My brand new (to me) Lenovo 92P Tiny Computer (Ubuntu Mate 18.04)

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csandste

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My old no-name small form computer almost caught fire in it's always troublesome power supply, so it was time to buy a new (to me) computer. Went down to EPC Computers (https://www.epcusa.com/computer-sales/) and got the smallest form computer they had, a Lenovo Thinkcentre M92P Tiny-- most of EPC's used computers have manufacture date on their i.d. sticker, but not this one. Figure it's about seven years old. The sticker said Win 7 but they had Win 10 on it. I tried to get a bare computer but that would have involved shipping one from Las Vegas at a cost of about $20 and I didn't want to wait. Hate paying $50 for Windows that I had no use for, but for a price of $195 out the door, the extra fifty won't break me. Almost kept Win10 on the computer long enough to play with it-- never used Win 8 or 10, but then I couldn't say that I haven't used Windows in years, so it died an instant death. Has an Intel Core i5i5 with 8 eight gig of memory and a 64 gig SSD. I suspect this would be underpowered with Win 10, but with a lightweight OS like Mate 18.04, this thing literally screams. About twice the processor, twice the memory and more than twice the power of my (offbrand) SSD in my old computer. EPC does nothing but commercial computers off lease and this thing is built like a proverbial brick outhouse. Here's a review of the same basic thing, but with less power: https://www.anandtech.com/show/6162/lenovo-thinkcentre-m92-system-review-pintsized-power Didn't mean to be a Lenovo fan boy but I now have their computer, Chromebook, and E4+ phone. I'm still brand agnostic other than maybe Moto phones, purchase decisions just happened this way. We'll see if they're put out of business on tariffs or spying. After a week, I'm in love with this little powerhouse-- at least compared to what I'm used to-- it screams. Like having that eight gigs of memory. I absolutely love Ubuntu Mate. It replaced Linux Mint and Peppermint Linux about six months ago as my only operating system.
 
Cool! I have an older Intel NUC that runs Ubuntu 16.04. I use it primarily a headless home media server. It's smaller than your Lenovo, but not as powerful. It has Core i5-4250U, 8 GB RAM, and a 128GB SSD. I got it 4+ years ago. It's been running great. It was my first foray into Linux.
 
I am doing only Ubuntu installs on everything from a Thinkpad R61 with dual core Pentium to i5 in a HP6300. Only use Windows if I have to. Enjoy your 92P. thumbsup
 
Why would an I5 with 8gb ram be too little for windows? Sounds like you havent used windows in years (yuk yuk yuk) Coffee2 now if it was an amd e-series or some other netbook abomination processor.. yes. what would be too small is the 64GB SSD. 128 is bare minimum for boot drive esp without a second drive to install programs too I had an $80 dollar windows 10 tablet from microcenter and it ran pretty good on 2GB ram and 32gb storage.. was handy for troubleshooting with its full size usb ports. but it wasnt something you could use normally.. just the windows updates ate all the space if you werent on top keeping it cleaned up.
 
Originally Posted by Rand
Why would an I5 with 8gb ram be too little for windows? Sounds like you havent used windows in years (yuk yuk yuk) Coffee2 now if it was an amd e-series or some other netbook abomination processor.. yes. what would be too small is the 64GB SSD. 128 is bare minimum for boot drive esp without a second drive to install programs too I had an $80 dollar windows 10 tablet from microcenter and it ran pretty good on 2GB ram and 32gb storage.. was handy for troubleshooting with its full size usb ports. but it wasnt something you could use normally.. just the windows updates ate all the space if you werent on top keeping it cleaned up.
Interesting that they put that small a drive on it. Should really have tried to fire it up out of curiosity since I paid Microsoft $50 for an unneeded license. With Mate, all of the many free and included Ubuntu software and almost twenty years of files on the drive I still have 41.9 gigs out of 64 left. Boot-up from off is roughly five seconds and seems to be getting faster. Last Windows I owned was Win7, which brought my 2009 vintage low end laptop to taking almost ten minutes to fire up. Ubuntu 12.04 worked good on that machine but 14.04 was too much for it. Switched to Linux Mint Mate 17.xx which worked well on everything but installed Ubuntu Mate 16.04 on my girlfriend's machine and loved all the different looks that it had. Want Windows--click, want Apple-- click. The present configuration can switch between eight or nine different looks in the matter of a couple seconds. And, no antivirus to worry about and updates when I want 'em. And, and... no slowdown (except Ubuntu 14.04 was a bit much for my very underpowered (even in 2008) computer.
 
