I like to use Rocky as my main desktop OS because I like the stability/reliability. I hated Fedora because nearly every update broke a bunch of stuff. That said, I am in the market for a new laptop and I also want to put Rocky on it (XFCE), but I’m having a very difficult time figuring out the most compatible laptop(s) since they are only typically certified for RHEL or Fedora if that… Also, I’d prefer to not have Nvidia graphics since I want the absolute max reliability since I mostly do work on these machines, I can’t afford to be constantly troubleshooting issues. However, since I also want 64GB+ of RAM, I’'m actually having a hard time finding a laptop that:
I know will work well with Rocky
Has 64GB of RAM and a fast modern processor
Can at least support a 2TB drive, ideally with a second NVMe SSD slot as well
Does not have a NVidia card - integrated graphics preferred as I do not do 3D work or gaming on it, but rather I’ll be running containers, VMs, and doing native builds of my software+ testing.
I prefer Rocky 9.8 but can do 10 if there’s a laptop that specifically works on 10 but doesnt necessarily guarantee 9.
Searching and AI only got me so far, I’d like to hear the straight dope from the folks here who run Rocky on your laptops
That said a lot of laptops should work, maybe some with a bit more effort required. Ideal is to take a look at vendors that make laptops that support Linux. For example Dell and Lenovo.
That might help for now until others chime in with their personal experiences.
I personally have a Lenovo Thinkpad T15p Gen 2 which I’ve had about 4 years but I run Fedora 44 on it and has been upgraded from previous versions of Fedora over that period without any issues or anything breaking. Considering it’s age, it could probably run Rocky as well but I haven’t tried it since I required more up-to-date versions of apps and not keen on using flatpak for that unless I really have to.
Love to see Fw getting a shout out. I have a 11th gen Fw13 I will have a hard time parting ways with, so the ability to upgrade by component swapping removes that pain effectively. (and can use the old components externally after the fact too!)
Interesting that you have Rocky 9 running on it, since I don’t see it listed on any of the compatibility charts for any of their laptops (12, 13, or 16). Did take much, if any, hacking and finagling to get everything working (if everything working)? A coworker was thinking of Rocky 10 when he bought one for work use, but, like the OP, couldn’t afford much time to config/tweak or troubleshoot.