The hardware:
5GHz i7 10th generation cpu
16G RAM DDR4
256G NVMe system drive
17" display
Ubuntu 20.04
This will be a rolling review:
- It's fast.
- I'm not happy that the number keys are smaller than the other keys.
- It has given me grief installing Xubuntu-desktop, but works fine with Gnome (there is a ticket in on this).
- It's not as heavy as the sherman tank. I wanted a 17" monitor, which limited my choices. Having said that, I am not disappointed with this machine.
- The trackpad is the size of a Chevrolet, and will require syndaemon to keep it tame. It is missing the middle button, which I used a lot on the old machine.
Can't say much more until it copies files over and goes into heavier use.
This is the first laptop I've had without a vga port: it has HDMI and MiniDisplay.
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No matter what I did, including step by step help from System76, I could not make XFCE work. I went with the Nuclear Option: boot to an Xubuntu usb drive to see if everything worked. Since everything worked, install Xubuntu, which is where I'm typing to you from. I can now find and run my programs and don't have to hit a key to find anything. The trackpad is still a PITA but it's coming along. I'm looking forward to doing 17 things at the same time, quickly.
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Xubuntu has been working mostly fine. I find a lot of issues are Driver Error, meaning 'person driving the laptop.'
When the lid was closed, it would not suspend.
Well, if you go to Power Management, you can tell it to suspend.
I continue to install programs I forgot I use.
The trackpad continues to vex. Fortunately I leave it off most of the time and use a mouse. However, it didn't turn on the last time I tried, then turned on spontaneously later. I was expecting some magical speed difference from my 8 year old machine, but it's not radical. I think I went from 1st gen i7 to 10th gen i7 and double the RAM.
Again, mostly user issues. The laptop has not complained about anything. It runs well and fast. It does not overheat, which is downright wonderful. My resource meters are not pegging, although Kodi drives this laptop crazy, eating up an entire cpu, just like the last laptop.
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The above issues continue.
The only showstopper is the trackpad instability.
I continue to work on it, with a 100% success rate in failure.
One other System76 owner echoed my sentiments, and a 3rd said all was well with his.
At this point I can recommend their laptops, but only if you use the stock Gnome desktop or POP OS. If you purchase one and want to change the desktop, run a live version of what you want to change it to, to see if it works. Do a thorough test on whether it plays well with the hardware and power control.
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So it's about a year later.
I asked about the trackpad and was given a link.
What a surprise that nobody told me about the proprietary drivers!
Now the trackpad is only a small PITA. The video doesn't get the CPUs hot, and some of the screensaver/lock issues seem to be gone. Unfortunately the keyboard lights are no longer on. They work during boot, so I have to look around, maybe in boot.
The reason I was talking with customer service is that the 'A' key is going wonky and I need a new keyboard. Their customer service is wonderful. Not sure the keyboard should have gone in one year, though. $75 plus $25 shipping.
I still haven't gotten used to the keyboard layout in my year or so. I would definitely move the 'Scroll' key, which is right about ENTER. I hit it often (my mistake, but...). I would like the number pad keys larger. They're smaller than all the rest and I can't type quickly, which I used to.
Again, the thing is a Ferrarri. I have only seen the CPUs max out once.
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Very shortly after the new keyboard was installed, the trackpad went back to its mind-numbingly frustrating behavior. It's the only thing I really need to work correctly. Syndaemon still doesn't fix it.
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There's a bizarre video bug. I don't think this is Sys76 territory, but who knows. The laptop will not play videos in VLC or many other players, except mpv. Audio will play but no video.
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One day I heard a small snap. Much as I tried to ignore it, the lower left plastic hinge cracked. After a few days, I had no display. I used an external monitor to make sure it was ok. Of course the laptop would only boot up on its own display, so I had to guess a lot.
This laptop has a 20' travel radius: sofa to office and back. That's it. I don't play football or basketball with it and treat it pretty nicely. I baby my stuff. There's no reason for this break. Since we're at it, there's no reason for having to replace the keyboard, and no reason one of the trackpad buttons is pushed way down and will probably have to be replaced.
While we're at it, the machine itself has gone so slow, it's now on Stupid. I type, stop, and watch the text appear on the screen. I have no idea. Everything is delayed 2-3 seconds. More than 1 thing changed, so I can't blame 1 source.
