discussion about buying a new superlight laptop

On Tue, May 5, 2009 at 7:19 PM, xxx wrote:
> > yyy wrote:
>> >>
>> >> Hey, which Lenovo did you buy when you left your x40 in the cab? was
>> >> it the x200 or the x60? Do you still have the same thing? Is it
>> >> functioning well?
>> >>
> >
> > I bought the x200 which sucks compared to the X41. Though it is quite a bit
> > faster and 64bit allows me to mmap the big data. Today if I were to buy, I
> > would get an x6[10] but I don't know maybe they all suck now.
> >
> > The battery life is a joke. Less than 2 hours. And even worse : I still
> > haven't managed to get the thing to sleep with Ubuntu, (at all) it will
> > always hang completely and I have to reboot. My sleep issue is slightly
> > different from all the millions of other combinations of sleeping issues I
> > have found googling for this problem and the x200. I have tried everything
> > from turning off a processor before sleeping to downgrading the kernel. I
> > can only use hibernate which takes like 5 minutes to wake-up.
> >
> > Two of the most critical (for me) features in a super light laptop don't
> > work. I want to be able to take the laptop anywhere, not worry too much
> > about battery, and be able to whip it out and stuff it back in my bag. Now
> > I basically leave it on my desk, except when I shuttle it back and forth
> > from home. But I don't whip it out on the subway to read a paper or test
> > some random code I was thinking about. Or whip it out to show some friends
> > a terrible web-video in a bar.
> >
> >
> > xxx
> >

::sigh:: that's exactly what I was afraid of. Running Windows for me
is no longer an option (if simply for no other reason than 'developers
that I respect do not take anyone who runs Windows seriously') so so
it's either Ubuntu or OS X. I bought the MacBook Pro in November -
it's a diesel laptop that replaces a desktop in every way in terms of
its computing power, but at 5.5 pounds it is simply not an option to
carry around. So, I am looking into laptops. I just bought the ideapad
s10 netbook yesterday - don't get those, the keyboards are not
full-sized, and are really cramped, and, funny enough, one of the most
important keys (Tab) is like, an eighth of an inch wide, and is
practically impossible to hit. I am afraid I would have to return it;
but at $350, the price is just right. Anyway, I was just pricing out
the x200, and I managed to get the configuration that I would enjoy at
$1200, which is also palatable; but the point of it would be to use on
the subway or at a cofeeshop, and I'll have the same issues as you do.
I don't really know anything about the other laptop manufacturers
anymore - people talk about Dell a lot. I also looked at the Macbook
Air, but that thing is just priced in a completely ridiculous way. The
price would be palatable if it wasn't for the fact that the RAM is set
at 2GB, is soldered into the logic board and not upgradeable.

yyy

 

I think your friend was over-exaggerating the problems of Ubuntu on the x200. I gave Ubuntu 8.04/8.10 a pretty good run on a standard x200 and it generally worked quite well. Suspend/Hibernate was always smooth and never a problem.

Unfortunately almost all Linux distros have relatively poor management compared to Windows. In my experience the difference is about 25% less in Linux than in Vista. It may be possible to improve this with heavy tweaking, but the default is for power usage to be a few watts higher.

Also, I wouldn't expect any other brand of PC to be particularly more Linux friendly than a ThinkPad. If you haven't checked it already I would suggest looking at ThinkWiki. This is a group dedicated to running Linux on ThinkPads and the various tweaks (usually minor) required to get the most out of them.

 

ubuntu has gotten much better as jon indicated...i don't see how this is the fault of the x200 though (to the extreme that OP commented on).

 

ubuntu was awesome on the x41. battery was great 5+ hours no kidding I could program all day. with literally constant compiling I could get 3 hours battery. granted the x200 is a faster machine, but the battery is definitely much worse. plus on the x41 suspend always worked from the begining with no tweaking.

I have spent multiple hours trying to get suspend to work on the x200 as it is the #1 thing which annoys the heck out of me. There are literally dozens of sites with people who have slightly different variations on "suspend doesn't work". My suspend results in a total freeze on wake up : blinking moon, no cursor, black screen, no ctrl-alt-delete. hard power down is the only way out. With all the fiddling with kernels and acpi scripts, nothing has ever changed the base frozen when coming out of suspend.

I'm happy that suspend works for you, but there are many users who are still having issues. I don't know if this is ubuntu's fault, or weird variations of hardware between x200 models, but to me it feels like the begining of the road to laptop crappiness at Lenovo....

 

Here's what the thinkwiki site says about sleep.

Of course those are some of the tweaks I have already tried as well as reverting to an older kernel, and a newer kernel. You *cannot* rely on suspend using linux on this laptop. I only ever use linux. I don't switch OS every few days for fun. I need a laptop that works with linux which I always got with the thinkpads, until this one.

 

If you are requesting help (i.e. not just venting) it would behoove you to provide the full specs of your x200 and your distribution/kernel.

In my experience, sleep worked just fine on a unmodified kernel of Ubuntu 8.04/8.10 using the AMD64 Alternate CD. The only hardware issues I had on the x200 were slightly worse power management (5+ hours was still possible with a 9 cell) and the lack of TrackPoint scrolling/APS. Support on the x200T is similar, although the digitizer on the x200T is an entirely separate issue.

 

I thought this was a forum for venting. I sent specs to the bug report. For some reason this doesn't seem like the right place.
I am currently of course using the AMD alternate CD and am now back to the un-modified kernel.
2.6.27-11-generic #1 SMP Wed Apr 1 20:53:41 UTC 2009 x86_64 GNU/Linux
Any attempt to resume from "suspend" does nothing except the little blinking moon. This happens no matter what software configuration, kernel changes I make which seems like a hardware issue to me. "worked for me on the weekend I installed ubuntu" doesn't really elp me with the "I use ubuntu on this laptop every day for hours, writing and compiling code" and it sucks compared to other thinkpads I have had in the past. I was very depressed to get what feels like a regression in terms of battery life and suspend which is much more important to me than hibernate. I am counting the days to when I can buy another machine and I was hoping that Lenovo would at least try to make an effort for the users that choose/have to use Unix on a daily basis (the way IBM did)

 

I wouldn't listen to the guy. He doesn't state what cell battery he is using. The X200 has superb battery life. Also, it's not the X200's fault the Ubuntu isn't sleeping, it's his installation of Ubuntu that's to blame (after all, Ubuntu on the X200 isn't officially supported by Lenovo) and Ubuntu doesn't exactly have excellent power management.

With regards to you buying a new laptop, I wouldn't let this user's 'rant' deter you from considering purchasing an X200. So, you bought a Macbook Pro, but it's too heavy for your liking? What about the Macbook? Have you considered getting that? It's only 2.03kg (4.5 pounds) and has excellent battery life. Plus, it's OS X .

 

Power management in linux is more intel not releasing info for developers. And wantsuperlight...what made you think that this forum was for "venting"? And sleep/hibernation was a known issue with ubuntu. My roommate has less issues with it on the latest version.