Will this laptop work with Ubuntu?

[adajac566]

I'd like to buy a laptop with the following spec. Does anyone know of any reason why any of it might not play nicely with Ubuntu?

Chassis & Display
UltraNote: 14" Matte Full HD IPS LED Backlit Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i5 Dual Core Processor i5-6200U (2.30GHz, 2.8GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM)
8GB HyperX IMPACT 1600MHz SODIMM DDR3 (1 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
INTEL® HD GRAPHICS 520 - 1.7GB Max DDR3 Video RAM - DirectX® 12
1st Hard Disk
1TB WD SLIM BLUE 2.5" WD10SPCX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (5400 rpm)
M.2 SSD Drive
120GB KINGSTON SSDNow M.2 2280 G2, SATA 6Gb/s (550MB/R, 200MB/W)
Memory Card Reader
Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
Sound Card
Realtek 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Wireless/Wired Networking
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® AC-8260 M.2 (867Mbps, 802.11AC) + BLUETOOTH
USB Options
2 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT AS STANDARD
Battery
UltraNote III Series 32WH Lithium Ion Battery
Power Cable
1 x UK Power Lead & 40W AC Adaptor
Keyboard Language
14" ULTRANOTE III SERIES UK KEYBOARD
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
DVD Recovery Media
NO DVD RECOVERY MEDIA REQUIRED
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 1MP HD WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Insurance
1 Month Free Laptop Insurance inc. Accidental Damage & Theft
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 9 to 11 working days
Quantity
1

(with apologies for cross posting on the "check this spec" thread: a reply there suggested this might be a better place for my question)

 

[Wozza63]

Should work fine. Ubuntu is usually pretty good with hardware compatibility. Xubuntu worked fine on my Cosmos II laptop and I don't think I've seen any forum threads complaining about major issues with Linux. You may wish to search the forums to see if anyone else has installed Linux on the UltraNote and find their experiences.

 

[Stephen M]

Looks OK. You may need to fiddle a bot when installing Ubuntu, disabling UEFI, secure boot is sometimes needed and installing with "nomodeset" may be needed. I have put a varoety of distros on two PCS machines and had no major problems.

 

[adajac566]

Thanks folks. After a little googling I have found a couple of bits that looks like they may cause problems. Looks like mostly they get fixed, but it sounds like I could spend a lot of time fiddling about first.

I think on reflection I may buy my laptop from Entroware instead. They're a bit more expensive, but given that they guarantee Linux compatibility I think that's probably a price worth paying.

 

[Wozza63]

You may be able to contact PCS, they may have a better knowledge of which parts may cause issues. But personally, I've never had an issue installing Linux in the 4 years I've been using it on and off across a number of machines. It's not the issue that it once was. The one big problem it does have with some laptops is Nvidia Optimus but as you are using onboard graphics and no dedicated GPU, it will not be an issue.

 

[adajac566]

I tried contacting PCS. They said they have no idea which components may or may not work with Linux, and I would be buying the system entirely at my own risk. I'm sure you're right that it's a small risk, but nonetheless, it's a risk I'd rather not take if I don't have to.

 

[Wozza63]

Yeah I can understand that. Have you tried to Google each of the parts and their compatibility? The only thing I can see that might be of any issue is the wireless internet and possibly the webcam.

 

[Spectech]

I should think this would work with Ubuntu
I don't see a reason why those specs wouldn't work on Debian
The only problem you may have is the Ethernet and wireless, which can be fixed via a simple package install.
The only other problem you may have would again be with the wireless, but that is fixable by upgrading the kernel, which I recommend anyway.

 

[Hamamelis]

I am thinking about buying an 14" UltraNote III too with more or less the same spec. I would expect it to work fine with LinuxMint17 (based on Ubuntu Trusty 14.04 LTS). I use kernel 4.2.2-040202-generic.
I would expect everything to work with the exception of the brightness +/- keys, but there are ways of fixing this: DuckDuckGo it.

When I first get the new laptop, what I usually do is to take a working LinuxMint hard disk or SSD out of one computer and put it into the new laptop. I have found that this way the kernel boots fine and almost all the software works. (Make certain that you do NOT try to boot a MSWindows partition - it will stop working.) From here I copy the boot, system and data partitions to existing internal HD or SSD except MSWindows. If you do not wish to insert the HD, you can boot off an external SSD using a USB adaptor. The other way is to insert the external disk into the DVD slot using a special caddy. I think this caddy may be supplied with the Ultranote but I use a cheap one that I bought. You will have to do minor adjustments to the bios setup to boot from the correct disk. After this you may with to reinstall the Linux system but I have never found I needed to do this.

On my Samsung Q210 with LinuxMint17 I use two external monitors when at home connected to HDMI and VGA, setup suing ARandR. Using the internal Intel graphics the two monitors appear OK on a fresh boot. I have found that on resume after Suspend or Hibernate that the HDMI monitor will not start. Everything works but the HDMI screen is blank. You may experience this problem. The HDMI monitor start fine with an Nvidia card - but it has other niggling problems.