Kubuntu Focus Ir14 Gen 2 assessment: Using Linux instead of messing with it

There are heaps of laptops—perhaps all of them—on which you’ll run a Linux desktop. There are a number of distributors that provide laptops with intensive Linux compatibility. After which there are a choose few focusing on Linux laptops, assist them, and even customise them.

Kubuntu Focus is one of the choose few. It despatched me one of its laptops to check the Ir14 Gen 2, which runs, of course, Kubuntu, the KDE desktop variant of Ubuntu. The “Focus” within the firm title comes from what it is hoping to supply: a tool on which you’ll simply do your work with out worrying about what’s taking place deeper in your system. Go forward and sudo apt replace, says the Focus workforce; we’ve received you.

I used the Ir14 Gen 2 for Ars Technica work and my private wants for at the least two weeks. Setting the system up with Focus’ guided wizard, putting in apps from its retailer, and refusing to the touch any of the deeper system recordsdata, I achieved one thing fairly exceptional: no surprising behaviors on a Linux laptop computer. Had something gone mistaken, I might fairly lean again on the system’s rollbacks, which I used a pair of occasions with no drawback.

Is that this what it could possibly be like? Does utilizing Linux on the desktop not must contain compiling from supply, looking for that one related discussion board remark associated to an issue, questioning the place the fault lies alongside the chain from kernel to desktop to repository to me? Perhaps. Are you able to give up a bit of your improve and tinkering curiosity in trade for figuring out that issues will work after they get to you? It is perhaps trickier than you suppose.

What’s a Kubuntu Focus laptop computer, precisely?

A Kubuntu Focus Ir14 Gen 2 laptop computer contains these items:

• A laptop computer made by Carbon Methods, which provides lots of fleet and enterprise methods, and occurs to make them comparatively improve and repair-friendly
• A inventory Kubuntu 24.04 LTS system with a Plasma desktop, with Focus’ integrations inbuilt
• A number of software program instruments from Focus, together with energy profiles and rollback

The Focus shouldn’t be meant to allow you to do no matter you need however to maintain doing what you do. Researchers, builders, and jet propulsion labs are some of Focus’ prospects. Focus checks all the pieces that can arrive on official replace channels to the gadget. When kernel updates seem within the upstream, Focus makes positive all the pieces on the gadget works with it, whereas additionally contributing again to Ubuntu, Kubuntu, KDE, and the kernel itself.

You don’t get interim releases. You don’t get employees within the boards serving to you with operating Arch or Fedora. There’s no customized desktop surroundings or windowing system (“We felt constructing a separate distribution and ecosystem is the very last thing anybody wanted,” the corporate writes). Focus selected reliability for daily-driver gadgets operating Linux. It will probably, in different phrases, prevent from your self, when you’re lots like me.

Apart from testing, Focus additionally makes a bunch of tweaks to the system earlier than transport: some keyboard shortcuts, display screen scaling and console font alterations, automated energy profiles on plug and unplug, and the like. Focus has additionally written up nearly each nook of your system you need assistance on; you may examine it out on its web site.

The bodily laptop computer

There’s not a lot to say concerning the {hardware} expertise of the Ir14 Gen 2. The appear and feel screams “fleet,” although a bit lighter and sleeker than the ThinkPads and HP Somethings of that realm. It weighs 3 kilos, the chassis is magnesium alloy, and the display screen is a matte 14-inch FHD panel. The webcam is a 2 MP 1080p mannequin, and also you look about as unhealthy as on each different laptop computer. The keyboard is backlit, and the Tremendous/Win key’s a bit of Kubuntu icon, which is cute.

Inside is an Intel Core i5-13500H Raptor Lake chip, and you may pack in as much as 96GB of DDR5-5200 reminiscence. Packing it in is simple, too, as this laptop computer is simple as heck to open, improve, and repair. You possibly can slot as much as two M.2 NVMe SSDs inside (PCIe 4.0 x 4) (on the beginning worth of $1,080, you get 500GB storage and 16GB RAM). And the port choice is kind of good: A full-size HDMI 2.1, Thunderbolt 4, USB 3.2 Gen 2 Kind-C, two (2!) USB 3.1 Kind-A ports, a stereo jack, and a microSD card reader.

Probably the most notable function on any non-Apple laptop computer I check, the trackpad, will get a strong 7/10 from me. I might nearly think about utilizing it in tap-to-click mode, however a number of errant clicks and painful field alternatives led me again to my default click-to-click setting. I questioned if there have been extra settings out there than the comparatively few I noticed, checked the assistance docs, and, sure, of course: Focus defined its alternative of utilizing Libinput by default instead of Synaptics touchpad instruments. Neither one actually received me to the place I used to be completely comfy with tap-to-click on that pad, however sparing me from the what-if rabbit gap is a price add.

The opposite two {hardware} notes: The webcam has a built-in privateness cowl, however it’s a fussy little flap that I discovered laborious to maneuver round on my unit; the keyboard was responsive, had respectable depth, and was each labeled clearly and backlit. It’s a wonderfully cromulent portal to the software program, which is what actually issues right here.