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Antonis Tsolomitis | University of the Aegean


My experience with laptops designed for Linux



There is a difference between laptops designed for Windows or MacOs that someone installed Linux on them, and laptops which were designed to operate with Linux. Safety and privacy are usually in the priorities of companies that design their laptops for Linux, beyond the guaranteed compatibility of their hardware with the Linux kernel, as opposed to laptops designed for Windows or MacOs, usually ignore the user, and have as their first concern the user's monitoring and reporting of his data to both the parent company and third parties (such as Facebook etc). The main difference is whose property the laptop is. Linux laptops belong to the user. He has all the rights that the concept of "property" always has. Instead, you cannot own a laptop designed for Windows or MacOs. For example, the latter do NOT have the right to repair. Especially with Mac, that's certainty. Similarly, for Windows, for example, you cannot control what the machine does. If it decides to upgrade, you won't have it at your service for several hours.

Personally I would prefer a laptop designed for Linux even if I wanted to run Windows on it rather than vice versa. Despite a laptop designed for Windows on which to run Linux.

Apart from the above, there is also the economic issue. Windows/Mac-laptops are much more expensive even if you buy them without a Windows license. Made with cheap materials, often plastic everywhere, and expensive parts such as RAM memories and SSD drives.

I have experience with two companies that produce Linux laptops. One in the United States (Purism) and one in the European Union (Slimbook). Personally I am pleased with both products at all levels. Design, elegant appearance, mostly metallic construction, reasonable price, performance, security, privacy and the machine obeys me and no one else.

But I want to stand more on the human part. I used the support of both of them. Complicated settings (my own desire) for Purism products and one problem with Slimbook hardware. People not only responded immediately, not only did they solve all of my problems, but they were very friendly, showed their interest in the user and exceeded formal corporate processes to serve me. Try talking to known multinational computer companies...

As the Mozilla Foundation rightly says "people make the internet great, not billionaires". Take the step. Get out of their suffocating control. You'll never have to look back.