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I need some help!

Good luck with your surgery Chuck. And I'm glad you got a good laptop for Linux. I've run Debian on several Win10/Win11 laptops. I'm sure the Dell XPS will work great for you.

All the best!

Seaken
 
Chuck(G) said:
Picked up the XPS13 today. Owner did a clean install of Win11 Pro. Charger is USB-C, not the 4.5mm special connector;no biggie. Case is clean and display crisp. Even plays 4K movies without stuttering. Core i5 gen 8 CPU so plenty of speed for casual use. I'll install Linux later.
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That is fantastic. If means you can get a decent size powerbank andk keep running from battery if you can't get to the mains.
 
Got Debian installed on the XPS13, importing my regular email and browser profiles. Works fine, but going from a 27" screen with a Model M keyboard to a 15" one with a laptop keyboard and touchpad is taking a little getting used to. But it'll do. I'd never use it for program development, however--just too limiting for a CLI-oriented guy. I shrunk the Win11 Pro partition just in case I need it for some reason.

I was surprised that creating a bootable USB drive on Linux was being promoted with balenaEtcher, where a simple "dd" works just fine. Could it be that Linux is being contaminated with the Windows influence?
 
Chuck(G) said:
Got Debian installed on the XPS13, importing my regular email and browser profiles. Works fine, but going from a 27" screen with a Model M keyboard to a 15" one with a laptop keyboard and touchpad is taking a little getting used to. But it'll do. I'd never use it for program development, however--just too limiting for a CLI-oriented guy. I shrunk the Win11 Pro partition just in case I need it for some reason.

I was surprised that creating a bootable USB drive on Linux was being promoted with balenaEtcher, where a simple "dd" works just fine. Could it be that Linux is being contaminated with the Windows influence?
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I think that balenaEtcher over DD is more due to the fact that if you have Linux and use it extensively, you already know how to boot from a USB and how to flash it - where as with Windows, you're going to need a tool to flash the USB with the disk image, and most of their new customers probably grew up with Windows and not Linux.

Though it's less common not to provide both sets of instructions, but I'd still expect the Windows instructions to be far more prominent, because many windows users are going to struggle with simple stuff like making a bootable USB, because it's just so alien to Windows users - They've probably never installed an OS in their life!
 
Chuck(G) said:
I was surprised that creating a bootable USB drive on Linux was being promoted with balenaEtcher, where a simple "dd" works just fine. Could it be that Linux is being contaminated with the Windows influence?
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Where did you see that? I just checked the official Debian instructions and they give, cp debian.iso /dev/sdX; sync.

Though I wouldn't be surprised at all if multi-platform instructions went with something like balena Etcher just for the simplicity of being able to do it the same way on all three major platforms, which would probably reduce the technical support load. A Unix user who knows what she's doing will probably just go use dd anyway, and other Linux users are more likely to be able to download and use Etcher without problems than figure out dd, assuming Etcher is available in their Linux distribution's standard package repo.
 
Good luck with your surgery, Chuck.

I've run Dell Precision laptops for a long time with various flavors of Linux. Like you, I greatly prefer a 17 inch screen, but those things are usually quite heavy; I still own an M6500, two M6700s, and a 7740. The Precision 7740, while slimmer than the other 17's, is still a heavyweight, nearly reaching 7 pounds. The old Ruger M77 Mk II Ultra Light bolt action rifle, chambered in .270 Winchester, that I used to own years ago, was lighter than the 7740, by about a quarter pound. (Kicked like crazy, too)

Was recently given a System 76 Lemur Pro 10, and getting used to the relatively tiny screen was a big adjustment. I use GNOME, and installed the package that allows display scaling; scaled 125% it's usable. The Lemur Pro 10 is manufactured by Clevo, the same company that does a lot of the higher end Dell, HP, and other laptops. It is almost too light; I would have preferred a bit more metal and a little less plastic, but it's passable. And it was a gift, so I'm pleased as punch with it in that regard.

Debian Bookworm, of course, and it just works.

So I think you did really well with the XPS 13; hope it gives you good and reliable service, especially for this purpose.
 
Chuck(G) said:
There are several sites detailing installing various distros, including Debian, alongside Win11. None mentions dd or cp. Maybe it's just the GUI mindset that pervades with Windows world.
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If the sites are documenting how to install Debian alongside Windows 11, yeah, I'd expect they'd go straight for the tool that runs on Windows 11. These folks almost invariably have Windows 11 installed first and, even if they don't, it's probably better to wipe the disk and install Windows 11 first and then install Debian after that. (I have no idea what a Windows 11 install is going to try to do to your bootloader, but at the very least, I reckon it's not going to offer an easy option to boot Linux, whereas if the Debian installer detects Windows on the PC, it will add that an option to boot that to Grub.)
 
I am starting to get worried too... It's been nearly a month since his last interaction. I hope he's alright.
 
When I had my major operations (back in 2012) I thought I was going to have a lot of spare time on my hands when I escaped from hospital.

How wrong I was!

It was amazing how tired I became, so I had to 'ration' my time very carefully...

Dave
 
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