Which T4x works best with which Linux/BSD distros?

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hydrostarr · #1 Post by **hydrostarr** » Sat Dec 10, 2005 6:05 pm

Hello,

I'm in the market to purchase a T4x-series Thinkpad (probably a T42 or T43 flavor) that will run a Linux (or BSD) distribution. I'm trying to find out which combination of T-series box and Linux/BSD flavor will work best for me.

The notes below outline my requirements and other things related to my investigation. I would appreciate any feedback this community can provide.

Fyi, I have owned and used a Thinkpad T41 for the past 2 years running WinXP.

Best regards,
-Matt

Key requirements I seek:

Binaries are compatible with one of the following distributions: Debian, RHEL/Centos, FedoraCore, FreeBSD (yes, I realize that FreeBSD is not a Linux distribution).
7200RPM drive, 60GB or bigger
1400 x 1050 resolution

Requirements I'd like:

DVD burner

Requirements I'm debating:

A larger 15" screen. Great for screen size, not sure I want the extra weight.

General notes

I'm getting the impression that a T42 (assuming it does not have the problematic SATA bridge in the T43--see below) is more "friendly" with Linux/BSD distros then the T43. Any thoughts on this? Here are couple references:

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Problem_w ... hard_disks
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Problems_ ... _and_Linux

What's the state of the above SATA problem on various Linux distros?

Can I get all the emergency-maintenance (eg, Knoppix-boot like) capability from a CD or a USB key? I'm hoping not to thave to buy a floppy device.

Will I want to use a specific bootloader regardless of the OS distribution? I don't know much about LILO or others; I'm not sure if Knoppix fills this role, either.

Does IBM/Lenovo support Linux distros on any of it's Thinkpad T4x models?

I want to run WindowsXP as a VMware guest on this VMware Linux host machine; does anyone experience with this configuration on a Thinkpad T4x series?

I want to be able to build binaries (libraries and executables) on my native (as opposed to a VMware guest OS) Linux distro that are compatible with Debian, RHEL, FreeBSD, or FedoraCore systems (I'm a software developer and manager that will routinely be building proprietary software nativley on this system and in the various VMware guest OSes that I will host from this Thinkpad). I suppose this may restrict my Thinkpad-installed distro to one of these 4 OS variants or their "descendents." eg, I under stand distros like Xandros (and others: http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Debian/installers.html ) are based upon the Debian distribution, maybe this an option?

(Also, I will be running services (web, proprietary) on my Thinkpad in a server-like configuration--although not permanently, just for testing some of my builds.)

AT the same time, I'd like to minimize the amount of tweaking and configuring I need to do. If I need to do things like patch the kernel in order to get one for above 4 OS flavors to work, then so be it; however, I'd like to minimize this.

I'm also inclined to go with something that's more popular and/or widely used. The philosophy goes that if more people are using and/or updating said distribution, the more likely it support all the Thinkpad's requirements and/or will be fixed quickly to do so.

hydrostarr · #2 Post by **hydrostarr** » Sat Dec 10, 2005 8:35 pm

It might also help to note:

I plan to run this machine with 2GB of memory, probably after purchasing quantity=2, 1GB DIMMs from a 3rd-party seller (and save some cash over IBM/Lenovo's markup) and using the 512MB+ of installed memory (that comes with it from Lenovo) somewhere else.

I plan to be configuring multiple VMware guest OSes (not necessarily running more then one at once, although I will occasionally) and will generally be riding this machine pretty hard with proprietary, server-side software development (mostly C++ based; very little if any Java) and test activities, in addition to general "business" things (email MUAs, web browsing, spreadsheets, document editing, etc...even though I know that all these tools exist in LinuxLand) that I'll mostly run in a Windows VMware guest OS.

All in all, I'll be software developing, building, and testing from 5 platforms (FedoraCore, CentOS/RHEL, Debian, FreeBSD, and Windows), one of which I want to be the native OS I'm running on Thinkpad (preferrably one of the Linux/BSD platforms) and running VMware guest OSes for the rest. Yes, this may be tall order for a laptop; however, this system needs to be decidely mobile. I have many other desktop and server systems to do broader developing and testing.

Fyi: I have little need for any high-class video or sound or any other "rich media" requirements.

Thanks again for any recommendations or guidance.

-Matt

benplaut · #3 Post by **benplaut** » Sun Dec 11, 2005 2:59 am

any modern (released in last 6 months) linux distro should have about the same hardware support... my favorite is Ubuntu. hardware support is known to be a bit sketchy with FreeBSD, and if you're a first time *NIX user, Linux is probably a better choice

LiveCDs are your friends!

