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A bit OT, but I didn't know Librem made laptops - does anyone here have any experience with them, especially the 13" model?



I use a librem 13v3 as my main computer.

I like it because the hardware is all well-supported under linux. I run a fairly stripped-down Debian. I am no linux wizard, and I was able to make everything I needed functional. Bluetooth required a non-free firmware package.

Additionally, I got to support a company working toward more-open, more-free hardware. I would love for movement in that direction to be more common, so I put my money where my mouth is. If you don't care about that, you could get a laptop of equivalent performance, or better, for less money.

I don't know much about hardware performance or what the latest-and-greatest is. I don't play games or do anything that performance intensive locally. It is more than performant enough for my needs. The battery life seems good, but I've never timed it. I have an M.2 SSD in it.

The trackpad and keyboard are both relatively nice. The trackpad is a clicky pad, like the one on a macbook. I have it configured to use the "clickfinger" click method of libinput and two-finger-scrolling. The keyboard is backlit and has decent travel (not nearly as good as the old thinkpad keyboards, though).

There are hardware kill switches. One for wifi and bluetooth, and one for the camera and microphone. I generally just leave the camera/microphone off, and the wifi/bluetooth on. The switches protrude a bit so it is possible to accidentally move them.

The screen is a matte 1920x1080 IPS panel. I hate glossy screens because I like to use my laptop outside, so this is perfect for me.

It has a decent complement of ports. No ethernet port, though.


I got the Librem 15" laptop about a year and a half ago. I am happy with it. I ran QubesOS for a couple of moths and NixOS since with no issues.


They're expensive for what they are, but I want one anyway. The only reason I haven't so far is because they only have US keyboards. If I'm going to spend that much on a laptop, I want my £ key!


It should not be too hard to add your own keyboard layout. Many are available already (but not UK): https://forums.puri.sm/t/translations-and-virtual-touch-keyb...


Can't you just map that in software?


I don't want to. I want a laptop with a physical £ key. Like my Macbook and my Thinkpads have.


I do not own one but from what I gather their laptops are great.

I have also seen many review claiming the track pad is great and even one say it is as good as a macbook track pad.

However, one problem with them is that they are not refreshed often and use older Intel ships (currently 7th gen).

One of the thing I suspect prevents them from refreshing the laptops is they do not have enough resources (people) to do some while developing the librem 5.


They have been using an exploit that allows you to wipe out the Intel backdoor. Maybe that prevents them from updating.




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