I got a System76 last year and I have no urge to go back to Windows. I was worried from prior experience with desktop Linux 10+ years ago that I'd be suffering a constant toll of minor breakage and annoyances, but it's been a lovely experience. (It's also possible that every Linux DE these days is this good, I only have a single sample.)
My experience now is that the Windows desktop is intolerable compared to Linux at this point. Overwrought, buggy, and confusing. Mac is better but it's far too locked down. If you are willing to put some effort into customization, especially with tiling window managers and other WMs besides gnome, you can get a sublimely efficient and natural experience. I'm currently using Sway and it's vastly better than commercial desktops for software dev.
I am a long time Linux desktop user (20+ years) but am still forced to keep a copy of windows around to use Adobe Acrobat for filling and signing forms. I have tried various Linux pdf applications (including commercial ones), using Adobe Acrobat via wine/crossover but haven't found a solution that works across the board. That is the only holdout from not having to interact with windows/mac.
In a way it has stripped out a little of the fun of it, but that is a very VERY minor thing by comparison to systems that now just work!
As for Desktop environments, it is very rare that I have had any game breaking events on these for a very long time. The foundations are mature and hardened nowadays.
I have had the occasional issue on a elderly T400 Thinkpad when transferring large files on Mate and Enlightenment DE but I get the feeling that is potentially a hardware issue.
Oh, you can still have fun. Just run something that's not a a full DE. My Sway setup is super stable now, but only after an ungodly amount of tinkering. :D
Yup, all the years of incremental improvements have really made the whole experience amazing. I switched from MacOS a few years ago and never looked back. It's been amazing. Fedora 36 + i3wm and Steam+Proton for gaming. It's as close to the perfect workstation/gaming/fun environment that I can think of.
I was about to reply to you before reading your last sentence. I'd say that is very much the case. In fact, I tried pop! out of curiosity, and found that I liked it less than arch + gnome. At least overall, there was a little mix of pros and cons.
I’m waiting for (probably far off) day when System76 makes its own laptops instead of using Clevo hardware. I just can’t deal with that keyboard & trackpad quality.
I just wrote into System76 support looking for a replacement battery for my Lemur Pro (swollen battery), and mentioned I'd switched to my Framework in the meantime. Just got a response a few minutes ago:
> I received your message in the support ticket that you have gotten a Framework Laptop. A great choice.
Gave me a burst of hope for official Pop!_OS Framework laptops sold through S76.
If that means getting 15" framework laptops with discrete GPUs, sure. If it means sticking to the current framework or a larger one with the same basic hardware... nothanks.
is the touchpad better? Have to agree with GP that clevo touchpads are bad, i have the orpy5 and the touchpad is the worst. Its bad on windows too so it isn't just some linux driver thing. Super easy to do stray palm presses and send the cursor to random places.
I purchased a high end workstation and was incredibly disappointed by the case construction and extraordinarily weird design choices made in service of aesthetics or...something.
I don't get it: a Linux laptop with physical buttons on the touchpad but only two of them. I've been pasting text with the middle button all the time since forever and any time I had to use a two buttons mouse or touchpad it was hell. My ZBook has three buttons. It was one of the reasons I bought it.
Less visible downsides: only 1 TB SSD (I have 3 TB now), 16 GB RAM (I have 32) and the screen is smaller as the laptop is "12.73 x 8.44 x 0.75 in; 32.34 x 21.46 x 1.91 cm"
The only good points are that it weights almost half of mine and it's numberpad free :-)
> I’m waiting for (probably far off) day when System76 makes its own laptops instead of using Clevo hardware. I just can’t deal with that keyboard & trackpad quality.
oh, i never knew that! i thought they made everything.
for real though, who thought that having pgup and pgdn as mini keys on top of the left and right arrow keys was a good idea? and how did that get through quality assurance?
I vastly prefer pgup and pgdn there. Moving between tabs in a browser is Ctrl+PgDn / Ctrl+PgUp, and physically mapping it near left/right arrows matches my mental mapping.
They make their desktops but not their laptops. That's probably why their laptops can sometimes have some weird quirks (keyboard layouts, screen resolution options, etc).
Similar for me. When I looked at System 76 laptops 1-2 years ago, the keyboard type was a deal-breaker for me. They were like Asus ROG laptop keyboards, whereas I strongly prefer keyboards like my Lenovo Legion's.
I was hopeful when they announced an all-AMD laptop recently. But unfortunately it's too small / underpowered / non-upgradeable for my needs, and I couldn't tell from the pictures if the keyboard was more to my liking.
