HP Pavilion zd8000

Liam Marshall · External Since: Apr 10, 2004 Posts: 4

Am so pissed off with windoze and its vulnerabilities. Have been
running/administering a linux terminal server lab at school for 2 years
now K12LTSP 4.4.x right now.

going to switch my laptop to completely Linux. Just trying to determine
the best distro.

I would like to edit video and use the firewire ports and broadcom
wireless. Anyone know of a known working distro with this laptop?

help greatly appreciated

General Schvantzkoph · External Since: Dec 29, 2004 Posts: 1199

On Wed, 11 Jan 2006 23:06:42 -0600, Liam Marshall wrote:

> Am so pissed off with windoze and its vulnerabilities. Have been
> running/administering a linux terminal server lab at school for 2 years
> now K12LTSP 4.4.x right now.
>
> going to switch my laptop to completely Linux. Just trying to determine
> the best distro.
>
> I would like to edit video and use the firewire ports and broadcom
> wireless. Anyone know of a known working distro with this laptop?
>
> help greatly appreciated

The Broadcom wireless is going to require Ndiswrapper, there is no Linux
driver for it. I've got a Compaq R3000z which has the Broadcom in it and
I've been able to make it work with Ndiswrapper so I expect you'll be able
to do the same. My laptop has an Nvidia graphics chip so there are no
problems using Linux because Nvidia does a good job of providing graphics
drivers. Your laptop has ATI graphics in it, I don't know how well those
are supported.

Jim · External Since: Apr 21, 2005 Posts: 996

Liam Marshall wrote:
> Am so pissed off with windoze and its vulnerabilities. Have been
> running/administering a linux terminal server lab at school for 2 years
> now K12LTSP 4.4.x right now.
>
> going to switch my laptop to completely Linux. Just trying to determine
> the best distro.
>
> I would like to edit video and use the firewire ports and broadcom
> wireless. Anyone know of a known working distro with this laptop?
>
> help greatly appreciated

dunno about the specific laptop but I do have a Dell Inspiron working
under SuSE Pro 9.2 with a Broadcom wireless. Went straight on, zero
config required, I get 11Mbps on a 54g Linksys AP with 128-bit WEP. Not
full speed for the card (also 54g) but then I'm not gaming on it, I just
want to surf and do my email.

Jim · External Since: Apr 21, 2005 Posts: 996

General Schvantzkoph wrote:
> On Wed, 11 Jan 2006 23:06:42 -0600, Liam Marshall wrote:
>
>
>>Am so pissed off with windoze and its vulnerabilities. Have been
>>running/administering a linux terminal server lab at school for 2 years
>>now K12LTSP 4.4.x right now.
>>
>>going to switch my laptop to completely Linux. Just trying to determine
>>the best distro.
>>
>>I would like to edit video and use the firewire ports and broadcom
>>wireless. Anyone know of a known working distro with this laptop?
>>
>>help greatly appreciated
>
>
> The Broadcom wireless is going to require Ndiswrapper, there is no Linux
> driver for it. I've got a Compaq R3000z which has the Broadcom in it and
> I've been able to make it work with Ndiswrapper so I expect you'll be able
> to do the same. My laptop has an Nvidia graphics chip so there are no
> problems using Linux because Nvidia does a good job of providing graphics
> drivers. Your laptop has ATI graphics in it, I don't know how well those
> are supported.

Radeon 7500 mobile under SuSE 9.2 is spot on. 1400x1050 XGA native
resolution, right off the bat.