> I just got my new HP laptop, don't know if any of you noticed it > lastnight. I would like to turn it to a linux box, Gentoo most likely. > This will be my first install of linux on a laptop. It there anything that > I should be aware of that is different from a desktop install? > > Damon
I've had a couple issues. X still doesn't automatically detect screen resolutions and even common ones like 1640x1080 aren't in the defaut x.conf. I've had to manually hack the x.conf to get RedHat to run correctly on all 3 of my wide screen monitors. Wireless support IMHO is joke on linux. I've gotten it to work, but not without major headaches: iwlist, iwconfig, edit /etc/sysconfig/networks-scripts/ifcfg-x to add WAP keys, compiled drivers, and use windows drivers on Linux. I've wasted hours of my life on this stuff. This type of stuff might be fine for servers that don't change configs often, I find it to be hell on a laptop where you are constantly changing networks. I ended up maxing out my RAM and installing VMWare on XP, and that's the config I'm using most of the time now. I know a lot of people here will probably disagree, but is my opinion that XP is far better than Linux on x86 Laptops. And I spend a lot of time keeping Linux boxes running in production, and have been very happy with its performance in that domain. Unless you are developer interested in improving Laptop support for Linux, I say save yourself the hassle, max out your RAM, and take a look at VMWare. BTW, VMWare won't solve your problems with X resolutions. Still requires manually hacking the config file. Just my experience. _______________________________________________ RLUG mailing list [email protected] http://lists.rlug.org/mailman/listinfo/rlug
