this post was submitted on 03 Jul 2023
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I want to know your opinions on the best distro that is convenient for laptops. Main reason is I want to really optimize hardware performance and more specifically battery life for my University classes. I also want to try a tiling manager as they seem perfect for laptops.

Things of note:

  • Convenience/Performance is key
  • My laptop is a Thinkpad E15 w/ 16 gb ram
  • On my home desktop I run Archlinux w/ Open box & no DE (I've been using Arch for years but haven't used another distro since Ubuntu in highschool)
  • I will likely dual boot with Windows 10 for Office
  • I want to run a tiling manager
  • I don't video game
  • I wont be using a mouse
  • I don't necessarily want to use Arch, want to try something new that I don't have to rely on AUR updates for certain software
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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

My understanding is that it's not really the disrto, but the software running on it that'd effect battery life and performance. Both Debian and Arch can come pretty bare bones on a blank install (Ubuntu and derivatives tend to come with a fair bit of stuff bundled out of the box).

I'd personally reccomend trying a Debian installation (I'd likely say use stable, but testing or sid are also options if you need quicker updates and don't care for flatpak/snap/appimage/distrobox). The installer plays nice with Windows, and you can skip installing a desktop during installation then CLI install a tiling window manager to really minimize 'bloat'.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

this really makes nixOs so good because I can just make others do the hard work of configing it for me and use it 😂

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Unless you want to run a stake pool on Cardano, you’d have to fork and modify my config.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

YESS!!! I just switched from vanillaOS to Nix and its been a learning curve but if you screw up you just go back a generation and rebuild. And I haven't had any package manager BS like ubuntu.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wow these seems really cool, good job and thanks for your contribution! I am gonna check it out!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Glad to help! I’m merely standing on the shoulders of the giants before me.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Pop!OS is great and ticks most of your boxes. Although, you'll likely have to read into the battery optimization.

[–] astraeus 2 points 1 year ago

I've had a pretty good time with PopOS. GNOME is a bit rough at times (handling window sizes, font size changes, monitor layout updates) and I only had DisplayLink driver issues, which is probably trivial for most personal users nowadays.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Why not something like Debian Testing?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

specifically battery life for my University classes

try undervolting your CPU/GPU. That was the first thing I did when I got my thinkpad and it improved the thermals and battery life significantly.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I would use one of the tools listed in the archwiki; I have an intel chip so I've never used any myself.

Once you find a tool that can undervolt, usually the recommendation is to lower the voltage incrementally until you see unstable behavior and crashes, than raise it back to the last good voltage, then run a stress-test to verify.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Hum, any guide you followed ?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

just the readme for throttled

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Add tlp package for battery life. And any major distro should be fine really

[–] aport 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Fedora is the best distro for anything therefore it is also the best distro for laptops.

[–] WeetHet 1 points 1 year ago

Redh*t bullshit

[–] tappyturtle 2 points 1 year ago

You could go with plain, trusty Debian. Good hardware support, pretty easy to customize post-installation.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I liked using fedora Sway spin on my Dell XPS 13. Sway because it let's you utilise the screen space well and fedora spin because it came working out of the box, you can use it in any distro really.

[–] solidsnail 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Some thinkpads have official support for Ubuntu by the manufacturer (lenovo), which means battery optimizations out of the box, amongst other things. Might be relevant for your laptop.

[–] Shareni 1 points 1 year ago

And some models like t480 have permanently throttled CPU, which will give you better battery life whether you want it or not

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes, the best distro I always recommend is Fedora Silverblue, especially the KDE version: Fedora Kinoite. I hate this naming scheme though.

Sadly Fedora is controlled by Red Hat and it may get killed off soon.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I used to enjoy fedora silver blue (daily drove on Lenovo t450) then I switches to Lenovo w540 I sniped of eBay and the DRIVERS ARE AWFUL FOR EVERY DISTRO. Tried manjaro, arch, gaurdua, Debian, Ubuntu its 22.4, Ubuntu 12 and fedora silver blue, and fedora the I tried nix and got the GPU working but the driver was so old I settled on windows (even though it pains me to use).

