Linux on DeX review

I’ve bought a Galaxy Note 9 recently, one of the coolest things I noticed was, it can now run Ubuntu 16.04 LTS.

Linux on Dex Beta is currently available on both Note 9 and Samsung Tab S4, for more information you can visit their official website or you can download the beta APK here and image here

Here is my setup in the office, I connect USB mouse and HDMI through a USB-C adaptor to the Galaxy Note 9 and pair it with Bluetooth Logitech K810 keyboard.

I tried to power the USB-C adaptor with Samsung fast charger cable, unfortunately, the battery still drain, but in a slower paste. It lasts me for 7 hours before the phone run out of juice.

A better way is to use Samsung Dex Pad or Dex Station to keep the phone charge while I’m using it

This is what you will see when you run the Linux on Dex Beta apps from your phone or tablet. I created a container with 10GB of storage space, how many disk space you can create is depending on your phone storage. Keep it to default is good for testing purposes.

Good news for the developer, both Visual Studio Code and IntelliJ IDEA are installed by default.

Both Chrome Chromium and Firefox Quantum are installed by default, I personally prefer Chrome Chromium over the Android version of Chrome because of the Chrome plugin in PC version can still be used in Chrome Chromium.

Performance wise, the CPU fluctuates between 17% to 40% depending on the number of the application running. Below are the applications running while I do the test.

• 6 tabs on Chrome browser, playing Youtube video, speed test, and 4 other web pages.
• Firefox browser
• Visual Studio Code and
• IntelliJ IDEA
  

Below are some of the observation after I messed up with the box

• I noticed ping command is not permitted, not sure why.
  
• Wireless IP address of the box same as the host
  
• Due to Galaxy Note 9 using ARM processor, therefore applications (E.g. Skype and Slack) running on Intel or AMD architecture cannot be install.
  
• WhatsApp, Skype, Line, and Outlook still able to run using Chrome as an alternative
  
• Not sure why, but I could not get apache server up, I noticed there is an error
  “unlimited error setting limit (Operation not permitted)”
  
• Able to Chromecast

• Keyboard backspace key is not functioning properly if used Swiftkey
• No way to hibernate the box, once HDMI cable unplug, the box shut down
• I can change the root password, but once I close and reopen the box, the root password reverted back to the default password
• Default DNS is set to 8.8.8.8 from /etc/resolv.conf, the cons are I need to switch DNS server IP between home and office
• Music play out of the box works perfectly fine

Maybe Linux on Dex still in Beta version, I’m looking forward to the official version. Hope that those issues will be fixed, or if you have any workaround to the above issue I mention, please feel to share or correct me if I’m wrong. ^^

Overall I quite like the experience of using, I’m currently leaving my notebook in office after office hours and dock the Galaxy Note 9 when I reach home. I’m not sure how far can I go yet, and I will keep you guys posted after a while. ^^

Well done Samsung!