Re: Seeking recommendation for Laptop, must satisfy:
I've recently bought a Compaq Presario 905EA and am quite happy with it.
The only major problems I've had with Linux are that, as it's a very new
laptop model, it ships an (still) unsupported graphic card (ATI Mobility
Radeon U1, which works with the VESA driver but has no 2D or 3D support)
and I couldn't get the sound to work. Other than that, it works great.
:)
> built in cdrom and floppy, no stupid docking stations...sony vaio...yikes
> better yet a built in dvd drive....
It has both, and the DVD is a combo DVD/CD-RW drive.
> needs to be able to run vmware so that windows can be run...
I haven't tried to run vmware on it, but I think it will run without
problems (Mobile Athlon XP 1800+, 256MB RAM).
> lightweight, good sized screen, great resolution,
About 3Kg. Maybe that's not exactly "lightweight", but having in mind
that its an "all-in-one" laptop (DVD/DR-RW, floppy, network card, modem,
IR port, USB, firewire... anything you'll ever need) I don't think it's
really that heavy. It has a 15" screen at 1024x768, which also means
that the keyboard is BIG. I'm not used to laptops, so for me a BIG
keyboard and a BIG screen were a must. :)
> Probably i386 arch would be the best since I'm not sure VMware
> will work on non i386 arch...
Athlon XP. Same thing.
> Powersave mode has to work easily in linux.....
ACPI works with a patch... AMD's PowerNow! is unsupported but that is
beeing worked on. It's just a matter of time.
> It just has to work without a lot of hassles of looking for obscure patches..
> :-)
ACPI and PowerNow! (when it's ready) are the only things you'll need a
patch for, if you plan to use a 2.4 kernel. The 2.5 series already have
those applied, if you're not afraid to use the development kernel
series.
> price is the least important but it would be nice to not to spend too much....
> not more than 2000US
The laptop's price was 2000 euros here in Spain, so... yes, that's about
$2000. :)
I've made a web about setting linux up in this laptop, it's at:
http://www.bisente.com/documentos/presario905/
You'll get there a better idea of what works and what doesn't, and what
patches do you need.
As I've said earlier, the only major problems are getting 2D/3D accel
support from the graphics card and getting the sound card to work, so no
multimedia applications... man, the day I'll be able to play a DVD with
sound on this hottie I'll be really happy. :D
--
Vicente Aguilar <bisente@bisente.com> | http://www.bisente.com
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