System76 have put Coreboot into two of their main Intel-powered laptops

Quoting: GuestI really hope System76 starts offering AMD-based laptops.

Agreed, but I also wish AMD could open up the PSP. It's great to see ryzen getting coreboot support from Google though.

It's a shame the most premium AMD laptop is made by Microsoft (Surface Laptop 3 15"). I'm going to see if I can get Linux running on one.


Last edited by drlamb on 11 October 2019 at 12:33 pm UTC

My idea was getting a Librem 13 as my new laptop, not any time soon anyway, but if System 76 starts implementing coreboot perhaps that is a better option.

Although to be fair, I am also in love with the new AMD based Lenovo x395...

My wife has the Gazelle. We're happy with it but the key spacing is odd. She said that she's used to it, but I still don't like it I have to say. I like MacBook and Dell Latitude keyboards better.

Speaking about AMD laptops... are they good these days? I like AMD as a company, but I also don't dislike Intel. The last AMD laptop in my household was ten years ago, and it was bad. It was an HP something. Perhaps it was bad design around the chips, but that thing was pretty bad. It ran super hot, loud, and slow. It also had stability problems pretty quickly. We got rid of it after owning it for only about a year I think. So, anyway, that's the last taste of AMD in a laptop for me. Worth a taste again? I know AMD has been in gaming consoles many times.

QuoteSystem76 are gradually becoming a bit more like the Apple of the Linux hardware world now.

When a company's actions essentially say "We're in control, trust us," I'm not likely to do so. When a company's actions say "Don't trust us, you're in control," I'm much more likely to trust them. Strange how that works...

I'm honestly still waiting to see more mobile Radeon GPUs for Linux laptops, at least for gaming and even workstation purposes. The iGPU stuff is decent enough, and all, but everyone's still putting nVidia chips in for their 'high end' lineup.

nVidia, the one damned-near actively hostile company to proper Linux driver adoption, withholding the what... keys, firmware, whatever it was for the GTX 980 and newer for how long now? Still offering proprietary binary-blob drivers, etc.

Nah, I want all my future systems to have AMD GPUs because of the much better, new open source driver (we don't talk about fglrx), which coincidentally, isn't the one Valve has been helping them optimize and such, too?

CPUs, yeah, Ryzen has issues with the PSP, just like Intel's 'Management Engine'. Honestly, I can't wait for "x86" (or the weird bastardization of what's left of it as a mess of decoder logic taking up wayyy too much space in modern CPUs) to die and be superceded by a much more open RISC-V implementation anyhow. One day. ;)

Looking forward to laptops with AMD and coreboot. So far AGESA makes it impossible.


Last edited by Shmerl on 11 October 2019 at 4:15 pm UTC

So cool. But when I buy one of those, I will erase its disk and install Ubuntu MATE instead. I didn't get used to pop_OS!. But nice stuff right there System76. Way to go

Quoting: KithopHonestly, I can't wait for "x86" (or the weird bastardization of what's left of it as a mess of decoder logic taking up wayyy too much space in modern CPUs) to die and be superceded by a much more open RISC-V implementation anyhow. One day. ;)

Normies are going to ensure that this remains forever a pipe dream.

Quoting: GamingonLinux.comSystem76 are gradually becoming a bit more like the Apple of the Linux hardware world now.

Well System76 already charge very similar prices to Apple, and that's before shipping or local taxes (e.g. the infamous "Australia Tax")... After factoring-in shipping / local taxes, System76 is well and truly into "Apple" territory, with regards to price.

You could argue that System76 provide their own drivers, extensive support to their customers and so forth... But I'm not convinced that these things are worth such a huge markup, especially when you consider the existing hardware which is generally pretty Linux-friendly (ASUS are a great example here) and the endless stream of technical support for Linux that is available online.


Last edited by Cyba.Cowboy on 12 October 2019 at 3:54 am UTC

Quoting: GustyGhost

Quoting: KithopHonestly, I can't wait for "x86" (or the weird bastardization of what's left of it as a mess of decoder logic taking up wayyy too much space in modern CPUs) to die and be superceded by a much more open RISC-V implementation anyhow. One day. ;)

Normies are going to ensure that this remains forever a pipe dream.

At a point where playing x86 games (and using other software) with decent performance is possible on RISC-V, adoption can start to grow. At least here it isn't one company against another necessarily. Intel absolutely will start selling us RISC-V at some point if it seems lucrative.

Quoting: 14Speaking about AMD laptops... are they good these days? I like AMD as a company, but I also don't dislike Intel. The last AMD laptop in my household was ten years ago, and it was bad. It was an HP something. Perhaps it was bad design around the chips, but that thing was pretty bad. It ran super hot, loud, and slow. It also had stability problems pretty quickly. We got rid of it after owning it for only about a year I think. So, anyway, that's the last taste of AMD in a laptop for me. Worth a taste again? I know AMD has been in gaming consoles many times.

I don't think it is entirely fair to speak of "AMD laptops" or "Intel laptops". I mean, CPU/GPU design might affect how the laptop runs a tiny bit, but I'd argue that the majority of how it performs is on the manufacturer's shoulders there. You can always cool and excellent CPU or GPU poorly (loud or hot or slow).
My personal opinion is that consumers are sometimes even oversimplifying too much when they are talking about producer brand affecting the performance of a device. In general past experience is a good indicator of future experience in this, but reviews are so much more reliable - a generally good producer can produce a shitty laptop and a generally poor producer might produce a great laptop.

All of this applies to desktop computers as well, but much more so for laptops where compromises between price, noise, energy draw (battery life), hotness and performance is especially impactful.