Please do not let the discussion in this thread deter you from future participation or contribution. Know that you were not ignored; I and probably others share your initial thoughts that for new users who simply want to know “will this work or not”, the answer cannot be had easily. That’s why I applaud @Sven’s thread for helping to address that (Short list of laptops/desktops that work well with Qubes OS).
Qubes has the wonderful issue of debating the “right” way to do security, who to do it for, and most importantly…who’s gonna do it. I’ve come to learn that there is no single answer for all three of those factors and they tend to come up often in various topics, just like any other open source project.
As far as I can tell, the “who’s gonna do it” part is probably the biggest hurdle with respect to this thread (and many other Qubes issues).
So what can we do about it if we’re not web developers? I’m encouraged by the increase of HCLs I have seen. Collecting the data is the first step. The more [fresh] data points there are, the more the HCL serves its purpose. Presenting it is the next step, but prior to debating how to do that, we need to think about the goals, which is where the extra discussion arose.
Someone brand new to Qubes will not have context to think about previous releases, Xen, BIOS and motherboard versions, etcetera. A new user wants to know does a certain device work with the software I want to install. Most helpful would be HCLs for the current release. That does not mean an HCL reported during Release 3.2 won’t work - but how does a new user evaluate that? It is ambiguous to them and confusion-inducing.
That is, unless the new user cares enough about wanting to use Qubes that they are open to experimenting, troubleshooting, and reviewing documentation and community resources. To put it frankly - are they willing to lose their productivity potential to time lost doing research and debugging?
The issue is finding the balance and this is where the lively debate was focused. If the user has a hard time with the HCL, they may not enjoy Qubes later. But on the other hand, how hard of a time should they be having in the first place?
To make a long story short, while your input sounds like simple suggestions that may have appeared to be ignored, the issues run a little deeper; but don’t let that discourage you from letting your voice be heard. Qubes can really benefit from hearing more voices.