To be fair, even Framework laptops don't have swappable keyboard types, AFAICT. So even a System76-Framework team-up wouldn't necessarily fit my needs.
I actually got a laptop from sager (clevo) and after 5 years of heavy use. my biggest complaint is the dam case. all the plastic clips broke. only a few screws holding it together. lots of gaps now. and a few cracks in the plastic.
but it's been thrown in a back pack and gone through several years of traveling in a back pack
I have one too. I love the very standard hardware - even a regular barrel jack for the power adapter.
That said, the keyboard could be better.
I hate the trend in flat-top keys we have now. I honestly love the feel of gently recessed keys. I had an early macbook pro and the keys seemed to press against my fingertips uniformly instead of having the "hotspot" you get in the center of the flat key.
I have a ~6-year-old Clevo laptop (from Mythlogic, which tells you something). After about five years, the keyboard kinda crapped out. Got a new keyboard, took about ten minutes to swap it in. The hard part was getting the part, had to order it from China.
I have one from mid-2014 (base model W550SU, now-bankrupt distributor), used about as heavily as anyone would ever use one (probably averaging sixty hours a week). Its keyboard was not great within one year (spongy), and distinctly unpleasant after two years (very spongy), with its space bar becoming extremely unreliable during the third year. It became impossible to type at speed on it.
This looks really good. I'm curious when we'll get to see the first beta of the whole DE and especially how the tiling will work.
I recently switched back from Pop!_OS to Ubuntu because of really annoying bugs with the tiling window manager and especially with the suspend functionality. So I think they should not neglect their current DE.
They changed text from puke orange to puke grass. This is progress I aways embrace. May be in far away future my grandchildren will be able to select the text colour or even define it themselves at their loking. That quantum leap would be called “century of linux on desktop”.
Are these four-finger gestures customizable? Is there perchance a profile for the incoming macOS user to match what they expect?
Edit: I suppose the assumption, based on the paragraph and screenshot, is that they update depending on the arrangement of workspaces: horizontal vs vertical
I just want 2-finger gestures to be configurable (or at least the same as on Windows as I use both). For some reason it has been almost impossible to get a two-finger left/right swipe to act as forward/back actions (the only browser it works for is Epiphany, which doesn't support plugins until the most recent version)
Using PopOS, I have three-finger left/right mapped to back/forward in Firefox. Intuitively I would expect two-finger left/right to control horizontal scrolling, although I'm well aware that some browsers/platforms interpret this as back/forward.
Oof. You are indeed welcome to your own customizations, but having the scroll gesture suddenly become a navigation gesture because I dared bump into the end of a scroll area is absolutely infuriating. Customization ftmfw.
I have one of their cheapest compact models, the Lemur, and I love it. I don't use it much lately, but everything "just works" for the basic cases, and I only have to sometimes deal with poor Linux support for non-System76 peripherals which would be an issue on any Linux notebook.
I plan to buy a desktop from them soon because I'm not into having a laptop now that I work from home permanently and I also want to run some games on it that you absolutely cannot run without a graphics card.
Dumb question: when considering a company that sells branded generic laptops, why not buy from the generic laptop vendor directly (Clevo in the case [0])?
It supports a company selling linux laptops, and they make sure everything works out of the box, and provide support. Pretty much the same reason to use their OS, which is basically just Ubuntu + drivers. It should all "just work" which is exactly what a lot of people expect from a laptop.
If you have a desktop system that's giving you problems in linux because of incomparable hardware or crappy drivers it's a pretty easy to find what component is working well for other people and swap some parts, but laptops are such a pain I don't even want to open one up if I can help it. It sounds like System 76 works with Clevo to put together certain builds they might not offer normally. Why risk getting a similarly spec'd Clevo only to find out it's got a different wireless chipset or GPU variant and now you're stuck with a bunch of of problems to try to work around.
I bought my S76 laptop via my work's "choose your own workstation" program. It's a great way to support continued development of the software I use PLUS when you buy via S76 you get lifetime support for the device. The support is not something I've made use of often, but it certainly paid off the one time I needed it. Basically, it depends on your idea of "value" - do you value money (buy cheaper hardware) or time (buy S76 with support)?
I bought a NUC from them years ago that was always a bit wonky, but not unusable. Until one day I couldn't stand it any more and sent it back for repair. At that point I'd had it for well over a year, maybe more than two. It came back with a fixed controller and has worked flawlessly ever since. So, you pay for support. And the price difference is peanuts compared to all of our hourly rates.
