All EmperorLinux systems come with a custom kernel (download) specially tailored to support all the exotic hardware on your system. We start with the latest sources from kernel.org, add patches and tweaks to get the ever-changing hardware working, and roll it all up into a nice portable empkernel RPM (or DEB). We then throughly test it on all our systems and all our in-house laptops. (Yes, it's still open, and you get all the sources.)

People often say that Linux installation on a laptop is difficult and this is true. However, many people think that the difficult part is configuring the X server, but that is just the beginning. Just because you have X running on your laptop, doesn't mean that you're done.

Are you using the kernel that came with the stock distribution (that big hog)? That kernel was specially designed by the distribution authors to boot almost every Intel-based system on the planet, and almost half of it is stuff that you don't need.

Also, there are some very important things for laptops left out of typical distribution kernels. Many distribution kernels have very poor PCMCIA, USB, wireless, and ACPI support. Full support for eSATA, USB3, FireWire, newer 802.11 cards, GOBI wireless cards, internal GPS, webcams, LCD brightness control, hibernate, and other exotic devices may not exist at all.

• 32GB memory support (on both 64-bit and 32-bit installs (PAE))
• Software RAID support (for dual-drive laptops)
• SMP Multi-processor support (for laptops up to 8x CPUs)
• power management (full ACPI support (hibernation and sleep))
• automatic CPU throttling (frequency scaling) improves battery life
• DMA access to the PCI bus (including exotic laptop controllers)
• full TCP/IP networking (gigE, all 802.11 a/b/g/n WiFi, 802.11e WiMAX chipsets)
• ExpressCard (34/54), CardBus, and PCMCIA card support
• SCSI module support
• USB, USB3, eSATA, SD cards, and IEEE-1394 "FireWire" (i-Link) support.

We supply kernels with the smallest possible base image that will support all of your notebook's hardware and modules to support every conceivable peripheral you would ever add.

While our kernel gives the hardware support, you'll want to take a look at the manual to get an idea of how to use all these goodies in your daily Linux work. Current customers can download kernel updates and more by going to downloads.emperorlinux.com.