Andy, I have a powerbook, and I know that all of Apple's Airport Extreme wireless cards are not supported under Linux. Broadcom makes the chipset, and they will not release drivers for linux for the card. The irony is that it is possible to get the chipset to work in an x86-based system with ndiswrapper - a windows driver emulator for x86 linux distributions.
That having been said, the Centrino chipset is preety good. The integrated shared-memeory graphics are a sore point, but other than that it is okay. The wireless card integrated with the centrino works with linux with an open source driver, as I understand. If that does not work, you can always fall back to the ndiswrapper, but I am sure that an open-source driver is stable now for it. The graphics work in linux, I think, but the 3d performance is dismal in any operating system. The processor architecture is wonderfully efficient and fast, from what I have heard. The 2nd-generation processor with 2MB cache is supposed to be quite a good all-around performer. So, if you would like to run Mac OS X on a laptop, the Apple laptops are great. I can vouch for the battery run-time - still probably better than almost any x86-based system from the price and weight standpoint. The operating system is unix, but it has a very nice package system where you install an application as a single "virtual executable". To install most applications, you drag-and-drop the icon from the installer self-mounting-image into your applications folder. To delete it, you drag it to the trash can. However, Linux is still my preferred operating system. Ironically, there are some applications that I wish that I could run natively on the Mac which I can not. Personally, I just like tweaking the system, and knowing how it works at a very low level. Mac OS X does not make this easy, but Linux does. And, a lot of my favorite applications are second-class citizens in Mac OS X because they run in X11. X11 is wonderful, but does not integrate with the system very well. Also, Linux is Free and free, but my new version of Mac OS X(Tiger, 10.4) cost me over $70, and that includes the educational discount. So, if you like Linux, go for the x86 solution, if you just want a stable system with good battery life, you can give Apple a spin. I hope that this is at least somewhat helpful. Caleb Jorden [EMAIL PROTECTED] Andy Linsenbardt wrote: >April 16, 2005 > >So yeah, I think I've conned Mom and Dad to get me a laptop for >graduation... I'm seriously considering getting an Apple (likely an >iBook...), but Dad wants me to look into PC options as well...in which >case, I'll want to put Linux on it... Does anyone have experience with >getting Linux to work on a modern (i.e. within a year or two old...) >notebook? I'd like to ether get an Athlon 64 in it (sadly, Turion isn't >really out yet...) or a Centrino, but I'm not sure how well certain >distros deal with Centrino (or any integrated wireless offerings, for >that matter)... I'd rather keep it integrated wireless, rather than >springing for a PCMCIA card with Linux drivers... > >Thoughts? Ideas? Thanks! > >Andy > >----------------------------------------------------------------- >To get off this list, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] >with Subject: unsubscribe >----------------------------------------------------------------- > > ----------------------------------------------------------------- To get off this list, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with Subject: unsubscribe -----------------------------------------------------------------
