At the risk of being “that guy”, my solution was to buy an M1 MacBook Air.
At some point you have to accept that there is no one in the linux space incentivized to create a modern desktop experience, much less laptop power optimization comparable to a “vertically integrated” player like Apple.
I would love to get Apple hardware and battery life running Debian. Maybe Asahi will make it happen. In the mean time, I’m enjoying 99% of the things I like about Linux, with none of the massive pain wading through forum posts trying to figure out what bitman97 did back in 2015 to get their backlight to work with the Debian stable kernel
I love Linux, but I also just want to be productive in my job. Gone are the days where I can spend hours happily compiling my own kernel to optimize the hell out of bootup time and slim it down. There's no single ready to use distro that has a somewhat modern feel to it (IMHO).
So I bit the bullet long ago, bought a Mac, made it feel as close as home as I could and I haven't spent a second trying to debug a random bug affecting my bluetooth, audio, graphics or wifi card since. The only thing I truly miss is i3wm.
Yeah no. The Air is defintiely better than my 2018 MBP but the 2018 MBP gets in tthe way so much. Crashes multiple times a day for no reason. This macbook fanboyism is tiring
The m1 locks up when doing basic haskell compiles. People fight that comparing apples ridiculous pricing to pc is not apple to apple and yet here were comparing the work of volunteers to a greedy company that exploits the planet through planned obsolescence and pushes for that. And does green washing in marketing.
The real problem is that laptop manifacturers aren't incentivized to optimize their stuff for linux. Just look at videos the steam deck to see what happens when linux is a first class and windows a second class citizen
Besides Microsoft hardware products which represent a small share of the Windows hardware ecosystem there isn't a vertically integrated player in the Windows world but battery life on these same laptops tends to be massively better under Windows. Ubuntu and Fedora are certified for my Thinkpad and Lenovo sold it with them installed but the battery life on Windows is at least twice that under Linux. The market is just too small for Lenovo to dedicate much effort to optimizing battery life for Linux. Lenovo updates the Windows power management driver for the laptop regularly.
I saw massive differences in window managers. Every Linux machine I have beats windows in battery life by a very large margin iff I use i3. With default (‘nicer looking’ depending on taste) they do far less. Like my 2011 x220 still does 15 hours on i3, gpd pocket 1 similar, Pandora gets 20 hours, etc. The ones that run Windows, like the pocket and x220, barely make 4 hours. Note that I did optimise the Linux and did nothing to the windows installs, but still. I have a stack of laptops with dual boot from Dell, Acer etc and I have the same results there; far shorter than the above go to machines, but windows less than half of Linux for anything I do.
How many batteries does your x220 have attached to it? You’re probably running the extended one and the one that attaches to the bottom right? Mine won’t last 2hs on its own with the portable battery that doesn’t stick out. I think it’s the i5.
So I wonder if "using fewer GPU calls" is the solution to Linux's battery problems, or if you've just found a parallel way to cut battery usage that counteracts it...
Best solution I have seen is to buy a Chromebook and install galliumOS. Still has most of the same issues as any desktop Linux but at least has all the power saving features of chromeos are included. That way you don't have to buy a device from a company that decides to throttle the CPU when they want you to buy a new computer.
I once bought a windows ultrabook for on the road, with a 128gb ssd. When I unpacked the computer 90% was used by the operating system. It was basically useless. I installed Linux and only 6gb was used. I had no battery issues. I could use apt install. Life was beautiful.
[+] [-] ahepp|4 years ago|reply
At some point you have to accept that there is no one in the linux space incentivized to create a modern desktop experience, much less laptop power optimization comparable to a “vertically integrated” player like Apple.
I would love to get Apple hardware and battery life running Debian. Maybe Asahi will make it happen. In the mean time, I’m enjoying 99% of the things I like about Linux, with none of the massive pain wading through forum posts trying to figure out what bitman97 did back in 2015 to get their backlight to work with the Debian stable kernel
[+] [-] halfdan|4 years ago|reply
I love Linux, but I also just want to be productive in my job. Gone are the days where I can spend hours happily compiling my own kernel to optimize the hell out of bootup time and slim it down. There's no single ready to use distro that has a somewhat modern feel to it (IMHO).
So I bit the bullet long ago, bought a Mac, made it feel as close as home as I could and I haven't spent a second trying to debug a random bug affecting my bluetooth, audio, graphics or wifi card since. The only thing I truly miss is i3wm.
[+] [-] spacexsucks|4 years ago|reply
The m1 locks up when doing basic haskell compiles. People fight that comparing apples ridiculous pricing to pc is not apple to apple and yet here were comparing the work of volunteers to a greedy company that exploits the planet through planned obsolescence and pushes for that. And does green washing in marketing.
[+] [-] TT-392|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tssva|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nikau|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tluyben2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] culopatin|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] phendrenad2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] barbacoa|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] siliconpotato|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _nub3|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jurschreuder|4 years ago|reply