TUXEDO Computers continue to push out new and more powerful hardware, with their focus on the Linux market. Today, they announced two laptops with a choice of CPU vendor. Yes, that's right. Two new models and both let you pick between Intel and AMD for the CPU. Giving you more choice is always good! However, it's only NVIDIA for the GPU.
Available to order now, with stock expected later next month they've launched TUXEDO Polaris 15 and TUXEDO 17, with the main obvious difference being the screen sizes. Other than that, the rest of the specifications are mostly the same. The Polaris 15 starts with a 60hz screen but the Polaris 17 can only come with 144Hz - both screens are 1080p mat (so less glare) and IPS.
Here's some of the specs, split between the two where needed.
| Screen |
Polaris 15 IPS mat 15,6" 1920 x 1080 60Hz, up to 144Hz Polaris 17 IPS mat 17,3" 1920 x 1080 144Hz |
| Processor + GPU |
AMD Ryzen 5 4600H | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti AMD Ryzen 5 4600H | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 (Polaris 15 only) AMD Ryzen 7 4800H | NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti AMD Ryzen 7 4800H | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 Intel Core i7-10750H | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 1650Ti (Polaris 17 only) Intel Core i7-10750H | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 |
| RAM (both) |
8 GB (1x 8GB) 2666MHz Samsung Up to 64 GB (2x 32GB) 3200MHz CL22 Samsung |
| Storage (both) |
250 GB Samsung 860 EVO (M.2 SATAIII) Up to 2000 GB Samsung 970 EVO Plus (NVMe PCIe) + Space and options for a second drive |
| Ports (both) | 1x USB 3.2 Gen1 Typ-C (DisplayPort: no; Power Delivery: no) 2x USB 3.2 Gen1 Typ-A 1x USB 2.0 Typ-A 2x Mini DisplayPort 1.4 (G-SYNC), 1x HDMI 2.0 (HDCP 2.2) 1x Gigabit LAN/network RJ45 1x Headphone-out 1x Mic-in 1x Card reader (SD/SDHC/SDXC) |
I think they're doing a lot of things right, but it seems too many hardware vendors are stuck into having 8GB RAM as the standard and TUXEDO have done it again here. Games are sucking up more and more RAM, and for the types of games you're going to want the CPU/GPU combo power offered here, going for less than 16GB RAM is a bit crazy. So keep that in mind. Definitely go for higher RAM. Other than that, they seem like ideal Linux machines for gaming on the go be it a train, coach or in bed.
As standard, they come with TUXEDO_OS 20.04 LTS 64Bit. This is their tweaked Linux distribution based on Ubuntu with the Budgie desktop environment.
The Polaris 15 starts at €1,124.45 and the Polaris 17 starts at €1,174.45.
Find out more in their press release.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Last edited by setzer22 on 2 September 2020 at 5:13 pm UTC
JSVRamirez Sep 2, 2020
Quoting: medI see that unfortunately it comes with an nvidia GPU. I understand this works for some, but it is a no-go for me. Is there any good quality offering of a pure AMD gaming laptop?
Quoting: setzer22AMD CPU but no option without Nvidia... Makes me sad :(I've been out of the GPU-loop for about five years now, but are Linux AMD drivers good enough for gaming now? This was always a problem before?
That said, I am very excited about this company.
Quoting: JSVRamirezYeah, things have changed on the driver front in the last 5 years. Basically, the AMD open source driver is the driver everyone uses for AMD, AMD have been fairly co-operative about making that workable, and it has thus improved a lot in that time. It's developed pretty actively, keeps up with new developments. AMD drivers are currently considered pretty solid.Quoting: medI see that unfortunately it comes with an nvidia GPU. I understand this works for some, but it is a no-go for me. Is there any good quality offering of a pure AMD gaming laptop?Quoting: setzer22AMD CPU but no option without Nvidia... Makes me sad :(I've been out of the GPU-loop for about five years now, but are Linux AMD drivers good enough for gaming now? This was always a problem before?
That said, I am very excited about this company.
NVIDIA continue to basically block full effectiveness of open source drivers, so everyone uses their closed drivers. These are, to be fair, mostly decent by most accounts, but they have their glitches, which we can't do anything about because closed, and NVIDIA continues to be unco-operative with Wayland stuff.
Between those two sides of things, and a tendency to feel that AMD have regained momentum lately, Linux gamers have increasingly shifted to AMD graphics cards.
Quoting: tmtvlWith two browsers (Falkon and Firefox) open, while on other tags I have Konsole, Emacs, Okular, Kontact, Cantata, Steam, and Discord running I'm using 5661M RAM. While of course 16GB is always nice to have, it's not too much of a problem to make 8 work.As long as you don't want to play games as well, sure.
But in your scenario, a hell of a lot of games, especially those requiring lots of heavy assets, wouldn't even run unless you close half your programs so that they get at least 4 GB.
Quoting: medI've been out of the GPU-loop for about five years now, but are Linux AMD drivers good enough for gaming now? This was always a problem before?
My RX 5700 took its fair share of time to play nice with two displays (required kernel 5.7.x OR 5.3.x), but as far as gaming goes it has been quite smooth from the get go.
Quoting: TuxeeQuoting: damarrinNo they aren’t.
Care to elaborate?
I don't need to: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/forum/topic/4128
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