long for me to realise there always seemed to be a better option for me as a daily driver. To me its like an new Linux user OS where a lot of stuff is chosen for you to use basically as is. Even the name Kubuntu where the K is for KDE but on other distros you would just choose your DE when you install.

I agree. It feels like combination of peak windows UI with the ease of Ubuntu baked in. Then the little mobile app they have that gives you shared clipboard with iOS is cool.

Also consider Kinoite, the immutable Fedora KDE (like Silverblue). Very effective and robust.

If I was you I will have gone for the T or X series

Why?

E is more like a budget line of ThinkPads, at least compared to X and T.

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