[davidhyde]

To me this is a problem of user effort. Free open source software is not advertised as aggressively as paid versions so you have to go out and find it rather than it coming to you. There is still a preconception that paid software is somehow better than free open source software despite the abundant evidence to counter it. If you are scared of Linux then don't be. Something like Linux Mint is closer to Windows 7 (the last UI friendly version of Windows IMO) than Windows 10 and 11. Wine (for running Windows programs on Linux) is so good these days you can sometimes even play graphics intensive games using it.

There are more options than ever before to avoid corporate lock-in nowadays. It just doesn't come to you - you have to go to it.

[api]

What's the best Linux laptop option these days? Are there any with decent build quality, solidness, aesthetics, and reliability compared to recent Macs?

Also how's hardware support? Last time I used Linux on a desktop, admittedly a few years ago, I still had to futz around with wireless and video drivers routinely.

[davidhyde]

I use a little Intel Nuc which fits in my pocket and set up screens at home and at work and just plug it into a cheap hub on either end. That way I get the equivalent power of a $2k laptop without the noise, upgrade restrictions and sore neck peering down at a small laptop screen.

BUT, if you want to use a laptop then I believe the System76 or Dell XPS line of laptops (just be careful about the nostril camera models) are quite Linux friendly.

Edit: My main PC has an nvidia graphics card (GeForce GTX 1070) and I admittedly had to use the proprietary Nvidia drivers instead of the FOSS equivalent for better performance. Like you I had to fuss around a little to find a version that did not crash my system (I settled on nvidia-driver-460 for Linux Mint 20.1 Cinnamon kernel 5.4). I probably wouldn't go for Nvidia next time and do my homework before buying graphics hardware. But I can play Windows games using Wine and it uses the graphics card which was surprising for me! For anything else like wireless stuff I find that most hardware just works out of the box. I usually just look for the word "linux" somewhere in the description and then I know that it will work. And you usually don't have to install drivers for stuff like wireless cards / dongles, bluetooth, keyboards, and mice. It just works in my recent experience.

[tomrod]

Exactly this.

[lbayes]

Since 2016-ish, I've been using the Dell XPS 13 "Developer Edition" (3 models so far), and they're consistently decent machines.

I still have a Linux workstation for big tasks, but XPS has been good enough to wean me off Macs ever since they introduced the touch bar, which was a hard pass for me.

Caveat:

I had to swap the radio in the first one due to driver issues, and I continue to experience occasional issues with Bluetooth, suspend and graphics rendering.

It's not all roses, but the benefits far outweigh the disadvantages (for me at least).

[JCWasmx86]

I don't know some laptops by name, but look for:

-Intel GPU in CPU (No firmware required/works even without)

-Or AMD GPU, Nvidia is not that linux-friendly. AMD GPU requires firmware-amd-graphics on debian

-Realtek wifi (I heard a lot of bad things about Broadcom). Requires firmware-realtek on debian

[fsflover]

https://puri.sm/products/librem-14