Ask HN: Anyone successfully installed Arch Linux on a Sony Vaio Z Series?

2 points·drKarl··2 comments

I'm about to order a Sony Vaio Z Series, with Core i7, 8GB RAM, 256GB SSD, 1920x1080 screen, and I was wondering if someone had a similar machine and successfully installed Arch Linux on it. Perhaps partially, with some features not working, like the speed/stamina switch, or any other feature.

I would also be interested in experiences installing other linux distros on a Z Series Vaio.

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I have a (2 year old) Vaio VGN-Z11WN and it was a bit of a nightmare to get Linux to install correctly on it. The main problem was the Stamina/Speed graphics switch, which is a software switch in this model, where as previously it used to be a hardware switch.

I joined the Launchpad group for the Z-series: https://launchpad.net/~sony-vaio-z-series which helped a lot, but there were still things like the microphone not working etc.

I have tried Ubuntus Jaunty, Karmic and Lucid on there with mixed results - karmic for some reason was the best. Fedora 13 installed perfectly (excluding the speed/stamina switch) but then I ended up in dependency hell!

Because of the trouble I have had with getting Linux onto this machine, I don't think I am going to get another Vaio.

My main desktop runs Arch, but I didn't even dare go there on the Vaio!

I would be very interested to hear how you get on. Good luck.

Thank you for sharing your experience. If Arch is too difficult to install in a Vaio, I'll try something more mainstream like Debian or Ubuntu. Perhaps if I just choose to use either the intel graphics or the nvidia and give up on the switch I can get it working. I'll share my experience!

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