TUXEDO Computers Announces New High-End Polaris "Linux" Gaming Laptops
The German computer company TUXEDO has launched two new high-end "Polaris" gaming laptops aimed at Linux gamers. The machines are available as variants with AMD Ryzen 5 4600H, AMD Ryzen 7 4800H and Intel Core i7-10750H processors combined with either a Nvidia GTX 1650 Ti or a Nvidia RTX 2060 Refresh GPU. The machines are not available without a dedicated Nvidia graphics card so proprietary binary blob drivers are required to use these machines.
written by 林慧 (Wai Lin) 2020-09-06 - last edited 2020-09-22. © CC BY
TUXEDO is one of the few companies who market laptops toward Linux users. Their new Polaris 15 and 17 "gaming" laptops add to a long list of laptops "made specially" for Linux users. The Polaris 15 comes with a 15.6" 144 Hz display in a matt black aluminum chassis while the Polaris 17 has a 17.3" 144 Hz display in a "robust" soft-touch finish.
Both machines are available in variants powered by a combination of one of a AMD Ryzen 5 4600H, AMD Ryzen 7 4800H or Intel Core i7-10750H CPU and a Nvidia GTX 1650Ti or a Nvidia GeForce® RTX 2060 Refresh GPU.
The base Polaris 15 model with a AMD Ryzen 5 4600H CPU, a Nvidia GTX 1650Ti GPU, 8 GiB RAM and a 250 GiB Samsung 860 EVO SSD is priced at €1.124,45 EUR ($1330). Upgrading that to a Ryzen 7 4800, a Nvidia GeForce® RTX 2060 Refresh GPU, and a 1 TiB Samsung 970 EVO Plus NVMe drive raises the price to €1583.3 ($1873).
The base Polaris 17 model with a AMD Ryzen 5 4600H CPU, a Nvidia GTX 1650Ti GPU and a 250 GiB Samsung 860 EVO SSD will set you back €1.174,45 EUR ($1390). Upgrading that to a Ryzen 7 4800, a Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Refresh GPU, 16 GiB RAM and a 1 TiB Samsung 970 NVMe drive raises the price to €1413.3 ($1673).
None of the machines are available in variants without a Nvidia graphics card. You should look elsewhere if you want to use free software graphics drivers, using these machines will require a proprietary binary blob driver from Nvidia.
It does seem a bit strange that TUXEDO keeps on marketing machines with graphics cards that can not be used without third party closed-source drivers who taint the Linux kernel as "100% Linux compatible".
The machines are available with Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, OpenSUSE 15.1 or something Tuxedo calls "TUXEDO_OS 20.05 LTS" which is, in reality, Ubuntu 20.05 LTS with some custom graphics and some pre-configuration.
The base models with a AMD Ryzen 5 4600H are available from September 15th and the more expensive variants are available from September 29th. You can look at the Polaris 15 here and the Polaris 17 here.
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