p150HM and linux

[kennyams]

Just ordered a P150HM, no OS, Will be installing ubuntu 11.04 on it. Its great that suppliers are now beginning to come forward with the no OS option. My current laptop is an eeepc 901, bought as it came with linux, its been a great machine but is a little slow. Now need a desktop replacment with a bit of umph, Old one is big, old and clunky and is hardly ever used, even though it now has ubuntu on it as well. Its also the last machine I hope to buy with windows pre installed.
I have been looking for quite a while for a supplier of the p150hm machine in the uk. I did find two others but they got really bad reviews on the forums.
I found one company, link below, outside the uk that supplies this machine with ubunu pre installed so hopefully It will be ok with computability.
http://www.ggsdata.se/index-en.php?p.../p150hm-en.php
Has anyone else install linux on this machine? I will let you know how I get on but would be interested to here if anyone else has had a go.

[ubuntu-user]

The short answer is I don't know about that specific machine but in my case I found that Ubuntu 11.04 installed easily (very impressive), I just had to install the proprietary drivers for the video card.

I think given that line of laptops is used by System76, one of the leaders in preinstalled ubuntu, you can be reasonably confident it will work, you may even be able to find answers to any queries on their forums.

Good luck

Stephen

[onlynik]

I run a Linux Mint VM (which is based on Ubuntu) and Have no problems with it what so ever. If I didn't play games I'd drop Windows like a stone (and quit paying them £300 a year too)

[pr1s0ner]

Gaming is the only thing that keeps me on w'dos as well

[kennyams]

Thanks ubuntu user for pointing me at system 76, same spec as the one I should get tomorrow.
I suppose I should have pointed out that the machine is a 15.6" Vortex II 15 as some people may not know that these products are based on Clevo systems. One of the reasons it took me so long to find this site is that I was looking for a p150hm. Might be a good Idea if this company put the code for the oem in the blurb.
Not sure why pcspecialists did not offer this memory config:
16 GB Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1600MHz - 4 X 4GB ( +$295.00 )
as system76 do.
I had terrible problems with ATI cards and linux but I believe that nvidia are much better for linux, another reason for getting this machine.
I used to be a big fan of gaming in the days of quake 1 but I am getting to slow and old now. May see if I can get some of my old games running under wine though.

[pr1s0ner]

If anything, I've had more success with newer games running in wine. I guess its where the main effort is.

[ubuntu-user]

If anything, I've had more success with newer games running in wine. I guess its where the main effort is.

I only ever play oolite, but sometime would like to get Doom I and Quake I running for some retro gaming

[pr1s0ner]

The Doom engine runs natively on linux

[kennyams]

Been a bit tied up to reply to the forum for a while New Laptop to hack.
First I tried to install ubuntu64 from cd but it did not work. Ubuntu 32 bit installs fine and everything seems to be working apart from the finger print sensor. Found some projects that support the finger print sensor so may try and install something for this when I get time. Nvidia drivers seem to be working ok but then I have not done anything 3d intensive yet. Trying to get to grips with blender. Best to use the version from the blender from web site as the ubuntu packaged one seems a little old.
I have not install ubuntu 64 along side the 32 bit version. Had to use a usb flash drive of 2gig. half way though the boot process the drive seems to get unmounted and you need to pull it out and put it in again. Install is then seemless. Back on the 32 bit partition now as this is where everything is configured.
I tried to run my old version of populous the beginning but had no luck. Just remembered that I did run the game openareana which seem to be a clone of quake III. This worked very well indeed.
Very impressed with the 1900 by 1000 display, great for viewing pictures and for software development.
The only downside so far is that my 3 3g dongle does not work, the modem manager keeps crashing. I think I will be able to get by my using my N900 as a modem though via bluetooth.
If anyone wants a linux laptop without paying the windows tax then I would really recommend this machine.

[kennyams]

Happy to report the finger print sensor works as well