SemiAntics

This is my new Lenovo X100e.

I recently acquired a new “netbook.” You probably shouldn’t call it a netbook as it seems that the maximum size for a netbook should be the 10″ screen. However, it’s 11.6″ diagonal, so it’s very close to being a netbook. I promptly installed Ubuntu GNU/Linux on it. Here’s a quick description of the process.

First, you need a thumbdrive to install it. It doesn’t come with a CD drive. This is actually a simple process provided you have a good thumb drive, and it’s probably much wiser than burning a CD that you will throw away once you’re done. Note on the thumbdrive: it needs to be at least 1 gig, and it is best to have one without the U3 system. The U3 system is very confusing, and frankly it’s a pain in the butt. It takes room off your thumb drive that could be used for storage, and it makes the file system not work like you’d expect. It’s also very difficult to get rid of the U3 system once you have such a thumb drive. So if you’ve not bought one yet, make sure it doesn’t have U3 on it!

With the thumb drive, you can create a startup disk. I did this using my Thinkpad T60 with Ubuntu (it’s extremely easy once you’ve got a well-configured drive). I followed the instructions on the Ubuntu page for netbook installation. They also have instructions for creating this disk using Windows and Mac.

Next, you have to reboot with the thumb drive inserted and make it boot from the thumb drive. I did this by pressing enter at the splash screen and following directions. It was very easy.

Installing from then on is standard Ubuntu, so I won’t cover it. Everything worked smoothly. I should note that I had the computer plugged in to the wall instead of using battery power. This is key, so make sure you do that.

Once you have it installed you need to update the system. Keep the power plugged in. A ton of drivers don’t work right until you update, including wireless. I suggest you update using an ethernet connection instead of trying to get wireless to work. While this is going on, don’t mess with any thing. Just update and then reboot when it’s done. Leave it plugged in!

On reboot, you’ll need to fix the one issue that I’ve had so far. Basically, because the driver for the Radeon HD3200 chipset has a bug in it. I followed the directions here to fix it. I’ll include the fix anyway:

This is a known problem with AMD RS780 chipset (Radeon HD3200) and kernel modsetting (KMS), which is enabled by default in Lucid. To disable KMS, you should do the following in a terminal:

Modify the grub configuration (Grub is the bootloader for your computer, installed when you install Ubuntu)

sudo vim /etc/default/grub

Modify line 10 to say

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="radeon.modeset=0"

You just fill in the part between the quote marks. Save, exit, and then run

sudo update-grub

Then reboot and you should be ready to go.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 27th, 2010 at 10:07 pm and is filed under Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.