Does Slimbook need third party repo for Fedora?

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Hi,

I became interested in the Slimbook notebooks when I could check out one at FOSDEM (we had one at our booth:). Although it does not fit some of my preferences when it comes to the hardware, I value stability and that the notebooks are tested for / sold with Fedora makes me hope :classic_smiley: I also like the idea that the company is involved with the community, which can sometimes be more valuable than formal support contracts.

However, I saw in a topic in their forums that a user once was a little impatient for updates in Slimbook’s repo for Fedora, which made me aware that they have a third party repo.

A question to people with experience with the Slimbook: Is the Slimbook dependent on this third party repo? So is it optional or required? Does it make a difference? What difference? Any experience is appreciated :classic_smiley:

I was asking them in an email this among other questions. They are super nice and quick in answering and provided the information I needed in most cases, but for this one question the answer did not fully resolve the question about the implications and if/when itis required/optional: I was said that this repo contains updates that are required if one faces issues with ethernet port, sleep, etc. Unfortunately, this can be interpreted in many ways.

Normally, I exclude notebooks that need third party repos at all, as this practically bypasses the QA of Fedora, and thus breaks the stability and security guarantees that are build up beginning upstream, and often it has reasons that other software is not included in our repos (patents ain’t always the background:).

However, I know that many people use that notebook and seem thrilled about it, and the company collaborated with our people and got confirmed to use Fedora name when selling the product with Fedora.

On one hand, what I read looks like I have to expect that it will become necessary to use that repo, and I cannot determine in advance when this will become necessary. On the other hand, using the Fedora name should imply that third party repos ain’t necessary.

So I reach out with hope someone can resolve the implications of this repo and how far and when it is required, and for what?

Thanks :classic_smiley:

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Their website is really awful, 5 out of 6 of their Fedora-branded models show a text (in capitals) OUT OF STOCK, DISCONTINUED PRODUCT, SOLD OUT and “No restocking date”. Only 1 of the Fedora models is available to order.

It would give me little confidence in their ability to provide reliable long-term support.

It’s a shame really, because i do like these kinds of dedicated little companies and i would like to see them succeed. This is just onprofessional though, and considering the cost of their laptops i would personally be hesitant.

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Unfortunately, these two things go often along (the same for, e.g., starlabs/starlite) because the massive global sourcing of today is itself a challenge that needs to be managed. They need to regularly find new vendors for, e.g, screens or so, and then ensure QA. This sourcing brings a lot of opportunities and allows small companies to create notebooks as professional as that of Lenovo or so, but it also goes along with new challenges… One who can ship the product one week might not be able to do it the next. I once read a comment of (I think it was) the Starlite people that elaborated that a little (don’t saved the link though). So the regularly out of stock issue does not necessarily indicate their capability to provide long term support for those products already assembled/sold.

But of course the guarantee of small companies is less reliable as that of big ones from a formal point of view. However, I experienced that the formal guarantee can mean little when buying products from big vendors as they can create a high barrier to get any support, and local contracts you get often exclude what seems to be guaranteed on their website.

I spare you the whole story of my T16 with guaranteed on-site support and extra battery support (the most unreliable notebook I have ever had - so was the support for it). Just as an incentive: paying for extra support for battery replacement in the first (I think it as 2) years when the battery gets damaged or so implies for the vendor that I have a right for support when the notebook battery is below 1 hour (originally 12-13 hours), which means 7.7-8.33 % of the original capacity. I think the general consensus is that a battery is broken once below 80 % :classic_smiley: The irony for me was that 7.7 % in the first two years should even justify a normal support case. Beyond, I learned that firmware is software, and software is not contained in support contracts :classic_smiley: (mine was shipped with a broken firmware that cannot be updated, regularly looses the capability to charge and thus needs regularly to be hard reset, so firmware hard reset, not OS). My personal favorite: on-site support implies that I have to prove that the notebook is broken (beyond “any doubt” in my perception) and that it was not my fault before the on-site support can be scheduled. I assume you can already imagine why I consider community guarantees and that of related companies more useful than that of major vendors if you put these three incentives of my T16 support case together and how they complement each other. The small companies that draw much advantages from the communities have different incentives towards the customer differ, but of course it is just another type of compromise.

Anyway, beyond the mentioned issue with third party repos, my fear at Slimbook is mostly that they seem to be not good with English, and in case some more complex issues comes up, I see problems with communication. The major goal in buying their stuff is that I can rely much more on the community because the company does the tailoring and testing with the exact product of the community so that task does not end up with me with a high likelihood (and they have incentives to keep taking care of that - which is likely to be relevant only in the initial life time of the notebook if the quality is good). But if I need a third party repo, that advantage is mostly disabled :frowning:

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I thought you meant Asus Slimbooks,
But you mean a Spanish company,

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Exactly :classic_smiley: They are also advertised indirectly by Fedora as they officially support Fedora and also have the acceptance of us to market their stuff that way. E.g., Slimbooks were one of the two notebooks we presented during FOSDEM on the Fedora booth with Fedora. Unfortunately, I was not aware back then of the repo issue and did not check out if a third party repo was contained in our device or not.