I'm not a fan of the trend toward monochromatic, low-contrast desktops. Colour iconography seems to be frowned upon, whereas it's a definite aid to speed of comprehension. The settings list in particular is just a sea of text with small icons that are only minimally useful. Microsoft went this way with its Metro design language but has come to its senses in more recent years and both Windows and Visual Studio are more colourful now.
I'd recommend a tweak to the amount of whitespace, too. I'd prefer smaller dialogs or a larger default font (and maybe a wider one, too) to balance out the vast areas of blank space.
What are people’s opinions of PopOS? I tried it one after reading a good review, but the experience had enough bumps that I resolved to just do Ubuntu next time.
I've run PopOS for over 2 years now, and am happy with it after distro-hopping for years. It runs Steam very well, the interface is great and works well with a hi-res display, and it is very easy to setup custom keyboard shortcuts, which I use to launch programs.
My workflow is pretty simple, I mostly want the OS out of my way, but when I have to interact with it, it's been nice.
I like it. Used it on an AMD/Nvidia desktop and had minimal problems.
The fact that it comes with the proprietary nvidia drivers is nice for gamers.
Main reason I stopped using it is because I dislike Gnome 3 and there isn’t much benefit to running popOS over another Linux if you don’t use their DE.
I like it a lot, using it on my Framework since I got it, and on a S76 laptop before that. Came from Mint, I like the simplicity of Pop. High "just works" factor.
Only other place I can imagine going is NixOS, but I suspect PopOS+Nix might be a better balance for me.
I prefer it over Ubuntu simply because of the nvidia image that's available instead of relying on generic drivers initially and then installing the proprietary ones. I have had no issues w/ it, though I had with Ubuntu over nv drivers.
Unfortunately I am stuck with NVDA until well, Triton has AMD support, or RocM PyTorch catches up in performance.
I use it for work. I kind of like it, works well enough and it keeps updating and not breaking which makes me happy. I feel its like ubuntu on training wheels.
The Gnome desktop environment is servicable, the only issue is I which there was a shortcut on the top bar for sound selections.
Basically it seems pretty robust, and I don't have any issues.
I really like it. Switched from Ubuntu several years ago (due to snap), and I like it a lot more than Ubuntu. The UI is nice, settings are well thought out and the app store is the best one I've found in all distros.
Only had a few minor issues with it over the years. The Nvidia driver gave me some problems on my discrete graphics a while ago, for which I found a solution online.
Occasionally the login screen fails to appear waking from suspend. Closing and opening the laptop lid fixes that; I haven't bothered to try to figure out what's going on.
Running it pre-installed on a laptop. Other than the fact it seems like they push updates multiple times a day, it has been the closest I have had to "it just works" in a long time.
My experience is pretty bumpy. I have their laptop called Adder. Top issues I've ran into:
o the screen is redrawn incorrectly for Chrome windows
o there is a 10% chance that I'll have to reboot if I close the laptop without explicitly putting it into sleep mode with Fn-F12
I am running the latest PopOS and keeping packages up-to-date. I have asked support but their advice either doesn't fix the problem, or involves so much effort (reinstalling everything for example) that I never do it.
I used PopOS for a while, and as a distro I thought it was nice.
Unfortunately, I encountered an unrecoverable/won't boot/have to reinstall error twice on my laptop of the time. So I went back to Ubuntu.
One anecdote, probably isolated or coincidence, but it's the sort of thing that happens to people and they never go back (but I bet I'll try it again, since swapping distros is pretty easy nowadays).
I use it as the main OS on my desktop, fairly unsophisticated usecase-some web browsing, programming, playing games via Steam. I’ve encountered no real friction or hiccups. It feels like “ubuntu but cohesive”.
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Fancy Zones is fantastic on Windows, corner tiling is at least a thing in most Linux DEs, and then there’s Mac.
Same way window management worked in System 7. Maybe worse because there was at least a visible grab corner back then.
I’m not sure how people use their touchpads without middle click emulation either.
Nowadays the only place I still use GNU/Linux as desktop experience, is my aging Asus netbook.
When it dies, it will most likely be replaced by a device from Apple/Google/Microsoft ecosystems.
As for Desktop environments, it is very rare that I have had any game breaking events on these for a very long time. The foundations are mature and hardened nowadays.
I have had the occasional issue on a elderly T400 Thinkpad when transferring large files on Mate and Enlightenment DE but I get the feeling that is potentially a hardware issue.
Everything System76 makes themselves is awesome.
