Which AMD Ryzen based Lenovo laptops work out of the box?

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Hi guys,

currently I’m using a HP Notebook 14-dk355 (AMD Ryzen 3500U) and so far it runs fine with Fedora except for wifi (Realtek 8821CE). There is an unofficial DKMS module implementation which works so far, but with a few bugs and an uncertain future in terms of support. There is also no sign on the horizon if the 8821CE will make it into the mainline kernel.

So since I learned that Lenovo has a very good standing amongst Linux and Fedora users (Lenovo even plans to release some ThinkPads with Fedora pre-installed!) I was wondering which AMD-based notebooks from them are working out of the box with the Linux kernel so that no manual fiddling is required.

I don’t want to spent a fortune like the business/high-end Lenovo’s cost, but their AMD-based products seem quite affordable. I’ve already discovered that some of the AMD-based ones have an Intel WiFi chip and therefore should be safe to use without fiddling, right?

ThinkPad E495

IdeaPad 5

What do you think about those two models in particular? Are they well suited for Linux and work out of the box with the provided hardware?

At least in terms of WiFi both are supported by the current stable kernel, right?
ThinkPad E495: Realtek Wireless-AC 8822BE
IdeaPad 5: Intel Wireless-AX 22260 (2x2) WLAN

Many thanks in advance!

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It’s generally difficult to answer questions like this since it normally involves someone else having to have the hardware first in order to give an accurate statement.

What you may want to do is check the official repositories for drivers which support the hardware you are wanting to run (wireless, bus, bluetooth, etc). If there are no drivers in the official repositories, branch out to the un-official ones, such as RPMFusion and various COPRs, but be WARY (don’t branch out too far).

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Yeah, it would be hard to respond for those specific models, but I just purchased a Lenovo Thinkpad. On their site I was able to make some modifications to the base model and it included the choice of Windows 11 Pro, Ubuntu, or Fedora (and maybe Windows Home). So obviously they believed the hardware was compatible with Fedora. I opted for Fedora, saving me $165, and it shipped with version 39. An upgrade to 41 was quick and easy and it’s working fine though I’m still trying to figure out if I would call 41 an “upgrade” given the problems I’ve had with it on two other computers.