I recently wiped Windows off my ThinkPad X13 Yoga and ran Ubuntu full-time for 30 days as my main creation setup.

Hardware & Power Management:

Suspend/Sleep: Moving away from Windows Modern Standby fixed my biggest mobile hardware headache. Closing the lid triggers true deep sleep, resulting in a flat battery graph overnight instead of a hot laptop in my bag.

2-in-1 UI: 1-to-1 GNOME gestures in tablet mode feel incredibly natural. Paired with extensions like Blur my Shell, the desktop environment looks modern and responsive.

FOSS Workflow Replacements:

Scripting & Notes: Logseq handled all local markdown planning effortlessly.

Graphics & Audio: GIMP and Audacity handled all thumbnail design and voiceover post-processing without friction.

Gaming: Steam Proton ran roughly 90% of my game library out-of-the-box with zero tweaking.

Friction Points:

Video Editing (Free DaVinci Resolve): Free Resolve on Linux lacks native H.264/H.265 MP4 decoding due to licensing. It requires running FFmpeg scripts to transcode footage to ProRes/DNxHR before editing.

Proprietary Standards: Expecting a 1:1 drop-in replacement for Adobe CC or native MS Office isn't realistic—you have to adapt your workflow to open tools.

Overall, desktop Linux feels ~90% ready for creator workflows. I put together a video walking through the full setup, desktop B-roll, and tests if anyone wants a visual breakdown: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ci_2rxbfwU

Just wrapped up testing an off-lease ThinkPad X13 Yoga Gen 2 vs modern sub-£200 Chromebooks. It’s wild how much plastic e-waste retail stores sell at that price point when off-lease enterprise gear running Linux blows them out of the water.

Anyone else running off-lease ThinkPads for lightweight mobile setups? (Dropped a quick 2-min video spec comparison if anyone's looking at cheap refurb gear right now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6Pw2cBKpfs)