[PLUG] Laptop search...

[Michael C. Robinson]

I'm looking for a 100% Linux compatible laptop to run 
maple 9 on under X and either Redhat 9 or newer.  Turns 
out I need at least a 700 megahertz Pentium III, but I 
am wary of buying old considering old is a greater 
issue with laptops than desktops.  New is also cheap 
now, Dell starts at $700.

Digging some, I have found
http://www.linuxcertified.com/liunx_laptops.html.
The web listed  prices are a bit high and I don't know 
if they are reputable, what their shipping times are, 
what the brand names are that they sell, etc.

I also ran into ALS looking at a Linux laptop Howto, 
this place is worse on prices than linuxcertified though.

Linux is free, yet a Linux compatible laptop appears to cost
significantly more than a Windows laptop.  What gives here?

Any incompatibility on a machine I expect to take to college
to study Linux, Vector Calc, and database with could cost me 
time, but the cost of getting a perfect Linux laptop may be 
too high also.  The only other thought is to figure out from
what doesn't work on different models what the Linux community 
will most likely fix by the time I need it working and get 
that laptop. 

I can probably get a Dell fairly reasonably, but if they have
abandoned their Linux line, what do I want to get in today's
offerings?

Doesn't HP have Linux preloaded laptops?
It'd be nice if I could run maple on Debian since that's
a more popular system to learn administration, etc, on.
I've never installed debian, hence a pre install would
be extra nice.

     --  Michael C Robinson