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Originally Posted by MONKEYMAN
I am doing only Ubuntu installs on everything from a Thinkpad R61 with dual core Pentium to i5 in a HP6300. Only use Windows if I have to. Enjoy your 92P. thumbsup
Since you're in the neighborhood, driving out to Cave Springs to visit EPC might be worth a visit. Some people give 'em bad marks for not being helpful and they do hide behind their service desks, but I prefer information when I want it to salesmen hanging around and asking "May I help you?" I had thought about replacing my old computer, but as is usual with a cheapskate I let it go until it fried. With a little lead time they would have saved loading the operating system for me and I would have saved fifty bucks. Without an OS, this thing really would have been a buy for $145.
 
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I've had two Lenovo notebooks and have never been dissapointed. The second one had a defective motherboard that would crash the computer whenever you picked it up and it flexed. I brought it in for warranty repairs a few days before it expired and they fixed it without any questions and it is still working great. I tried Linux but could never find one that I really liked and supported the drivers of my second Lenovo notebook. I'll have to give Mate a try, Ubuntu was good but I could never get flash to work on it IIRC. I then installed Mint and it would not recognize my network card.
 
As far as drivers are concerned, lots of oem's probably find the Linux market too small to deal with. My new computer has an internal antenna which picks up my router without incident although it did dither around a bit when I first fired it up. I think I had trouble with Canon printer drivers when I first went Linux. HP is usually a sure bet when it comes to printers. Instant connections -plug and play. I'll probably stick to them in the future since I print very little, mostly just .pdf's of everything. Included scanning software always works perfectly. Have no wired network, so have no idea about that. If it wouldn't work on Mint or plain old Ubuntu, I'm not sure it would work with Ubuntu Mate. If you have an old computer lying around, you might want to give it a try. Isn't flash a browser add-in that generates all sorts of safety warnings?
 
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Originally Posted by csandste
As far as drivers are concerned, lots of oem's probably find the Linux market too small to deal with. My new computer has an internal antenna which picks up my router without incident although it did dither around a bit when I first fired it up. I think I had trouble with Canon printer drivers when I first went Linux. HP is usually a sure bet when it comes to printers. Instant connections -plug and play. I'll probably stick to them in the future since I print very little, mostly just .pdf's of everything. Included scanning software always works perfectly. Have no wired network, so have no idea about that. If it wouldn't work on Mint or plain old Ubuntu, I'm not sure it would work with Ubuntu Mate. If you have an old computer lying around, you might want to give it a try. Isn't flash a browser add-in that generates all sorts of safety warnings?
Thanks for the reply, I was mistaken when I said flash. I could not get YouTube to work on Ubuntu. I almost never use my laptop anymore now that I have completed school, so I wanted to try Ubuntu on it just for fun but I lost interest. I thought I lost that computer, but it recently reappeared so I might give it another shot.
 
Since Google owns YouTube, it should work fine with Chrome no matter the OS. My older computer didn't have enough memory for Chrome (especially GMail which loaded slowly) so I switched to Firefox. The new one works fine and as much as I like FF, it's a Google world and a single environment for all my computing goodies is an advantage. Never had any YouTube problems with either browser.
 
Originally Posted by csandste
Originally Posted by MONKEYMAN
I am doing only Ubuntu installs on everything from a Thinkpad R61 with dual core Pentium to i5 in a HP6300. Only use Windows if I have to. Enjoy your 92P. thumbsup
Since you're in the neighborhood, driving out to Cave Springs to visit EPC might be worth a visit. system for me and I would have saved fifty bucks. Without an OS, this thing really would have been a buy for $145.
Thanks but I am good. I have 2 Windows 10, 3 Ubuntu, 1 XP, and 2 Mint Xfce computers in my room. I have one with Ubuntu I use at work. I did just buy a $35 Samsung Laser printer at Office Depot. It has HP drivers. It was easier to buy a new laser printer then spend more time installing the Brother laser all-in-one on Ubuntu.
 
Originally Posted by csandste
Glad to know the Samsung laser uses HP drivers. What model? For that price I might buy one.
Samsung Xpress M2024W I did install the Linux drivers from website first. Plug in and it installed. Nice thing is they delivered to door free.
 
Originally Posted by csandste
As far as drivers are concerned, lots of oem's probably find the Linux market too small to deal with. My new computer has an internal antenna which picks up my router without incident although it did dither around a bit when I first fired it up. I think I had trouble with Canon printer drivers when I first went Linux. HP is usually a sure bet when it comes to printers. Instant connections -plug and play.
My HP install at home on Linux went faster than with Windows at the office. Years back, on my Ubuntu box, a NIC went, and I was a little concerned since the new card came with a CD with three source code packages. I wasn't relishing the thought of compiling. But, it worked plug and play, which was more than I could say for Windows at the time.
 
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