I’m unemployed and my current laptop died. Is ThinkPad T480 still the goto and does it still work for software development? Thinking of getting a Framework but I don’t want to spend that much right now.
For laptops, I’ve successfully run arch on dell, HP, Lenovo, and a Surfacebook, all within the last 3 years. The only issues I had were on one of the dells and the SB, the touchscreen didn’t work, which I had no issues with. I did have intermittent issues with the Lenovo fingerprint reader, but that laptop was about 10 years old when I got it, so less surprising.
I wouldn’t limit yourself to manufacturer at all, and I would recommend a business class model, but if you can get a consumer grade for stupid cheap, I wouldn’t say no to that either.
When my company cycles out laptops, they pull hard drives and then send them to recycling. We are allowed to take them. I had an older 2018 Dell and got a 2023 Dell to replace it. I just moved the nvme from one to the other and everything just worked. I didn’t expect it to be so smooth, but I literally didn’t have to do anything. I say that just so you know it’s simple to upgrade if you find a better option later.
Linux runs on almost anything these days. I’ve installed Mint on Lenovos, Dells, and HPs without issue (even media keys all worked out of the box). As others have suggested, I’d probably look into used business workstations from the last five years to ensure you’ll get a solid five to ten years out of it.
I don’t think you need to limit yourself to a Thinkpad specifically. Linux should work on almost any laptop these days. I would look around for secondhand business laptops. They tend to be reasonably priced and often gently used when they are coming from business environments.
Sure but other brands tend to have a lot of issues in general and the Linux support is worse, whereas a T480 was like $200 last I checked and has a huge Linux community behind it and supposedly they last a long time
Sure, there is certainly nothing wrong with a T480, and if you can find them at a reasonable price then go for it. That said, I would not exclude any other brands out of hand if you can find a good deal on, say, a 3-5 year old business laptop from the likes of Dell or HP. For all the durability of a T480, bear in mind that it will already be ~8 years old when you get it.
I think historically Linux users had to be a bit more particular about laptop models due to spotty driver support on laptop hardware, hence the love for Thinkpads which had good Linux compatibility, but these days I think the only real compatibility concerns are around fingerprint sensors with proprietary drivers and the occasional oddball wifi chip.
Upgrading BIOS is also a concern as @PancakesCantKillMe@lemmy.world mentioned, but in some cases I have used a bootable Windows USB drive to run the .exe-based FW upgrades on my HP laptop, for example.
You can just extract the bios.files now. As long as you have a flash drive you can update the bios on HP.laptops.
That’s good to know. Thanks!
I’ll keep the business laptops suggestion in mind. Consumer Windows laptops are the ones I’ve had a lot of problems with.
The consumer lines are total junk and are not even worth repairing, I think. The other nice thing about buying these older laptops is the trove of parts available out there on fleaBay.
Yeah, that’s fair. It definitely depends on the model and the product tier. All the manufacturers, even Lenovo’s lower end/consumer models, can have poor build quality on some models, so I would avoid those. Your average mid-tier and up business laptop will probably hold up just fine, though.
At some level it may also be luck of the draw, even if build quality will help the odds. Sometimes even a high-end laptop can get dropped once at the wrong angle and stop working, and yet I have seen beat-up chromebooks which looked like they came from a warzone and yet somehow still run.
I think OP is right that most laptops run Linux fine and the business lines are best. I did have to flash my HP laptop BIOS/firmware using Windows as HP has no Linux tools for this yet. But with that said, I own seven or eight Thinkpads and run different distros (Mint, Cachy, Solus, etc). All work very nicely. I could not discourage you from buying a 480 at all.
For HP laptops you can just a flash drive now. You can extract the bios file and signature file from the bios updater.
Same with dell. Download the file, put on fat32 (I think) flash drive, boot to bios, flash. Ez Pz.
I’ve used HP laptops in the past, my first one only lasted like 2 years before the motherboard randomly died, the case was falling apart within a year of usage, the WiFi was shit and getting it working on Linux was a pain. My next one is better which I just started using again, although right now it’s barely in tact as a desktop and not usable as a laptop and certain components on it also suddenly died after 2 years (and the touchpad was already wearing down after only a week). Additionally I can’t enable secure boot on it because they locked down the BIOS, some of the components don’t work on Linux at all, and the SSD/battery is difficult to access and for whatever reason it rejects certain well-known SSD models. It’s also not a well known model so there’s not as much part availability, and while I could repair it there’s enough stuff that’s broken on it that if I could get a better laptop for $200-300 I’d rather do that.
Totally get it. I don’t directly recommend buying an HP laptop, but I only mention it as it runs CachyOS fine. This one is a gamer and just happened to be the right price. I would go Thinkpad, then Dell business, then HP business (all used).
I can sell you a 15” dell with a quad core and 32gb of ram.
E: this is not a joke, I have a 3520 from a couple of years ago with an 11th gen i7, a 256gb nvme, the sata kit included and 32gb of ddr4. HMU.
OP this is a great laptop if this commenter is selling at a reasonable price since Dell has official linux support on this laptop since dev work is one of its main purposes
Ty! I also have one of the same model, same specs, completely busted top cover that wiggles and wobbles around if they want to slum it and save some more bucks.
T4x0 series have never disappointed me
Just picked up this Lenovo Ideapad for $640 for my kid . Nothing amazing, but I’m hoping it matches my previous Thinkpads in durability and longevity.
Basic detail - not great, but will probably suit your needs if you’re not doing game development or high-end data analysis:
Lenovo IdeaPad Slim 3 Laptop 2025 15.6” FHD 1920 x 1080 Touchscreen, AMD Ryzen 7 5825U, 8-core, AMD Radeon Graphics, 16GB DDR4, 512GB SSD, Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2, 720p HD Camera, Windows 11 Home
Those specs look fine, I don’t really do anything GPU intensive but I use NixOS which tends to compile a shitton of stuff
The Ideapads are consumer grade laptops. The build quality and repairability are usually worse than the business laptops.
An old thinkpad that fell off the back of a truck and ended up on craigslist is still the best way to get a laptop
