Shopping For Linux Compatible Hardware

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Originally Posted by Jimmy

I've had more hardware suffer hardware failure than suffer from driver death.

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So have I, but I've still got a canon scanner which works fine on linux but doesn't have drivers for 64-bit vista and so is a (light, flat) brick there.

Back on topic.. I really like the idea of a rating system similar to that suggested earlier in this thread. Separate ratings for different drivers, both with multiple criteria. Something like:

- driver in Kernel (AKA works out-of-the-box) yes/no

Open source driver rating
- stability /10
- features /10

Proprietary/Other driver rating
- stability /10
- features /10

Some kind of wiki editability and user voting/commenting would be great too.. something like a cross between stackoverflow.com and newegg.com

Anything to make Linux shopping easier is a plus for Linux users, certainly. Such things could help to push companies to let others know when their stuff is Linux-supported by offering companies more ways to tell Linux users that and spread the word. It fosters more competition for Linux-compatible hardware IMO.