Re: New laptop - hardware questions

On Tue, 23 Oct 2007 14:17:00 +0200, Rene wrote:

Hello to all!

I am considering to buy a laptop (this one is so far my favourite:
http://www.zepto.nl/Shop/Notebook.aspx?notebookid=636). The model I am
interested in can be bought with an Intel Turbo Memory module of 1GB in
it. This was developed for prefetching and boot time speeding up in
Vista which I do not wish to enter my house. I have searched the web but
could only find people with the same question as I have, no answers. It
seems that in XP this card shows up as removable media. This would be
handy for Linux as well (I want to put Kubuntu and XP on it, the latter
for games only), it could be used as a swap drive. But can Linux make
some more "sophisticated" use of this? Would You recommend me to buy it
and why (not)?

It can also be equiped with 4GB of ram for 128 euro's extra (above the
2GB I would otherwise choose). Would this be worth the money? When
thinking of the turbo memory module that might be used as swap, wouldn't
buying this extra ram not make swapping unnecessary? Would buying 4GB
AND the turbo memory module make sense?

Thank You very much in advance!
Yours sincerely,
Rene

If Turbo Memory is an option I wouldn't get it. I don't know if it's
supported by Linux but even if it is I don't think it will be very
helpful. A 1G disk cache (which is what Turbo memory is) isn't big enough
to have any noticeable effect. The first generation of hybrid drives
(which combine FLASH with a harddrive) haven't been successful. A second
generation with a larger amount of FLASH is coming. A hybrid drive is a
much better solution because it's transparent to the OS.

I would get 4G of RAM, more RAM is always better. Linux runs just fine in
1G so the extra RAM isn't absolutely necessary but it's helpful because
Linux uses any unused RAM as a RAM cache.

The graphics on that laptop is Nvidia which has excellent Linux support
so you are OK there.

Make sure you get the Intel Wireless option not the default option. Intel
wireless is completely supported in Linux. The other option that they
offer is an unknown, if it's Broadcom you'll be completely screwed.
.

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