Slackware Linux on the Toshiba A135 - S2276 |
| Copyright © 2006-2007 by Zack Smith All rights reserved. 0. SummarySystem works pretty well. For almost all purposes it is a good replacement for Windows.My only remaining gripe is: The kernel's Synaptics trackpad driver needs improvement. It seems to misconfigure the trackpad such that the pointer doesn't come to a prompt stop at the end of a finger movement. 1. System ProfileMy A135-S2276 has the following hardware:
2. InstallationThis information is provided as-is. Proceed at your own risk.2.1 Linux + Vista
2.1.1 Before abandoning WindowsIf you plan on using Linux exclusively, be sure that before you do, you copy all of the Windows TrueType fonts to a disk for use with Linux. They're in c:\windows\fonts. Firefox looks much better when using Windows fonts.2.2 Linux aloneThere's nothing preventing you from, upon buying this laptop, downloading the Slackware 12 DVD mentioned above along with the additional needed files and then completely replacing Vista. You may find that Linux lacks a few things you may want, like a certain video game, but otherwise Slackware 12 is surprisingly complete.The only things that you'll need to get first are:
2.3 Fine adjustmentsThe following is my personal checklist for installing Slackware on this machine. You may want to do things differently.Install Slackware 12. If you install everything except TCL, Emacs, and KDE-Intl, it requires 4.04 gigs. Get linux 2.6.20.15 and untar it into /usr/src. Copy the good config to /usr/src/linux-2.6.20.15/.config Go to /usr/src and remove the linux link. Create a new link: ln -s /usr/src/linux-2.6.20.15 linux Go to /usr/src/linux-2.6.20.15 and 'make'. Do 'make modules_install'. Put madwifi driver in /root. Go to /root/madwifi* directory. Do 'make'. Do 'make install'. Create /etc/hosts.deny as ALL : ALL Copy the good xorg.conf to /usr/X11. Reboot; wireless driver should load during startup. Create user account. Create mount directories for storage: mkdir /dvd /usb Set acceptable speaker volume with alsamixer. Store this volume setting w/ "alsactl store" Add aliases to /etc/profile... alias d1="mount /dvd; ls -l --color /dvd" alias d0="umount /dvd" alias u1="mount /usb; ls -l --color /usb" alias u0="umount /usb" alias w1="iwconfig ath0 essid ...." alias w0="rmmod ath_pci" alias ll="ls -l --color" alias ..="cd .." alias D="cd /nt/Users/Me/Desktop; ls --color" alias lx="cd /usr/src/linux" alias mk="make" Get, compile and install libdvdcss2 -- needed to play DVD movies. Get, compile and install libsigc++ -- needed by Skype. Install major applications. 3. Drivers3.1. Video3.1.1. X WindowsIn Slackware 12, you can start up X Windows without modifying xorg.conf, however this will get you the VESA mode, which is 1024x768. Also, trying to switch to a virtual console or exit X Windows when in VESA mode crashes the X server.It is better to use the xorg.conf that I provide below, which allows for wide screen operation and doesn't crash the server. 3.1.2. FramebufferYou can start up in VESA 1024x768 mode. There may be a BIOS mode for 1280x800 but I haven't tested to verify that.3.2. SoundThe ATI High-Def audio chip works with kernel 2.6.21.15, but not with 2.6.22.*.Problems:
Sound recording does work. This command will record 10 seconds
of WAV data:
For debugging purposes, here is a useful script alsa-info.sh. Run that before asking questions on Usenet. 3.3. ACPII've seen the CPU slow to 1.2 GHz but I haven't learned how to change the power-management strategy just yet.3.4. USBFour ports total. They work. The one in the back appears to be slow USB only, whereas the others are USB2.3.5. PrintingCUPS appears to work quite well. Just connect your printer to the USB port and then point your browser tohttp://localhost:631.
I was able to print from Konqueror in about 2 minutes.
