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Ubuntu Linux on a Thinkpad X61s

The 2007-08-03 at 20:31 by Loïc d'Anterroches filed under Computer toys.

Basically it works out of the box using the Ubuntu Gutsy Tribe 3. You just need to tweak some little things to get really everything working. Just read on for more details.

General description

This little system is very comfortable, I am having it on my lap at the moment and it can really be used nicely. Nearly no noise at all is coming from the system (after a bios upgrade). I was spoiled with my T41p having a 1440x1050 screen resolution, here 1024x768 may look very small, but in fact it makes everything (fonts, etc.) big enough to read. I had often to increase the size of the text when using the T41p. The model is the UK427GE. It as 1.4GHz dual core low voltage processor with 4MB L2 cache. The keyboard is even better than the one on my T41p, maybe it is because it is new.

It is small, very small, and weight next to nothing, less than 1.5kg. I like to travel with the minimum, with this one I will travel happy.

Installation

First, I booted once under Windows Vista, and, let say it politely, it looks like I was used to Win XP and it is difficult for me to understand this new one. I was especially annoyed by all the pop-ups about security everywhere. Ok, so my Vista experience lasted maybe 5 minutes, plus 10 or so for the boot time and shutdown because some updates were installed at the same time.

I tried to generate the recovery CDs for Vista, but was not able to find the option to burn them. Most likely because I got a German Betrieb System and my German is not that good.

So, I plugged an external usb CD player and popped in the Ubuntu install CD, I took the standard one. I selected everything normal, but went for manual partitioning. There I modified the NTFS partition of Vista and resize it to 25GB, the system really resized it without trashing the content. I was not sure about it, but it worked! So then I just created root, swap and home partitions. The installation went without a glitch.

What is working, what is not

Working

The system is using the latest Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X3100 for the video with an Intel 3945 a/b/g for the wireless, I was not sure if that would be supported. They are working out of the box! Yeah! So basically everything is working.

External display in 1280x1024 where the LCD is in 1024x768. It looks like my screen can inform the laptop of its resolution, because this is working even before X is started.

Not/partially working

What was not working was the fan, it was always full speed when plugged on AC. Not nice, but a bios upgrade to the 1.06 version (using Windows Vista to do it, very painful process by the way) solved the problem (but I need to test further).

Other stuff not working was the suspend to ram, when coming back, the back light of the display was off and I was enable to get it back (even with switching to console and back to X), the trick is simply to use the level 3 of the acpi sleep. So just add acpi_sleep=s3_bios to boot loader and it will work. My line in Grub looks like that:

kernel          /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-9-generic root=UUID=7440af99-56fe-4af3-aa7f-03d05fcb3a06 ro quiet splash acpi_sleep=s3_bios

What is still not working is the control of the brightness of the display. I need to get more info, it looks like the bios could be a little buggy, I am not sure. I need to investigate that further.

Edit: For the moment it is possible to use xbacklight to set the brightness of the screen, for example xbacklight -set 10.0 to put it at 10%.

Partial conclusion

Wonderful little machine, I don’t think I can complain about anything. Oh, yes, one thing. I had the feeling that the Tribe 3 version of Ubuntu had a better polish than the full Business Vista. Strange feeling…

Pictures etc… and full review will come later. But basically if you want to buy and you are not sure, you can.

Looking for a new laptop

The 2007-07-23 at 20:08 by Loïc d'Anterroches filed under Computer toys.

The laptop of my wife is slowly dying… before it is dead, I am looking for a laptop to replace it. In fact, this is more a laptop to replace my own laptop. I will give her the T41p and will buy another one for me. The X60s looks very nice and not that expensive. I think I will go for it. If you know how it performs, if you can recommend a better alternative, your feedback is welcome.

Internet of the power line

The 2007-01-10 at 15:10 by Loïc d'Anterroches filed under Computer toys.

It is not that often when I am fully satisfied with an electronic system. For once, I am! For a little more than one year I have been using the Devolo dLan system to have Internet in my home office. I am using the 14Mbits system which more than enough as the goal is only to have interconnection between my ADSL modem and my LinkSys Wikif/switch (I have a 6Mbits connection). I had not a single downtime during that year. Basically, you plug the stuff and you forget about them, they just work.

Some days ago I got a Fon router, so I just bought another Devolo plug, put it into the wall, plugged the router into it, bing, it works, the connection between the ADSL modem and the Fon routeur is working, my in house power net is just a big hub, without doing a single configuration step.

I bought my first 2 plugs just because it was the only stuff available in the computer shop I went, I bought the 3rd one because I was happy with the 2 previous and I can tell, it simply works. So, I recommend this particular Devolo product.

Free Internet for my neighbors

The 2006-12-19 at 11:15 by Loïc d'Anterroches filed under Computer toys.

Today I received my Fonera. This little toy is really packed with technology. It fits in your hand and provide double SSID with one free and one encrypted. The general quality of the enclosure is really high with a nice SMA external connector for the antenna. It will be easy to adapt a bigger one in the future. I still need to test it, I cannot for the moment because I need to buy another Devolo dLan to dispatch internet on the balcony without having cables lying around.

I have been using this dLan product (the 14Mbps variant) at home for about a year with 100% uptime. It is dispatching internet from my ADSL router in the living room to my office without the need of an hugly cable. As I have only a 6Mbps internet connection, it is the perfect match. Now my ADSL modem routeur will connect through the Devolo both the Fonera (to be used only by my neighbors) and my Linksys for private use. I will not use the double SSID feature of the Fonera for the moment.

The next step is to find an enclosure to protect the Fonera when staying outside. Many thanks to Fon for the free toy.