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I put in a repair ticket for the hinge/cover/whatever. They require a deposit, then they'll diagnose. I think the deposit goes to labor if they fix it. If it's stupid simple, I may fix it. All will be revealed.
Due to the slowdown, I'll probably have to reinstall Xubuntu. ALWAYS install linux with a separate HOME partition. This way your data is undisturbed if you have to reinstall.
Above all, have a decent laptop or desktop as a backup. Going from a 17" to a 13" 32 bit machine is painful.
Btw, the issue with the failure to play video in VLC, only mpv, has cleared. This is operating system, as it happened on another laptop.
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The laptop has returned. The price for repair was half the purchase price. I am NOT happy.
Their customer service is sterling.
When I put my hard drives back in, everything worked as before, without the delay.
Well, everything but audio. This is also an OS issue.
I will not buy another System76 laptop, nor can I recommend them in good conscience.
Perhaps if you buy one, glue it to the desk, and use all external peripherals, it will live long and prosper.
I don't play that way.
It's great to have my laptop back. If nothing else, going from my anemic 13" laptop to 17" makes all the difference in the world.
Now I search for a backup used 17" laptop. I hear Thinkpads are very linux-friendly.
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The laptops are made by Clevo, spec'd by System76 and branded as such.
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The trackpad is getting weird(er). I am not having the typical cursor jumping all over the page and deleting entire paragraphs. This is because the trackpad stops working shortly after I log in. You read that right: it works fine when I log in and for about a minute after. The it just stops.
So aside from no audio or touchpad, all is well. And it might be doubling letters when I type, sometimes. It's a nice color, though.
I spent hours trying to fix these issues. They're not uncommon, but none of the fixes worked.
I didn't want to do this because I was afraid of what it would mean, but I booted to a usb drive with an install of Xubuntu 22.04 (hairy harlot). I ran it in live mode, meaning it runs in RAM and does nothing to your hard drive. I was correct in my fright: it all worked fine. Now I have to reinstall Xubuntu. I've never had linux screwed up like this - this is a Windows problem.
Xubuntu is not supported by System76. but they will answer reasonable questions, plus they have a support board where others ask questions and provide answers. Why Xubuntu had trouble but Gnome didn't is pretty odd. It's a desktop - it doesn't run audio.
I tried gnome and System76's POP OS, neither of which I could make do what I wanted, so it was Xubuntu. I've used it forever and it's quite configureable. It's also light, which is great for old machines and new machines.
Now comes the extended grief of installing a clean operating system. The first thing you need to do, on any install, is use a separate partition or drive for \HOME. If anything happens to the OS, all your data is on the other partition/drive, so it's saved and you aren't wiping it out. Then you need to research how to use the current data in a new install of the program. I have a lot of email in Thunderbird. I'll have to reinstall Thunderbird after the clean linux install. I had to look up how to move the existing mail into it. It's pretty easy. Make sure you have this info on every program you plan on reinstalling. On browsers, at very least back up your bookmarks. You can also back up or use the existing profile on the new install. I backed them up to be safe, but I don't expect to use the backups. I've done this before and everything remains right where it was, ready for importing. Of course you've been backing up for years, right?
Timeshift is an interesting program. It makes OS backups at certain intervals. I've used it twice: the first time it failed miserably, the second time it worked wonderfully. It's worth the install and config. You can choose to back up your data too. It'll get LARGE if you do. Best practice is to store it OFF the computer. Bestest practice is to make multiple backups and keep them in 3 different places, but that will only serve to drive you crazy.
For you apt-get people (Debian, Ubuntu), there is a way to list all installed programs and reinstall later. I hope to find this out before I start the install. You know, cuz that's a really great time to do it. I'm sure the other linuxes have a way to do this also, yum yum. What they say has some truth in it: I should get out more.
Ideally when you start your install, you will know which hard drive gets the OS and which gets HOME. Ideally you'll reformat the OS partition and DO NOT REFORMAT the HOME partition. You will want to have another computer or phone available to access the net, in case you need to. Thus far my installs have taken about 19 minutes and haven't required help. If you require a lot of help, you may be doing it wrong - check on this. You want to get this part perfect, or it will bite you all over your body down the line. Even if you have to restart the install, make sure it's exactly how you want it. And please, give it a safe password.
