What flavor linux for pennable notebook?
polycounter lvl 7
I have an HP 2710p convertible notebook with a built-in Wacom digitizer. I got it without an OS but put the Windows 8 preview on it and it's pretty good. I'm running Sketchbook Pro and Wings 3d on it and performance is OK, but not great. I'm now looking for a Linux distro to install on it and have been wondering which ones have the best Wacom support for a Tablet PC? Does anyone here have any experience in this area?
Replies
I haven't tried it my self but might be what your looking for in there.
For a more minimal distro, I have used Xubuntu with a wacom bamboo before, works fine.
To get your setup working if it doesn't work out of the box, this might help http://www.cogitationblog.com/journals/portege-m200/28-m200-wacom-tablet-under-linux
I would suggest Linux Mint. Its a Modded version of Ubuntu with a different Desktop. But with all the underlying Ubuntu libraries. Which means it should also in theory be compatible without much fuss when Valve comes out with the Steam Linux Client.
http://linuxmint.com/
a number of studios use centos, and the secont most popular redhad distro is scientific linux. that is the distribution maintained by CERN. they run the large hadron collider on scientific so i guess you can guess is is extremely reliable and mature.
as oXYnar says they all get there wacom drivers from the same source. but redhat linux has the bonus that programs like maya, mudbox, mari, nuke, vray are tested and certified on redhat and fedora. so if you want to mimic a system from those studios i would try centos fedora or scientific. you can be fairly certain that you will have no problems with professional 3d apps on those distributions.
also if you are looking for an app for sketching then try http://www.krita.org/
WAIT!!! Fedora is installed, and resource consumption is lower than everything yet. I'll report back after testing graphical apps and wacom devices.
sorry i think all those distros recommendations are sort of the main desktop distros so the resource usage out of the box will be not much different from windows.
the thing about linux is that you can run a desktop on an old 486 with 64mb of ram. so it definitely can go much lower in resource usage then windows. but you will either have to get one of the distros specifically configured for smaller systems. or do some tweaking and change the desktop manager.
before you make your choice i would try a few of the lite distros. you should see much lower resource useage out of the box.
damn small linux, puppy linux and crunch bang are all lightweight distros. if your just sketching on a smaller system those will bring down the resource use substantially.
http://www.techradar.com/us/news/software/operating-systems/8-of-the-best-tiny-linux-distros-683552
the developer of my paint is a really good guy and has developed a top notch brush engine.
The next thing I'll need to work on is pen calibration. The control panel applet for Wacom calibration doesn't seem to be working and as I move the pen to the bottomof the screen the cursor drifts away from the nib.