Pop!_OS With Linux 6.8 Is Benefiting Older System76 Threadripper Systems Too

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Pop!_OS With Linux 6.8 Is Benefiting Older System76 Threadripper Systems Too

As noted at the end of March, System76's Pop!_OS Linux distribution has upgraded to the Linux 6.8 kernel as a stable release update for this Ubuntu-derived distribution. That Linux 6.6 to 6.8 leap on Pop!_OS yielded some nice kernel performance improvements for the AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7980X available with their newest System76 Thelio Major workstations. But tests I've carried out of the Pop!_OS upgrade on a years older System76 Thelio is showing off some nice advantages too.

https://www.phoronix.com/review/linux68-system76-threadripper

[sophisticles]

If there is one positive to System76 using a Linux based OS it's that thanks to continuing work on the kernel and other components, an update can result in a significant performance gain, so that can be marketed as a value added benefit.

[skeevy420]

If there is one positive to System76 using a Linux based OS it's that thanks to continuing work on the kernel and other components, an update can result in a significant performance gain, so that can be marketed as a value added benefit.

Devil's Advocate: An update can result in significant breakage. It's one thing being beholden to Linux with their "don't break userspace" mantra. It's another thing being beholden to GNOME with their "my way or the highway" mantra. That's why they forked over to COSMIC and why I wonder if they'll have to fork anything else or if they'll ever have to switch to a different distribution as a base.

[sophisticles]

Devil's Advocate: An update can result in significant breakage. It's one thing being beholden to Linux with their "don't break userspace" mantra. It's another thing being beholden to GNOME with their "my way or the highway" mantra. That's why they forked over to COSMIC and why I wonder if they'll have to fork anything else or if they'll ever have to switch to a different distribution as a base.

I have actually repeatedly said that they should never have tried to build a business using an existing distribution as a base, they should have used LFS and gone from their.

I think their end game, at least that of upper management, is to eventually ditch Linux and use their own custom built Redox.

The proof is that the whole OS is released under an MIT license; I think they eventually transition to a closed source OS once Redox is mature enough for daily use.

[skeevy420]

I have actually repeatedly said that they should never have tried to build a business using an existing distribution as a base, they should have used LFS and gone from their.

I think their end game, at least that of upper management, is to eventually ditch Linux and use their own custom built Redox.

The proof is that the whole OS is released under an MIT license; I think they eventually transition to a closed source OS once Redox is mature enough for daily use.

Nah. Nothing wrong with building a business around an existing distribution. Heck, see my RIOS comment in the Alma article. Anyone can pick any one of those distributions, base their stuff off of it, and have access to a plethora of 3rd party Linux services and support. I feel odd saying this first part, but not every company is as benevolent as NVIDIA when it comes to closed source driver availability or AMD and Intel when it comes to FOSS drivers. It's usually the RIOS distributions and Ubuntu that get the best Linux support so it makes the most sense to pick from one of those choices. Of those supposedly common sense choices, Ubuntu is stereotypically the most user friendly distribution.

Whether System76 would have picked LFS, Gentoo, Arch, RHEL, or Ubuntu they'd have ran into the GNOME problem and would have had to come up with their COSMIC solution. Picking Ubuntu lets them focus on the parts of Linux that make the most sense to them while still being compatible with a lot of Ubuntu's resources. They can let Ubuntu focus on the OS as a whole while they focus on making their ideal desktop. Letting Ubuntu and Canonical do all that work: System76 are Ubuntu Freeloaders like Clem over at Linux Mint (that's a joke ).

Redox could be interesting, though. If we start seeing Linux engineers submitting graphics driver rewrites in Rust, quality graphics in Redox might not be too far behind and then who knows what'll happen. I'm not that paranoid over the use of the MIT. While I know that the worst case scenarios are things like it becoming like the PlayStation OS or macOS, it could also very well become the next Linux.

[Yoshi]

Is there any release schedule for Pop 24.04? Rumors had it, there will be an alpha release in the not so distant future, but nothing specific...

[drhoho]

Devil's Advocate: An update can result in significant breakage. It's one thing being beholden to Linux with their "don't break userspace" mantra. It's another thing being beholden to GNOME with their "my way or the highway" mantra. That's why they forked over to COSMIC and why I wonder if they'll have to fork anything else or if they'll ever have to switch to a different distribution as a base.

I've run a System 76 AMD laptop for 3 years with no problems with their upgrades except needed a bit of help from them for one upgrade, but the instructions they sent worked.

I've also run a refurbed Epyc Zen 2 Supermicro workstation for 2 years with Pop OS through upgrades with a Highpoint U2 SSD controller with btrfs raid 1 across 4 8 TB Intel U2 SSDs (seismic processing scratch space) and LSI SAS controller with 8 18 GB disks running raid 5+0. It is still working through all the updates including major kernel updates with an Nvidia card. They don't officially support any hardware except their own. I've reported minor issues with this system to them so they have that info as they move forward.

So far no breakage. This will be another major kernel update. We'll see...

[skeevy420]

I've run a System 76 AMD laptop for 3 years with no problems with their upgrades except needed a bit of help from them for one upgrade, but the instructions they sent worked.

I've also run a refurbed Epyc Zen 2 Supermicro workstation for 2 years with Pop OS through upgrades with a Highpoint U2 SSD controller with btrfs raid 1 across 4 8 TB Intel U2 SSDs (seismic processing scratch space) and LSI SAS controller with 8 18 GB disks running raid 5+0. It is still working through all the updates including major kernel updates with an Nvidia card. They don't officially support any hardware except their own. I've reported minor issues with this system to them so they have that info as they move forward.

So far no breakage. This will be another major kernel update. We'll see...

I was referring to Project Updates, like GNOME 39 to 40 or KDE 5.26 to 5.27, not Distribution Updates like Ubuntu 20.04 to 24.04. No matter what distribution System76 would have gone with, they'd eventually get hit with a Project Update. Normally on Ubuntu-like distributions Project Updates occur simultaneously with Distribution Updates, but that isn't always the case.

It can be double trouble when both updates occur at once when you're System76 and you're customizing GNOME on top of a distribution that customizes GNOME. Every major update you have to undo what Canonical does and redo what you do.

It's triple trouble when you go to GNOME with your changes and they're not really interested in doing changes that could assist a competing desktop shell. You can either keep on keepin on with that or you can go:

[Pander]

I'm using Pop!_OS on System76 laptop, but also on older desktops. As skeevy420 discussed graphics drivers, if anybody is interested in the support for older NVIDIA cards, see https://github.com/pop-os/nvidia-gra...-470/issues/22 Even if they don't want to support it officially, perhaps community support can be set up. Will save a lot of still good GPU hardware. For drhoho, I'm interested in the issues you have reported, if you can share them here or privately.

[mmstick]

The proof is that the whole OS is released under an MIT license; I think they eventually transition to a closed source OS once Redox is mature enough for daily use.

Redox OS is an officially registered non-profit organization with its own board of directors. It is not owned by System76, but System76's principal engineer. You would have to be an utterly deranged schizophrenic person to believe that the goal of Redox OS is to become closed source.