What's the smallest laptop that runs Linux and is actually usable?
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
wrote on last edited by [email protected]Ideally an old business laptop or tablet.
Something with at least 4GB of RAM, x86_64v3 compatible processor and SSD.
Dell, Lenovo and HP all made decent tablets and business laptops so check out eBay for your country. You also might luck out with Amazon Renewed.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
I have a Toshiba Satellite T110, 11.6" screen, now running Linux Zorin. I've had it for 15 years - got a new battery at one point and added RAM, very easy to do. It's been a cracking little machine, really nice for travelling with.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
https://x-plus.store/products/n150-netbook
I saw a post on this a few weeks back and excited purchased one. I've had it for a bit now and I'm generally happy with it.
If you've ever bought a Chinese product like this before, you know generally what to expect: about 95% quality and 5% WTF.
Personally I put Arch on it using KDE Plasma/Wayland and touch is lackluster. Other distros might handle things better, but I'm an Arch guy and I'm sticking it out.
- Keyboard is better than expected, but still a little janky. Key feel is surprisingly good but far from great, although sometimes they don't actuate. I think that's because I'm still learning to type on it. Key arrangement is not as big of an issue as I thought, although stuff like Tab, -, ", / can be a little awkward for typing terminal commands, plain text typing (like note taking) I can get pretty up to speed. Honestly the jankiest key is . but it's placement in the center of the cluster still makes it fairly easy to hit
- The screen is clearly a tablet turned sideways. I've seen this before and I think even the Steam Deck does this, but it does lead to some oddities like resolution being 1200x1920 and SDDM is sideways (I tried fixing it, I'm sure there's a way but I broke it so bad on one go that I ended up just doing a reinstall)
- It's hefty, feels like a solid device, although maybe even a little too hefty when using it folded over and trying to hold it with one hand while reading
For me it's absolutely perfect for the kind of note taking, book/comic reading, emulator playing, internet browsing I need to do. Admittedly it may still be too close to that "toy" kinda feel though ...
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
If you already have a larger Linux laptop that you're otherwise happy with, have you considered just throwing it in a padded laptop backpack?
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
Not sure how much power you need - but I just bought a used Microsoft surface 7 pro and installed Linux Mint on it. Was pretty damn easy actually. Runs great!
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I had one of the 10" eeePC machines for years. That thing was a tank. It did everything I needed it to, especially weird networking configurations. The battery also lasted over 6 hours. I mostly ran Crunchbang #! Linux on it.
I don't think I could live on a 10" screen anymore, but back in the day it was a dream machine.
For the hell of it, I used one as my main work laptop for a while. $199 plus $20 of RAM when I got it, IIRC.
External keyboard, put the laptop on a cantilevered board so that it's right in front of my eyeballs so that the screen size doesn't matter, use it mostly as a thin client to a beefier machine so the CPU doesn't matter much.
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No experience myself, but I saw this recently on Lemmy: GPD Win Max 2
Nice, I was going to post GPD. Also no personal experience, I've wanted one for a while now, maybe one day.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
A 2012 11" MacBook Air will run ZorinOS nicely and is truly tiny but very usable. Any Air made between 2012-17, really, but the 11" is SMALL.
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I had one of the 10" eeePC machines for years. That thing was a tank. It did everything I needed it to, especially weird networking configurations. The battery also lasted over 6 hours. I mostly ran Crunchbang #! Linux on it.
I don't think I could live on a 10" screen anymore, but back in the day it was a dream machine.
I don’t think I could live on a 10" screen anymore, but back in the day it was a dream machine.
Interesting. Years ago I moved from an 18in desktop setup to something like your eeePC. Unexpectedly, I also found it fine. These days I have a 14in and it feels unnecessarily big and heavy.
If you're happy doing things one window at a time (i.e. monocle view, or basically as on mobile OSs), turns out the floor's the limit!
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It’s clearly an objective measure. Do some research!
~/s~
I format all my movies to be under 9" so I can get 100% usability out of smaller laptops
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I format all my movies to be under 9" so I can get 100% usability out of smaller laptops
It’s 100 usables. It’s its own scale, don’t confuse people.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
ETA Prime reviews a lot of tiny laptops. They might help you find a good match.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
GPD laptops run Linux well. Even their smallest laptop. So it's really up to you as far how small you want to go.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
wrote on last edited by [email protected]Maybe not the smallest but I recently got a second hand Panasonic CF-RZ6 and it's incredibly useful. Surprisingly most(all?) hardware's working on Linux/FreeBSD/Win10/MacOS 10.13(OpenCore) that I tested, and the battery lasts about 4~5 hours with low clock speed on Linux. S3 sleep is also working pretty well. The japanese keyboard is hard to type on, and it's pretty hard to obtain outside japan though.
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I have a Toshiba Satellite T110, 11.6" screen, now running Linux Zorin. I've had it for 15 years - got a new battery at one point and added RAM, very easy to do. It's been a cracking little machine, really nice for travelling with.
Looks like a great machine. May I ask how's the battery life/power usage on it?
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
Possibly this. https://liberux.net/
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
IBM Thinkpad 701.
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Looks like a great machine. May I ask how's the battery life/power usage on it?
These days I mostly keep it plugged in, but it had good battery life when new. I got a replacement battery when it failed to hold enough of a charge for 5 or 6 hours. I honestly can't remember how long ago that was. I still travel with it occasionally, it's useful for working with photos (Gimp).
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I had the original eeePC too. I found the problem with the screen to be the resolution, not the size. My Lenovo Legion Go with its 8" screen is perfect as my daily driver.
I had one too. Besides the screen resolution, the actual worst thing about them was the MMC storage. Literally slower than a 5400rpm HDD. Mine was the one with the slightly faster atom CPU, but it was bottlenecked by the crazy slow storage.
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I'm interested in ideas for small laptop-style devices that (1) run Linux and (2) are actually usable (i.e., not so small or low quality they're basically toys).
My goal is for something to supplement my current, larger laptop. Something I can throw in a bag and pull out as needed during the day to take a few notes, read an eBook on, access the web, and so on.
Anyone have or heard of such a device?
