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After looking at just about every laptop on the market, and even considering one of the new Apple Intel iBooks, I think I've finally decided on getting the Acer Ferrari 4005WLMi this February with my tax money. It's got an AMD Turion 64-bit processor @ 2.0 GHz, an ATI Radeon graphics card, 1GB of RAM, and a 100gb hard disk, which is exactly what I want. I've been contemplating which distro to install on it, and while I love Debian, this laptop will give me an opportunity to try out a new distro. I was thinking maybe Gentoo. I hear they have a really good AMD64 port, and I think it would be a good learning experience, even if it means spending all weekend compiling KDE. If anyone has any recommendations for 64-bit distros, let me know.

SuSE Linux 10.0 is a great distro for laptops, and also has a good 64-bit version.

Wally Balljacker wrote:After looking at just about every laptop on the market, and even considering one of the new Apple Intel iBooks, I think I've finally decided on getting the Acer Ferrari 4005WLMi this February with my tax money. It's got an AMD Turion 64-bit processor @ 2.0 GHz, an ATI Radeon graphics card, 1GB of RAM, and a 100gb hard disk, which is exactly what I want. I've been contemplating which distro to install on it, and while I love Debian, this laptop will give me an opportunity to try out a new distro. I was thinking maybe Gentoo. I hear they have a really good AMD64 port, and I think it would be a good learning experience, even if it means spending all weekend compiling KDE. If anyone has any recommendations for 64-bit distros, let me know.

I've been loving AMD64 Gentoo. The only thing I don't like is getting flash to work because there is no amd64 flash player so you have to use the 32bit binary of firefox which is kind of annoying but not too bad. Its one of the few Distros that actually optimise all the programs for AMD64. However its not a noob distro. I know what Im doing so I don't have any trouble with it. No severe breakage and if there was portage is powerfull enough to get around it.

CptnObvious999 wrote:

Wally Balljacker wrote:After looking at just about every laptop on the market, and even considering one of the new Apple Intel iBooks, I think I've finally decided on getting the Acer Ferrari 4005WLMi this February with my tax money. It's got an AMD Turion 64-bit processor @ 2.0 GHz, an ATI Radeon graphics card, 1GB of RAM, and a 100gb hard disk, which is exactly what I want. I've been contemplating which distro to install on it, and while I love Debian, this laptop will give me an opportunity to try out a new distro. I was thinking maybe Gentoo. I hear they have a really good AMD64 port, and I think it would be a good learning experience, even if it means spending all weekend compiling KDE. If anyone has any recommendations for 64-bit distros, let me know.

I've been loving AMD64 Gentoo. The only thing I don't like is getting flash to work because there is no amd64 flash player so you have to use the 32bit binary of firefox which is kind of annoying but not too bad. Its one of the few Distros that actually optimise all the programs for AMD64. However its not a noob distro. I know what Im doing so I don't have any trouble with it. No severe breakage and if there was portage is powerfull enough to get around it.

Well, that's the reason I'd like to install Gentoo - it would be a challenge, and having my desktop to follow the installation guides should make it easy enough. If I don't try Gentoo, I'd like to try something else that requires me to get my hands dirty. Arch looks good, but I think that's only for Intel i686.

Wally Balljacker wrote:

CptnObvious999 wrote: I've been loving AMD64 Gentoo. The only thing I don't like is getting flash to work because there is no amd64 flash player so you have to use the 32bit binary of firefox which is kind of annoying but not too bad. Its one of the few Distros that actually optimise all the programs for AMD64. However its not a noob distro. I know what Im doing so I don't have any trouble with it. No severe breakage and if there was portage is powerfull enough to get around it.

Well, that's the reason I'd like to install Gentoo - it would be a challenge, and having my desktop to follow the installation guides should make it easy enough. If I don't try Gentoo, I'd like to try something else that requires me to get my hands dirty. Arch looks good, but I think that's only for Intel i686.

I like your style! I was just warning you I like Gentoo's start from scratch, get-only-what-you-want system. Do I really need to carry around 10 CD's just to install a distro? Plus the install CD is also a LiveCD/Rescue CD and has rescued me a few times, like when you accidentally uninstall GRUB

With Arch, I'm starting to learn the benefits of "build your own" and have come to appreciate this mentality, too.

I'll make my usual plug for Thinkpads. I've used several other lappy's (including the iBook) and I'll never use another. My T42 was an epiphany. Also, unless you're really only interested in a "portable worstation" aka a "luggable" you might seriously want to reconsider a 64 bit proc. Like the P4, it just isn't easy on batteries.

Snarkout wrote:I'll make my usual plug for Thinkpads. I've used several other lappy's (including the iBook) and I'll never use another. My T42 was an epiphany. Also, unless you're really only interested in a "portable worstation" aka a "luggable" you might seriously want to reconsider a 64 bit proc. Like the P4, it just isn't easy on batteries.

Thinkpads are expensive. To get a Thinkpad with what I want, I'd end up spending atleast $500 more than the Acer. The Turion processor is designed for mobility, so it can't be THAT bad on the battery.