I'm typing this on a Lenovo x230, having owned an x210 and x220. However, when such a statement above is made I was hoping that, like Dell, Lenovo had started to officially support Linux.
Hence the question.
Furthermore, Lenovo has been in the news late 2016 for not allowing Linux to run on some of their (Microsoft certified) laptops. And when the t460's and x260's came out early 2016, the Linux distros available at the time had all kinds of issues. Black screens, no Wifi, iirc.
So, again: is there any article that actually point to this laptop running Linux well? Or is it merely based on historical data and personal opinion?
As far as I'm aware laptops of new generations practically never ran Linux well out of the box from day one. It always took some time to adjust stuff to the new chips of a new generation. Only after some time you can just stick Linux into it and it'll just all work.
I bought my T440s pretty much on day one and didn't know this. If I recall correctly the following Ubuntu release almost half a year later was the first time I managed to get a system where both the 3G and wifi worked.
I kept hearing the same thing and seeing mixed reviews on the Linux commitment since Thinkpad left IBM and went to Lenovo. Seems like there was a big push around Yoga tablet-hybrids that were not Linux friendly for a while.
I ended up going with the Dell Developer Edition Ubuntu laptop line after talking to a few people who swore that their XPS 13 was the greatest thing they'd ever owned. Personally, I went with a beastly 17" Precision because I wanted a desktop replacement. Should be delivered any day now, but I'm excited. Btw, I'm switching from a Mac.
Thinkpads are still reliable for Ubuntu, but I went with a Dell for the 4k IGZO display, four DIMMS, and 1.8 teraflops of GPU. Battery is not great. It's not light. The keyboard is ok, but not a Thinkpad...but it does have a track-stick.
It's the third time I've bought a machine from the outlet and I've always been satisfied. I had spec'd out a base m7510 with Ubuntu, 70% gamut touchscreen, larger battery, and lighted keyboard. This one came up with the IGZ0, Windows 10, 4GB Quadro 2000, i7-6820HQ instead and was a bit less money. The base unit was still a good machine.
The 5510's are more Macbook like...slimmer, limited expansion, less powerful CPU's and graphics cards at the top end of the line (slim light cases limit thermal capacity).
The 7000 series are heavier and support ECC RAM and have four DIMM slots and can accomodate a conventional SATA drive plus an M42 x 80. For me heavy is relative. My first three laptops were 7 pounds, 6.5 pounds, and 8.5 pounds. The first one was light, the second was about a pound over light, and the third was svelte for a 17".
I've been running Debian on my X1 gen 3 since the day I got it. The only problem was Debian doesn't ship with drivers for proprietary NICs and you have to supply them separately, but that's a Debian problem, not an X1 problem.
I'm currently typing this while USB-tethered through a stock Android phone, which 'just worked' when I first tried it - the only settings screen I've ever seen when USB tethering is the one that toggles it on.
It is normal for linux to perhaps have a driver issue with a very new laptop, but it's usually sorted out in a month or two, especially with thinkpads as they have a large linux-using population.
When I was shopping for a laptop recently, I was told that to order one with Ubuntu pre-installed I needed to call sales during business hours. Ultimately, I went with a Dell Precision T7510, left Windows 10 in place, added an NVME ssd, and installed Ubuntu on that (Dell Precisions also offer Ubuntu pre-installed and at a discount).
i'm using a 4th gen x1 carbon as my work laptop. it's the machine google settled on as their 2016 linux laptop after doing a bunch of research on current models from various manufacturers, and it's worked perfectly for me. i used the 1st gen for a few years before that, and that was a great experience too. (the 4th gen has worse speakers than the 1st gen, which was kind of weird to realise, but other than that i've been happy with the upgrade too)
