Daerandin
Well-Known Member
My recent trip made it clear that I need to have a tiny computer (much smaller than my gaming laptop) I can bring with me, but still powerful enough for some simple games. I also want to be able to keep up my whatever programming learning project I might be working on, so I really want a multi-purpose system, but still small.
I landed on a Surface Pro 3 because of sufficient hardware, and I also thought it would be interesting to install Linux on something like this. Some basic specs:
CPU: Intel Core i5-4300U
RAM: 8 GB
Graphics: Intel HD 4400
Storage 256 GB SSD
I installed Arch Linux on this, which was kind of a pain to do because the cover keyboard does not work with Linux. Actually, from what I could dig up, it is only the scandinavian localized variant that does not work, so lucky me!
I had to dd the arch iso on to an SD card, so that I could use the only USB port with a USB keyboard I have. The install itself was without problem, except the screen resolution is so high that the console font appeared extremely small. Console in UEFI mode makes use of the screen resolution, so it can get very small if the screen runs a high resolution. At least I found one console font that looked large enough so that I could see properly.
Once Arch was installed, I set up X and did something I've never done with Arch before. I set up a display manager so I'll get a nice login screen as soon as the thing boots. I do prefer to just log in from the console normally and start x manually, but since this thing got a touch screen and all I wanted to give it a bit more "modern" appearance. I also went with the GNOME desktop since I had heard it work well with touch screens. I have to say that I was quite impressed, it does indeed work very well with the touch screen. It is obvious that GNOME has been developed with touch screens in mind.
I went with a kernel specifically patched for the Surface Pro 3, since otherwise the cameras and bluetooth does not work. Otherwise there was not really any specific configuration required. I used the bootctl bootloader since I've never tried it before, and I might actually switch from GRUB to bootctl on my main computer as well. Even the pen works great, although I can only seem to get any functionality from one button on it, although I have not really looked much into it yet.
So I really only have two things to complain about. The cover keyboard not working, but I think I read something about a kernel patch that was supposed to get the scandinavian variant working so I might see if I can find it when I have the time. The other thing is an ugly red screen on boot. I had to disable Secure Boot, naturally, to get this booting something else than Windows. But disabling Secure Boot make it show an ugly red screen every time it boots. There is probably some way to let Linux boot with Secure Boot on, but I have never looked into that in the past, so that will be a new project for me.
I have yet to test gaming performance on this thing, but I'll definitely give it a shot sometime later this week. I am finally in a position to see how things work on the Intel HD graphics.
I landed on a Surface Pro 3 because of sufficient hardware, and I also thought it would be interesting to install Linux on something like this. Some basic specs:
CPU: Intel Core i5-4300U
RAM: 8 GB
Graphics: Intel HD 4400
Storage 256 GB SSD
I installed Arch Linux on this, which was kind of a pain to do because the cover keyboard does not work with Linux. Actually, from what I could dig up, it is only the scandinavian localized variant that does not work, so lucky me!
I had to dd the arch iso on to an SD card, so that I could use the only USB port with a USB keyboard I have. The install itself was without problem, except the screen resolution is so high that the console font appeared extremely small. Console in UEFI mode makes use of the screen resolution, so it can get very small if the screen runs a high resolution. At least I found one console font that looked large enough so that I could see properly.
Once Arch was installed, I set up X and did something I've never done with Arch before. I set up a display manager so I'll get a nice login screen as soon as the thing boots. I do prefer to just log in from the console normally and start x manually, but since this thing got a touch screen and all I wanted to give it a bit more "modern" appearance. I also went with the GNOME desktop since I had heard it work well with touch screens. I have to say that I was quite impressed, it does indeed work very well with the touch screen. It is obvious that GNOME has been developed with touch screens in mind.
I went with a kernel specifically patched for the Surface Pro 3, since otherwise the cameras and bluetooth does not work. Otherwise there was not really any specific configuration required. I used the bootctl bootloader since I've never tried it before, and I might actually switch from GRUB to bootctl on my main computer as well. Even the pen works great, although I can only seem to get any functionality from one button on it, although I have not really looked much into it yet.
So I really only have two things to complain about. The cover keyboard not working, but I think I read something about a kernel patch that was supposed to get the scandinavian variant working so I might see if I can find it when I have the time. The other thing is an ugly red screen on boot. I had to disable Secure Boot, naturally, to get this booting something else than Windows. But disabling Secure Boot make it show an ugly red screen every time it boots. There is probably some way to let Linux boot with Secure Boot on, but I have never looked into that in the past, so that will be a new project for me.
I have yet to test gaming performance on this thing, but I'll definitely give it a shot sometime later this week. I am finally in a position to see how things work on the Intel HD graphics.
