Hello,I had the opportunity to use a tablet with Android… Never again!
I’ll buy on soon but I don’t want nether Android, nor iOS, nor Windows. Is there a GNU/Linux distribution to use instead? I’d guess Yes.
Which are the best? Why?
What type of tablet should I buy?
Any advice is welcome.
Thanks
Hi
I have a DELL Venue 7130 vPro running Tumbleweed, active pen works, but having fun with the synaptics touchpad on the keyboard, I prefer a mouse anyway so haven’t chased it up any further…
https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/538131-Dell-Venue-11-Pro-7140-No-sound
https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/537243-Looking-to-buy-cheap-tablet-mini-laptop-experiences-with-CHUWI-Hi10-Air
openSUSE compiles to many ARM CPUs which usually are what is used in tablets, although upper end tablets can be running an x64 like on a Desktop. If you have a tablet with Android installed on it, it’s almost certainly an ARM.
The approach you should take is to identify the ARM CPU and in combination with the make/model of your tablet, do an Internet search for that and “openSUSE”
You should find the version of openSUSE that might install on that device.
Do a little more searching for how to root your device,
Copy the right openSUSE image to some kind of storage your tablet supports,
Flash your openSUSE to your tablet’s internal memory,
And see what you get.
If you have problems finding what you need,
Post the make/model and whatever you can find about its technical specs and someone can give you a head start on what is involved to get openSUSE running on your tablet.
Recommend posting in something like the Hardware or Install Forums, depending on what kind of questions you might have.
TSU
Thank you both for your answer.
I had a lot of reading/viewing about tablet and Linux.
What I understand is on an Android tablet, Linux will be or like a virtual machine or like a shell or Samsung DeX. Am I right? Is there a way to install and run Linux (any flavour) directly removing all bits of Android?
Is it the same on the x86 based tablet?
I’ve seen generally tablets are not much different than phones…
You need to be able to root the device.
Once you’ve rooted the device you have access to the bootloader, and then depending on the bootloader you’ll have various recommended options for configuring it… It’s not the same but would work similar to when an x86/x64 machine has a bootloader installed in its own partition.
You can then flash (write) the new image from removable media to the device’s EPROM, essentially over-writing the factory ROM image.
So no…
Although I remember once coming across one solution that does what you describe (run a shell emulating something alien on Android), that’s the exception and not how things usually work. If your tablet really won’t support Linux, only then I’d look at one of the solutions you’re describing.
Although I outlined a general flow,
Details are extremely important to determine whether anything non-Android can be flashed on your device…
As I described, one part is to find the openSUSE build for the particular processor in your tablet.
If you can actually find someone having flashed any kind of Linux on your tablet before, it will suggest that I/O drivers are also available to support your tablet. That’s perhaps the biggest obstacle, mobile devices (tablets, phones, etc) often have proprietary I/O hardware, and if that’s the case then drivers may only be available through Android (or an Android replacement like LineageOS). Linux for the most part (with exceptions) supports FOSS.
TSU
As aforesaid, I used a Dell Venue 8 7840. The screen is very good for reading.
I’d be glad to get a new tablet with the same technology screen. I found this list OLED Tablets - latest devices on the market
After check, there is in fact no other brand than Samsung. The device that fit the best to my use case is Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 10.5
I followed your advice and did lot of search with the words and opensuse or Linux. Unfortunately almost all answers are more than 3 years old.
The best but on a 6yo tablet here.
In the Opensuse site I can’t find the right arm image, here
About the linux install I can’t see any info about only linux install but only as an application in Android. Linux Running on My Galaxy Tab S4
After a lot of reading I am disappointed, I can’t find any possibility.
Any help?
Your tablet runs on an Intel Atom processor which means that you’d be installing from x64 sources (likely same as any PC, laptop or server).
Only issue then is a recommended way to install
Without doing any more than a search using the keywords “Venue 8 7000 linux” I see a number of search hits that suggest someone was able to successfully install Ubuntu on their tablet… When you can locate the procedure, you’ll likely just replace the Ubuntu with an openSUSE install source
Again,
Any questions, just post…
TSU
I didn’t tell you that the Dell Venue is broken: USB is loose, charge is difficult and maybe the battery can’t keep the charge. Later, I’ll try to fix it, there is a very good video that show how to open et change the USB connector.
This is why I look at a new one the can run Linux.
I use qwant.com as search engine. Samsung Galaxy Tablet S4 linux request returns mainly Samsung Dex info. AFAIK Dex is a kind of remote desktop, not what I am looking.
Only this link is interesting Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 running Linux? Without DEX but no answer… It is a pity, just what I want to do. I am not the only one!
When I request adding -dex, the posts are at least 4 yo. With this answer, I’ll NOT use a brand new tablet to try Linux install!
That said, I think I’ll give up, not buying the tablet and think how do without it.
Searching on that tablet, it has a Snapdragon 835 processor,
Looks like although there might have been some spotty Linux support earlier, the current Tumbleweed kernel (5.5) should have brand new, extensive support for that processor. Because support by the Linux kernel is so recent, you’ll probably find very few blogs about people who have installed Linux on it, but there are a few…
Here is an article with comments that might pique your interest if you decide to try this tablet
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Linux-5.5-MSM8998-Modem
I’d recommend next step investigating how people installed Linux on this tablet, so a search with the keywords “samsung galaxy tablet s4 how to root” should turn up some relevant hits. Whatever you turn up, if there is an openSUSE Tumbleweed that can install, it looks promising.
TSU
Thank you tsu2 for you help. I’ll think about it but I think it is too early for the S4 tablet.
When I get a chance, I fix the Dell tablet and try on it, less dicey.
And I’ll go back to you in case I need help again.
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