3.6. External flash driveThese work fine, although KDE seems to get confused about whether they are mounted or not.3.7. PC Card slotThere is only one Type I slot. It appears to be supported, but I didn't test it.3.8 Networking3.8.1 EthernetThe Realtek 8139 Ethernet chip is a very commonly used chip and works very well.Don't forget to create /etc/hosts.deny in which you should have the line: ALL: ALL 3.8.2 WirelessWarning! Even if you think you have manually switched off the internal Wifi chip using the switch on the front of the computer, such that the LED turns off, it appears the Wifi subsystem is always operational under Linux.The Madwifi driver requires that the kernel be SMP and that module auto-loading works. The kernel I've used with Madwifi is 2.6.20.6. The process for using the wifi driver is:
3.9. Internal DVD writerSeems to work fine.3.10 Synaptics trackpadIt works as a PS/2 mouse, but the Linux driver is not as good as the Windows driver. In particular, it seems to produce more motion data than is needed, whereas the Windows driver dampens that somehow. Under X, the result is extra motion at the end of a finger-stroke. I'm trying to find a solution.It turns out that there is a driver in the X server for the Synaptics, and there is a utility called ksynaptics that uses libsynaptics that is supposed to let you modify trackpad behavior. However, these are all after the fact. The right thing would be to fix driver in the kernel first. 4. Performance4.1. VideoI tried playing a flash video and it worked fine.4.2. Hard driveThe program hdparm says that buffered reads happen at 37.3 MB/sec. Cached reads happen at 745 MB/sec.You should add -h to the poweroff command in /etc/rc.d/rc.6 to ensure a quiet hard drive powerdown. 4.3. ProcessorThe Intel Core Duo T2060 has two cores and is really quite sufficient for most purposes.It rates at 3191 bogomips. The BYTE magazine Dhrystone benchmark, is available anime.net/~goemon. The T2060 processor gets an index of 159.0. 4.4. Memory BandwidthTo ascertain memory performance, I wrote a utility called "bandwidth", which is here.The results for this machine when ACPI was forcing the CPU speed down were: CPU MHz = 1200.000 L2 cache sequential read 3627.51 MB/sec L2 cache sequential write 3195.66 MB/sec Main memory sequential read 2796.2 MB/sec Main memory sequential write 578.525 MB/sec Framebuffer resolution: 1024x768, 16bpp Framebuffer memory sequential read 13.981 MB/sec Framebuffer memory sequential write 84.2907 MB/sec Library: memset 516.222 MB/sec Library: memcpy 479.349 MB/sec Library: bzero 447.392 MB/sec 4.5. Internal DVD writerReading works fine for single-session DVD-R & DVD-R DL discs.Reading of one "live" DVD-R/DL UDF disk did not work for me, because the standard was too new. Linux only supports older UDFs. Reading and writing works fine for DVD-RAM discs (5 for $13 at Circuit City, but only 3X) but writing is slow. FYI, DVD-RAM uses the older UDF standard. For writing to DVD+/-R, I've tested it using DVD+R discs first running mkisofs to create an ISO, then writing that using growisofs. Worked fine. I've tried using K3B to write some files to a DVD-RW. It was slow and it failed. Playback of DVD movies has not worked, apparently because I don't have libdvdcss2 installed properly. I'm working on that problem. 4.6 KDEI really must say that KDE is a pain in the ass. It's like a bad joke of an imitation of Windows, which shouldn't be imitated in the first place. It is truly unfortunate that neither KDE nor Gnome are very good, but there you have it. That's why I use XFCE.Specific problem with KDE in Slackware 11 (also 12?):
5. ApplicationsIf you're installing Slackware, you're probably already technically adept. Still, you may not know about all your options. Here is a table of equivalent applications between Vista & Slackware 12. (I'm not very familiar with KDE so I mostly leave its apps out.)
6. KernelMy .config file for kernel 2.6.20.15 is here.Here is the compiled kernel that the above .config creates, which I provide AS-IS so you use it as your own risk: bzImage. 7. Mailing listtoshiba-dme.co.jpLinks
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