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Comment by olefoo | Hacker News Reader

I think it goes to show how slowly culture changes in hardware manufacturing that this isn't a checkbox feature that is in the press kit for new model releases.

From looking at the parts list, it seems like it ought to be reasonably easy to install and run linux ( even the WWAN card looks like it should work with the right drivers ) and yet it's not mentioned. It seems like they are missing out on a core market segment by not slapping a Linux Foundation badge on their website or box saying known to work with Kernel Version x.x and up. Or failing that I think both Canonical and Redhat would be glad to have their logo on there and all three orgs would only need a couple of days to validate on a pre-release model.

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I assume it's just reflecting the harsh reality of desktop linux marketshare, which is somewhere below Windows Vista.

Looks like Canonical at least is doing that: http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/hardware/201411-16196/

"awarded the status of Certified Pre-Install for Ubuntu"

"Certification notes: Hibernate is not working on this system"

Be wary of Ubuntu's certification. I have a Lenovo X140e. It's certified to work with no issues[1], but I spent months fixing basic things like graphics acceleration and screen brightness. Though it has an 802.11n card, wifi transfers at G speeds. I still can't get Bluetooth to work. The X1's all-Intel hardware should fare better, but I'd still recommend waiting for a Linux-centric review before ordering.

1. http://www.ubuntu.com/certification/hardware/201309-14195/

Did you get a preinstalled system? They make quite clear that standard images might not work with certain hardware which sounds exactly like what you are experiencing?

I tried, but I'm not sure Lenovo ever actually offered the X140e with Ubuntu preinstalled. The option isn't available on Lenovo's website. When customizing the order, OS choices are all Windows. I ended up buying over the phone, but couldn't get a Linux preinstall that way either. The person on the other end was just filling out a form similar to the one on the website.

Since I couldn't get Ubuntu preinstalled, I made sure to order the exact hardware specified on Ubuntu's certification page: A4-5000 APU, BCM43142 Wifi/Bluetooth, etc. I also updated the BIOS to the latest version, which had fixes for Linux.

I realize I was rather unlucky. The X140e is not a popular piece of hardware. Next time, I'll be sure to pick something widely used.

As part of Ubuntu certification if an altered image is used then we supply that to the OEM. So Lenovo was given an image for the X140e - that's why the Cert page specifies a vendor image.

You have to request that image from the manufacturer. Probably through their support process. I don't know how it works for Lenovo.

The reason this happens is because hardware revisions and Linux kernel, and OS releases (e.g Ubuntu) are not in sync with each other. Eventually the changes for each hardware certification flows into the Ubuntu LTS release for that time. So, they probably went into 12.04.2 in this case. But, in some rare cases it's not possible for all changes to be taken - so generally it's best to get the preinstall image.

@ggreer, I have pretty much the same latop (e145) and I still have issue with video (free driver), for example the video quality in HD is very bad. Most of the power is handled by the processor and not by the video card... Did you find any solution ?

Yes, modern Linux kernel might have pretty much everything to run this laptop's hardware, however it is likely a very different story when it comes to graphical desktop compatibility.. considering it'll need upscaling to quad HD resolution, many Linux GUI's might struggle with that..

I'm using Debian on a Retina MacBook Pro 13" with very similar specs for some months now with Xfce and my own HiDPI theme and it works very well. Here's some documentation on it: http://mntmn.com/Hipster%20Linux

There was a specific mention of Linux support in one of the spec tables toward the top of the article.

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