#4 Post by **carbon_unit** » Sun Dec 11, 2005 7:54 am

In this case I would recommend Ubuntu if you want the Gnome desktop or Kubuntu if you want the KDE desktop. Both have live cd's so you can try before you commit.

hydrostarr · #5 Post by **hydrostarr** » Sun Dec 11, 2005 7:01 pm

Ok, so I'm getting the impression from thinkwiki ( http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:T43 and http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:T43p ) and the responses on these forums that FedoraCore4, Debian, and Debian/Ubuntu appear to be the most-popular Linux loads on the T4x. Any others that I might be in the realm of feasibility/popularity?

Xandros (sp?) was also mentioned somewhere, but that seems a little too "user friendly" overboard for my taste.

At this point I'd guess I'd be going with Ubuntu.

For those I'm referring to this thread, see the T42-vs-T43 hardware investigation at:
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=18225

Also note email feedback I've received from a friend of mine that read this thread who's also a Thinkpad and Debian fan:

I can't say anythign as to a certain T series model working better with linux distros, but I imagine that the T42, being a little older, will be slightly better supported, even though most of the hardware is close to the same.

For out of the box compatibility, Ubuntu is probably the easiest to set up. It's along the lines of "put in the CD, wait 10 minutes, done," which includes full graphical environment. There may be some extra setup involving video drivers but everything else is more or less throw and go. Ubuntu is based on Debian, it's geared to be an end-client type desktop rather than Debian's back-end server focus. Ubuntu also has the sweet apt-get package management system, so installing most software is a breeze.

As carbon_unit mentioned in the thread, you can try out Ubuntu with a live CD before installing it, just to see if you like it. You could probably try it on your T41 too. If you want to see a quick and easy FAQ/starter guide, check http://ubuntuguide.org/. One thing to note right away is that by default, Ubuntu disables root logins, so you have to do (almost) any root-level command via sudo. There should be a FAQ question to get around this though.

Trying out the LiveCD on my T41 and the new T42/T43 will probably prove helpful.

-Matt

hydrostarr · #6 Post by **hydrostarr** » Sun Dec 11, 2005 7:10 pm

stgreek · #7 Post by **stgreek** » Mon Dec 12, 2005 12:10 pm

Gentoo also works perfectly fine with all T and X series I have ever tried it on

aabram · #8 Post by **aabram** » Mon Dec 12, 2005 2:52 pm

http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-mobile/

smugiri · #9 Post by **smugiri** » Mon Dec 12, 2005 10:37 pm

Most T4x series machines are Novell SuSE certified. For about $40, you can also buy pretty good support. SuSE 10 worked out of the box for my T40p meaning no fiddling with loose bits.

Everything including BlueTooth, Wireless on the dreaded Atheros card, Infra-Red and some other interested stuff that I had ( one of those little 18 in 1 smart-card readers that do SM/XD/SD/MMC/MS/MSPRO/CF/MD/everything else storage cards and my DVD writer on a FireWire PCMCIA card ) all worked without doing any fiddling. I admit that my machine is a little dated but Novell SuSE certification essentially gurantees you that "working out of the box" will be true for any T4x machine on the list including the newest of the T42/T43(p)'s.

Check out this link for a list of certified Thinkpads to see if the machine you are interested in made the cut.

Another point that may be worth thinking about is large disk support: not many distro's can handle NTFS disks and FAT32 tops out at about 32gb I think. If you plan to do dual boot, it might be worth investigating which distros can deal with NTFS volumes that can go above 32gb else you will end up having a ton of partitions if you want to share data between the operating systems ( I know you mentioned using VM ware so this might not be an issue ).

SuSE 10 can read NTFS data but cannot write to NTFS partitions with a stock kernel. Some tools exist to allow you to write to NTFS volumes including captive which requires modifying the kernel.

I am not sure what the other distros can do. I run into this gotcha a little while ago when I got a 100gb disk. I split it up into a partion for a windows install, another for linux ( which then took up another 2 partitions, one for swap and another for / ) and when I tried to create FAT32 partions for my data, I run out of partitions, Ended up making one monster NTFS partition for everything that I can sadly only write to in Windows since I have not been able to make Captive work yet.

I may be wrong about some of this as I am still feeling my way around and learning though research so if there are any experts out there who know different about all this, let me know.

There are 2 versions of SuSE 10, a completely open sourceone and the Novell versionthat they call the eval version. Be sure to use the Novell version as it is the one that includes Thinkpad specific drivers, the other may give you some headaches.

yukit · #10 Post by **yukit** » Tue Dec 20, 2005 12:57 am

You can search VMware's forum for people using Thinkpads.
Better yet, you can post the question there.

http://www.vmware.com/community/forum.jspa?forumID=19

One coworker is running Ubuntu on T42p, recently upgraded to T43p.

Which T4x works best with which Linux/BSD distros?

Which T4x works best with which Linux/BSD distros?

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