[–] slimsalm 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I guess you can run fedora if you want full features of a laptop. Im currently running LMDE5, is rock solid for me this past 2+ years, upgraded seamlessly from LMDE4. I guess LMDE6 will be released soon after LM 21.2 is released. I do think that at the end of the day , whatever you choose, you can change your desktop environment so it suites you.

[–] slimsalm 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

If you do use any debian distro, nala is a great way to update your packages.

[–] aeluon 1 points 1 year ago

following for the answers. I'm currently using Ubuntu on my Dell XPS 9330 and after 6 months as my daily driver I'm ready for something new.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Debian is solid. You probably don't want to have to fuck around on a laptop that you're using primarily for getting shit done. Flatpaks can handle most of the extra shit you'd want to use. That said, I used to be an Arch guy for years too, and if you're comfortable with it, it's fine to use, but you'll run into the same kind of annoyances. Not true breakage usually, but eventually I got tired of having new surprise bugs in shit that was working fine before.

Also I can't be sure, but I suspect Wayland is probably better on energy draw since it should be more efficient. Maybe try sway for your twm?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Not true breakage usually, but eventually I got tired of having new surprise bugs in shit that was working fine before.

yep, considering switching to nixos for this reason.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

In terms of optimization, Gentoo is the best you're gonna get, but the word "convenience" makes me hesitant to recommend it to you.

Arch is minimal, and has many resources/guides on battery optimization (Especially for ThinkPads), but if you'd like to learn something else, Void is the way to go.

If you're looking for a tiling WM, I can wholeheartedly recommend bspwm. Lots of control and customization, but pretty easy to configure when you understand it. Just know, it might be a hard change going from stacking to tiling.

[–] Shareni 1 points 1 year ago

I don't necessarily want to use Arch, want to try something new that I don't have to rely on AUR updates for certain software

That's literally the only relevant criterion. Search flathub for those packages, if they're not up there, search the repos of every major distro.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Fedora and Debian are good choices. I've been using Fedora for more than 7 years and it's still going. Very stable like Debian yet up-to-date packages.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

I've been running Debian for about 7 years as well, never an issue.* I use it for browsing, photo/video editing, coding, gaming with Steam with no complaints. Fedora has always been tempting for it's more up to date packages but Debian's usually have all the features I need.

*I have had self-induced issues by installing .debs from strange places but never with the default repos or even 3rd party repos.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago

fedora with gnome (fedora workspaces) is what i use rn :) used the xfce flavor, kde plasma one, and neither of them gave me everything i desired out of them like gnome did. gnome seems to have the leaast amount of small graphical bugs. also fedora is the shit overall, top 3 distros for sure.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Do you really need to dual boot for office?

I’m doing fine compatibility wise with the OnlyOffice flatpak. If you have a school account with Microsoft perhaps the PWA for Word, etc. will meet your needs.

For a laptop distro with a good tiling DE out of the box you might enjoy Pop!_OS.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

File compatible is one thing, but I just can't get over the difference in shortcut keys/workflow.

Plus, creating and editing charts is still miles easier in excel.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 1 year ago
  • Ubuntu LTS or Debian Stable. Your skill level is good so you can go with Debian 12, I am loving it after 6 years of Ubuntu LTS. Performance, stability and hardware support is amazing, as is battery. GNOME is the best DE on laptops if you use scaling factor in GNOME Tweaks.

  • If your only need is MS Office, you can get away with MS Office 2007 in a Windows XP VM in VirtualBox. Otherwise, buy a M.2 NGFF SSD (check PSREF spec sheet file for your ThinkPad) for Windows 10 (preferably Ameliorated Project).

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago

Popos. Surprised no one has said it.

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