From owner-freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Wed Jun 8 19:12:48 2016 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@mailman.ysv.freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:1900:2254:206a::19:1]) by mailman.ysv.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id EB9B9B6FE95 for ; Wed, 8 Jun 2016 19:12:48 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from dpchrist@holgerdanske.com) Received: from holgerdanske.com (holgerdanske.com [IPv6:2001:470:0:19b::b869:801b]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with SMTP id DFF93103F for ; Wed, 8 Jun 2016 19:12:48 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from dpchrist@holgerdanske.com) Received: from ::ffff:99.100.19.101 ([99.100.19.101]) by holgerdanske.com for ; Wed, 8 Jun 2016 12:12:46 -0700 Subject: Re: advice for buying a laptop To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org References: From: David Christensen Message-ID: <57586E36.40509@holgerdanske.com> Date: Wed, 8 Jun 2016 12:12:54 -0700 User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:38.0) Gecko/20100101 Icedove/38.8.0 MIME-Version: 1.0 In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.22 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 08 Jun 2016 19:12:49 -0000 On 06/08/2016 10:30 AM, Christian Baer wrote: > It may be that I am strange, but I actually like the older T-Series > by IBM or Lenovo much more than most newer machines. They have great > keyboards and the machines themselves are hard to break. They are > just built well. There is a store near where I live where they sell > refurbished Laptops and they have a whole bunch of T520s there These sites are useful: https://wiki.freebsd.org/Laptops http://people.freebsd.org/~bcr/laptop_article.html On 06/08/2016 10:30 AM, Christian Baer wrote: > I don't care about gaming performance. That's not what I need it > for. Most of my work will include writing (probably 80% TeX, lots of > emails, some letters). There will be some work done specifically for > my sports club (which requires special Windows software) - and yes, I > will try to get it to run with wine. :-) There will be some > Firefoxing and some video watching while I am on the train. This is > the basic usage profile. > > I will be running a dual-boot system with Windows (hopefully 7) and > I also want to run FreeBSD. Dual+ boot is a PITA -- been there, done that, got the scars. I prefer one small, fast SSD for each OS instance. I'd get a laptop with an easy to swap HDD/SSD or a laptop that can hold 2+ drives. On 06/08/2016 11:29 AM, Niklaas Baudet von Gersdorff wrote: > Make sure that the notebook doesn't have NVIDIA Optimus. I've had the best luck with Intel parts -- processors, chip sets, graphics, sound, networking, etc.. Other brands just cause problems and/or don't last -- especially NVIDIA. I was looking for a used laptop that is known-good with FreeBSD a few months back: http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-questions/2016-March/270997.html I never bought one, but my searches led me to Dell Inspiron with second-generation Core i processors. Latitude and/or Precision are appealing, but it's hard to find examples without NVIDIA or ATI graphics (other than brand new, which are very expensive). Let us know what you buy and your experiences getting FreeBSD onto it. David