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Even after blowups, most people can get back to zero, with a brand new installation.
Unfortunately. I'm not most people.
No matter what I did, I could not get Xubuntu installed. I kept getting a 'Fatal Error'. I spent hours researching the error. I had no trouble finding others who had this problem; unfortunately none of the solutions worked. The install would go all the way through, then fail. I gave up and put a ticket in with System76. The gentleman who assisted me was dogged in his attempts to help. We tried everything (twice). A bit too long after poking at it, he spoke with an engineer who told him exactly what to do. The BIOS was confused. I pulled the tiny battery leads and returned them. BOOM - it installed without error.
But it got better: because I had an existing HOME drive, the new installation 'saw' all the original information and settings and after I reinstalled the programs, everything came back up like it was. All the email was there, with all the settings. The whole desktop was there. No jiggering around and no re-pointing programs at old directories. Even the colors of the programs and customization were there. Hats off to Xubuntu. Last time I had to do some repointing.
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The final word (I hope) is that I am not happy with the plastic breaking and costing me half the purchase price of the laptop. But I can't fault the customer service - it was always excellent from day one.
My next main laptop will require research. My current backup laptop remains to be bought, but I learned a valuable lesson about having a very good backup laptop, that can do what the main one can do. If you spend a lot of time on yours, you need a backup, especially if you don't do your own installation and repairs. And reliable backups. No more System76 for me, though. Ymmv.
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So the above was not the final word. Surprise!
One day the keyboard simply stopped working.
Have you ever tried to use your computer without a keyboard? It's interesting.
There's an onscreen keyboard. You click on each individual letter. As you might imagine, this is neither efficient nor a happy experience. Avoid email entirely. Simply answering an email is like advanced tooth-pulling.
Eventually I gave up and tried to remove the keyboard to check the connections. Naturally the keyboard would not pop out, per the manual. I gave up, buttoned it back up, and booted up.
And the keyboard worked. HALLELEUJAH!
For just under a week.
It occurred to me (I'm pretty slow sometimes) that every step with the laptop was pure pain.
Ever try to use an external keyboard with a laptop on your lap, in an easy chair? I just can't.
Yes, I need another laptop, desperately.
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HP Omen 17
I wasn't sure what to do about a new laptop. Obviously the best value was used, but there wasn't much of a selection and I didn't know what to look for. Enter Micro Center. Obviously the prices reflected new laptops, but it was interesting to go looking, given my specs. I didn't want a top of the line box or gaming box - I needed a solid laptop with good performance, to last for a while.
- 17" monitor - this is the most important feature, which seriously limited my options.
- No onboard shared graphics - a separate graphics card
- 16g RAM
- Sturdy, for my purposes, which aren't a lot
- decent processor, AMD or Intel
All in all, it's not an impossible dream.
Micro Center had a few 17" laptops, including open box and refurbished. We found 2 that worked, 1 very fast and in the price range, 1 less fast. If you're anywhere near a Micro Center, I urge you to visit. It's like Disney for geeks. I even found pro-level guitar and mic cords, blinky light strips, security camera systems, tools, and too much I can't remember. There's even an Apple room, but I had to stay very far from it, lest my skin start blistering and smoke come off my body.
Unfortunately, Micro Center did not let me plug in the usb drive with linux: this was the way I was going to find out if the laptop was linux-friendly. I was less than amused. There is a 15 day return policy, so that would have to work.
I wound up with an HP Omen. At checkout I noticed it said "Gaming Laptop." Everything has its regular price, but if you add "Gaming," the price goes up by a large percentage, down the the MOUSE PAD. Yes, there are gaming mouse pads. I told them I can't buy the laptop - I don't play games.
The first hurdle, a large one, was finding the power button. I looked and looked. I gave it to Wife to look. She found it, carefully hidden next to the F12 key. I was looking it up online, and wasn't the only one to have a problem finding it. The 2nd hurdle was getting to the BIOS. I had to look this up too, as there were no indications when booting. You actually had to go into WINDOWS to find it. I hadn't wiped it yet, so I was able to tell it to boot from USB. Honestly, I have no idea what I'm going to do if I have to get into it again.