> I received your message in the support ticket that you have gotten a Framework Laptop. A great choice.
Gave me a burst of hope for official Pop!_OS Framework laptops sold through S76.
source: https://fosstodon.org/@soller/109677885135544538
Deleted Comment
https://hpdevone.com/
Less visible downsides: only 1 TB SSD (I have 3 TB now), 16 GB RAM (I have 32) and the screen is smaller as the laptop is "12.73 x 8.44 x 0.75 in; 32.34 x 21.46 x 1.91 cm"
The only good points are that it weights almost half of mine and it's numberpad free :-)
Word is, it's HP EliteBook 845 G8
(https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxhardware/comments/wc9d7a/hp_de...)
oh, i never knew that! i thought they made everything.
for real though, who thought that having pgup and pgdn as mini keys on top of the left and right arrow keys was a good idea? and how did that get through quality assurance?
Dead Comment
I was hopeful when they announced an all-AMD laptop recently. But unfortunately it's too small / underpowered / non-upgradeable for my needs, and I couldn't tell from the pictures if the keyboard was more to my liking.
To be fair, even Framework laptops don't have swappable keyboard types, AFAICT. So even a System76-Framework team-up wouldn't necessarily fit my needs.
but it's been thrown in a back pack and gone through several years of traveling in a back pack
That said, the keyboard could be better.
I hate the trend in flat-top keys we have now. I honestly love the feel of gently recessed keys. I had an early macbook pro and the keys seemed to press against my fingertips uniformly instead of having the "hotspot" you get in the center of the flat key.
I recently switched back from Pop!_OS to Ubuntu because of really annoying bugs with the tiling window manager and especially with the suspend functionality. So I think they should not neglect their current DE.
Edit: I suppose the assumption, based on the paragraph and screenshot, is that they update depending on the arrangement of workspaces: horizontal vs vertical
I plan to buy a desktop from them soon because I'm not into having a laptop now that I work from home permanently and I also want to run some games on it that you absolutely cannot run without a graphics card.
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17039414
(Yes there's a response in that link from S76 folks but I'm still curious on the buyer side your reasoning.)
It supports a company selling linux laptops, and they make sure everything works out of the box, and provide support. Pretty much the same reason to use their OS, which is basically just Ubuntu + drivers. It should all "just work" which is exactly what a lot of people expect from a laptop.
If you have a desktop system that's giving you problems in linux because of incomparable hardware or crappy drivers it's a pretty easy to find what component is working well for other people and swap some parts, but laptops are such a pain I don't even want to open one up if I can help it. It sounds like System 76 works with Clevo to put together certain builds they might not offer normally. Why risk getting a similarly spec'd Clevo only to find out it's got a different wireless chipset or GPU variant and now you're stuck with a bunch of of problems to try to work around.
Edited to add: the repair was free of charge.
What company does that?
I'd recommend a tweak to the amount of whitespace, too. I'd prefer smaller dialogs or a larger default font (and maybe a wider one, too) to balance out the vast areas of blank space.
My workflow is pretty simple, I mostly want the OS out of my way, but when I have to interact with it, it's been nice.
The fact that it comes with the proprietary nvidia drivers is nice for gamers.
Main reason I stopped using it is because I dislike Gnome 3 and there isn’t much benefit to running popOS over another Linux if you don’t use their DE.
Only other place I can imagine going is NixOS, but I suspect PopOS+Nix might be a better balance for me.
Unfortunately I am stuck with NVDA until well, Triton has AMD support, or RocM PyTorch catches up in performance.
The Gnome desktop environment is servicable, the only issue is I which there was a shortcut on the top bar for sound selections.
Basically it seems pretty robust, and I don't have any issues.
Only had a few minor issues with it over the years. The Nvidia driver gave me some problems on my discrete graphics a while ago, for which I found a solution online.
Occasionally the login screen fails to appear waking from suspend. Closing and opening the laptop lid fixes that; I haven't bothered to try to figure out what's going on.
Running on a ThinkPad T560.
I am running the latest PopOS and keeping packages up-to-date. I have asked support but their advice either doesn't fix the problem, or involves so much effort (reinstalling everything for example) that I never do it.
I used PopOS for a while, and as a distro I thought it was nice.
Unfortunately, I encountered an unrecoverable/won't boot/have to reinstall error twice on my laptop of the time. So I went back to Ubuntu.
One anecdote, probably isolated or coincidence, but it's the sort of thing that happens to people and they never go back (but I bet I'll try it again, since swapping distros is pretty easy nowadays).