Looking to buy a laptop for college...

[samurailink3]

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should get? I know I'm gonna need a hard drive at least 100G, 802.11b/g, at least 512MB ram, preferred 1G of ram, and I would like some form of a graphics card, preferably of the nVidia flavor. I was looking at this one, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834149046 But I'm not sure how linux-compatible it will be. I am planning on running the 32-bit Ubuntu 6.10 distro.
And also, if you use Linux on your laptop, could you tell me what you use, I can't really afford anything too expensive (about 1000USD is all). Also, how is wireless support? I know its come a long way, I just haven't had any way to check it out for myself.
Thanks in advance!!

[carlosponti]

the laptop looks like it will handle linux but there is no guarantee with laptops. the wlan card doesn't say what type it is. OpenSuse 10.1 recognized my wireless card and with knetworkconfig it shows a list of access points to connect to. you will have to know iwconfig for connecting to AP's that are not broadcasted. if the wlan card that is built in isnt compatible you will have to use ndiswapper and install the windows drivers. i cant vouch for Ubuntu since i have no experience with it. SimplyMepis has good support for wireless but i havent been able to get it to work on my laptop.

[samurailink3]

Ok, thanks!

[xander9791]

i've got a compaq v3000t series which is a good work computer. I'm running ubuntu and it fully supports my computer which is basicly your general intel centrino stuff. I would stick with intel just because it'll probably be easier to get the wireless to work. mine worked without a problem. I'm sure you can get broadcom stuff to work (hp's amd card) just more work.

[yankeeco]

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should get?

Unless money means nothing to you, you might want to have a good look at the Dell Inspiron 5100 series laptops, many of which are available for sale; eBay and other such sites. Yes, It'll be a used but upgrading the RAM volume shouldn't present much of a problem, if any.

Same goes for upgrading the hard drive.

The "on-board" or built-in modem for these Inspiron 5100 laptops work well with Linux (you're seeing it right now - via Suse v10.0).

As for wireless, I can't advise on that, have no need for it and don't use it.

Hope this helps.

[mdelorme]

I too have found Dell machines to be very linux-compatible. I own a desktop and recently purchased a laptop, both of which run linux without a hitch. Dell generally (can't speak for their recent AMD desktops/laptops) use very common Intel components (hard disk controller, sound controller, etc.). Support for Intel's latest devices usually gets added to the kernel pretty quickly. You may want to spend the extra and upgrade to an Intel Pro Wireless card; the "Dell" brand is usually a Broadcom card that does not have any native linux drivers, and therefore requires NDISwrapper to run windows drivers.

[BlahBlah_X]

If you want to dual boot Windows and Ubuntu, check out Tuxedo PCs. http://www.tuxedopc.com/

They have great prices, although they are not too popular.

[samurailink3]

Thanks a ton everyone, I've got some great ideas now. I'll be looking into the Dell laptops, and it'll be nice because they are quite cheap for most of them. Thanks a ton!