The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    m15x (or m17x) in Linux.

    Discussion in 'Alienware' started by Mystik, Jul 7, 2008.

  1. Mystik

    Mystik Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    164
    Messages:
    1,095
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    Anyone running linux, or wanting to run linux on your m15/17x, this board is for you.

    I want to hear from the users that are running linux now, what problems you have, what features you can still access and how, and what difficulties you have had, and have solved!

    especially driver problems!

    on my laptop, I've only tried the live CD of Ubuntu x64, and Backtrack 3. Both worked with the hardware fine so far... Except Ubuntu was confused where to output the audio, It would only come out the headphone jack, not the speakers...

    I didn't get the nVidia restricted drivers running because they require a reset, and since it was a Live disk, I obviously couldn't do that.

    anyone else? battery life? network performance? anything?
     
    Mystik, Jul 7, 2008
    #1
  2. KShub

    KShub Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    177
    Messages:
    112
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    Hi Mystik,

    The live CDs are pretty cool and a full install might be nice, but I love VMWare, aka virtualization. I work with hospital IT departments all the time and they were the ones who turned me on to VM. Working in 5-10 individual VM's, with different OS's at the same time is just plain cool. Hospitals use Solaris, Linux, Unix, MS, etc...so they are moving everything to VM.

    Anyways enough about how I love VM.

    Please see my older post here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=252656

    As an update to the post above. I'm really enjoying Linux. The only downfall is that I can't game. I like the photo tools and the active community for the tons of free, legal software that's out there on the internets.

    I can't comment on the battery life or network performance because I'm still using Vista as the host OS.

    The really neat thing about VM is that all my lights still work! I don't get any lag on the keyboard either =)

    Please let me know if you have more specific questions or if you would like me to test or demonstrate anything...

    Best,
    K. Shub
     
    KShub, Jul 8, 2008
    #2
  3. Cerath

    Cerath Notebook Enthusiast

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    20
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    I've been thinking about dual booting linux onto my m9750, but I'm worried about driver isssues.
     
    Cerath, Jul 8, 2008
    #3
  4. odessa

    odessa Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    25
    Messages:
    172
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    REMEMBER that linux is not 100% plug & play . Some time you have to recompile the kernel in order to add some modules, or patch the kernel.

    If you are the kind of guy who does not want to do that, linux is not for you.

    Probably the safest way for you is to install linux on top of VMWare.
     
    odessa, Jul 9, 2008
    #4
  5. Mystik

    Mystik Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    164
    Messages:
    1,095
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    If I wasn't already prepared to do that, I wouldn't have even considered the option. :)
     
    Mystik, Jul 9, 2008
    #5
  6. odessa

    odessa Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    25
    Messages:
    172
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    If that is the case you are ready to go my friend :D .
     
    odessa, Jul 9, 2008
    #6