The install was flawless, and faster than I've ever seen it. Normally it's just under 20 minutes. This was considerably less. Watching it install additional programs from downloads was frighteningly fast - I couldn't see what it was doing.. the text went by so quickly. I partitioned the drive my way and I can't describe the feeling of wiping out the Windows partition. Partitions: 512m efi boot, 16g swap, 50g operating system (mounted /) and the rest /home. Separate home folders are mandatory: all your data resides there, so if you want to do anything with the OS or something breaks, you won't hurt your data.
Surprisingly it booted right up. I never had problems til the System76 laptop, so I never knew what to expect. Linux and the laptop got along wonderfully. It found just about every feature. Uh-oh... it has programmable keys. That must be the gaming reference. Due to my ADD-addled powers of observation, the thing had no numeric keyboard. I missed that one entirely. THIS could be the thing that decides the fate of the laptop. I don't need programmable keys. Gaming laptop. It also has a keyboard backlight that modulates through the color spectrum. I have no idea how to stop it, but I like the very effective backlight. It found the audio just fine. It used a generic video driver; I have to decide if I want something proprietary - options exist. The audio jack is singular.. as in there is no input for mic, just one (stereo) input/output for both headphones and mic. This may require wiring up adaptors, if I don't use BlueTooth. It seems to have a lot of available ports, including USB-A and 4 thunders(?), which can be used as USB-C also. There's a display port too. I like that there's a lot of connectivity, including an actual ethernet port. The touchpad is large. The right/center/left clicks are accessed by physically pushing down on the pad at the bottom. I don't know if I like this, but time will tell.
I have to move over mail and all the other neato stuff, so it's only just operating, with most of the programs installed. Configs and data will have to copy over. So right now, it's ready (in theory). The keyboard works, which is more than I can say for the System 76. The Omen came in about $100 less and hopefully I won't have to repair it, costing half again the purchase price.
More as I find it.
[suspenseful organ music] Will he like the laptop? Will he return the laptop? Will John really run away with Marge in his beautiful balloon? Stay tuned...
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Yes, the HP Omen 17 stays, if only through laziness. Not a good way to choose a laptop, but this one isn't like I'm settling. Everything behaves, except for the backlight colors strobing through the colors. I'll check with HP to see if they have linux drivers. This is a fast-ass laptop. I checked a few reviews but they don't seem to be exactly the one I have. The reviews were positive but with some surprises in the video department.
The display goes to 25xx resolution. This stayed for about 2 days until my eyes threatened to go on strike, and take my nose with them. 1920x1050 is the current resolution, and a good resolution. The eyes are happily on-board and it turns out the nose had no real intention of leaving.
I have some assignable keys on the left, which I immediately and mistakenly hit when I want ESCAPE. The external monitor is a little weird, in that it brings up the monitor settings, but will not actually bring up the monitor. It's most likely something I did. I have that effect on things. No serious complaints. I like the touchpad because it's huge, but I have to remember this when I go to right-click (yeah, I'm left handed). It still makes the cursor jump all over the place, but I haven't messed with it yet.
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As if that were the end of it... hahahahaha.
After trying to adjust the touchpad, the unit stopped powering up.
Speaking of power, I picked the System76 back up and played 'See if you can keep the power supply powering the laptop' all week. I'd have to put it in this way, then that way, then halfway out, then with a slight twist, then an upward twist.
The nice folks at System76, where the customer service is unparalleled, suggested I send the laptop in for service. The last time I did that it cost half the price of the laptop. So I resoldered the power jack to the board, which had the same effect as a rain dance being done for it in Ukraine; nothing (except incoming Russian missiles). System76 is sending me a new power jack ($20) and shipping it Ground ($30). Did shipping also have Supply Chain Difficulties? $30 to get a tiny metal piece halfway across the country? Wife tells me I have no idea what things cost, but even she's surprised over this.
Meanwhile the jack has completely given up the ghost (where did that phrase come from?) and I can't power it up until I get the new jack in.
Once again, System76 has the best customer service I have ever dealt with. The laptops aren't worth a doorstop, though. The hardware manufacture is Klevo, which I decided will now be called Klepto, because they take my money.
All through this nightmare, my ancient 32bit Dell laptop has worked flawlessly. It's so old it has a Core2 Duo processor and you can hear it sweating when it has to do something complex.
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