25 Apr 2012

Converting to Arch Linux

It’s been about 4 months now since I switched my HP Tm2t to ArchLinux.  This came after using my laptop for work  with necessary proprietary programs on Windows and dual booting into Crunchbang Linux (Debian based). Well, I upgraded the work laptop to a Vaio workstation replacement i7 w/ nVidia dedicated GPU which freed up my Tm2t! In my excitement, I swapped out the 500GB spinning platter drive for a 60GB 3Gbps SSD, installed ArchBang Linux, and couldn’t be happier. ArchBang is based on the style and concept of Crunchbang Linux (Openbox Minimalism with high utility) but based on the packaging system and system structure of Arch Linux.  This 2-3 yr old laptop is very quick and a nice environment for evening Ruby programming & development. I replaced Openbox with XFCE because my minimalism doesn’t run quite that deep, installed RVM, Chromium, gmrun, configured keyboard shortcuts for Terminator, spacefm (slick file manager), and then spent the next few weeks working on final optimizations (feeling pretty good about the 3+ hours of battery life under Linux). Now if only my touchpad had the quality of a MacBook Pro under Linux (or even the quality of the touchpad under W7), the battery lasted 5+ hrs like W7, and a high resolution screen.  I’m on the lookout to upgrade from this laptop once a decent high resolution ultra portable comes out, preferably from Lenovo’s Thinkpad line.