Ubuntu 5.04 Mini-Review

[benplaut]

At the moment, i don't have enough time to write a full review


I have been using SuSE 9.2 for about a week, but am pestered by a little voice inside my head saying “BLLOOOAAAATTTWWAARREE!!! BLLOOOAAAATTTWWAARREE!!!” Therefore, i started to look for alternative distros that, as a rule, would fit on 1 CD. First, i looked at Yoper. It seemed decent, but it had such a small user base that i nixed it. Next, i looked at SimplyMEPIS. It also looked like a possible, but the download was taking FOREVER. Finally, i looked upon a distro that I had never thought of as an installable- only as a liveCD. I downloaded Ubuntu Hoary RC in about 15 min (VERY fast), and then burned it to a CD. then, i went on the #ubuntu IRC channel and was informed that Hoary final was being released in about 20min from then. Obviously, i waited until it was released, and then hopped on the Torrent. That download took a few minutes longer, but was still very fast. The next day, i did the install.

First, i backed up the /home/ben/ folder of the SuSE install onto a Jumpdrive, and prepared to abandon my SuSE partition. I would have done a dual boot, but in my few weeks experience with Linux, dual boot brings trouble. If i decided to bring back SuSE, i could just replace the /home/ben/ folder with my backup and be back on my way.

Then came the actual install. It went very painlessly. I put in the CD, selected all the default options, and let it begin (Tip: Don't be scared by the “text based” install; I was and it turned out to be just as easy to use as SuSE's graphical YaST. It is text based, but it is not command-line based). The install took about 15min, then called for a reboot. I took out the CD, rebooted, and entered a username and password into the (still text based) window. Then, i watched as a few hundred packages decompressed and installed themselves. After it was done, i was presented with a nice looking login screen with the Ubuntu-brown style to it. I logged in and was presented with a horrible looking GNOME 2.10 desktop. It looked horrible because the theme included with Ubuntu as default looks, in my opinion, like digital puke. Of course, my first order of operation was to head over to www.gnome-look.org and get a nice theme and background.

As for the configuration, i haven't done any yet. I haven't needed to. Everything was detected PERFECTLY!

I enabled the online apt repositories, and went into Synaptic to get the packages i wanted. Everything is there. With the exception of Skencil (hard to find anywhere), every package i wanted was there.

My next task is to enable the middle scroll button and forward/backward buttons, but i'm sure it will work soon enough.

Ubuntu is a great choice for those who are looking for a distro that is Newbie friendly, but leaves some room for growth. This one's staying.

[baraider]

nice work...can't wait to hear your full review...this one has Potential with a capitcal P .

Waiting for my t43 to try this one on. I haven't seen anyone trying this one on t43 yet...don't know if they have any driver problem or not...X300 graphic, fingereaders...

How do you like the GNOME, did you try KDE before? I heard bluecurve is nice...

Another question, if i have the t43 with the main HD with XP on it, can i slap another HD into the minibay and install utunbu on it...that's way i have each os on a different HD and i can duaboot it...


Anyone got any idea on how to do this?

[benplaut]

nice work...can't wait to hear your full review...this one has Potential with a capitcal P .

Waiting for my t43 to try this one on. I haven't seen anyone trying this one on t43 yet...don't know if they have any driver problem or not...X300 graphic, fingereaders...

How do you like the GNOME, did you try KDE before? I heard bluecurve is nice...

Another question, if i have the t43 with the main HD with XP on it, can i slap another HD into the minibay and install utunbu on it...that's way i have each os on a different HD and i can duaboot it...


Anyone got any idea on how to do this?

i should be able to write a full one next weekend... in absence of school. I have tried KDE, and really liked it. My plan was to install Ubuntu, then download the kubuntu packages, but i am liking the simplicity of gnome. I still haven't made a decision whether or not to put on kubuntu, but i think i will just stick with this...

i have heard of people putting OSs on minibay drives, but i haven't tried i myself (only have a mini-dock)... it should work if you press (i think F7... have to check) on boot to bring up the device menu. Otherwise, it would just boot to the higher priority device in your BIOS instead of presenting you with a GRUB or LILO menu.

Good Luck!

[s0larian]

I installed this weekend the new ubuntu 5.04. Wireless is working without any problems, I just put in the ESSID and WEP key in the network config tool. That's it. This is really nice!

But for all dual boot Thinkpad owners: be carefull, the standard installation overwrites the MBR, even if you install grub into an extra /boot partition. With gentoo I had never this problems and I was able to keep my original MBR. So the only solution with ubuntu is backing up the MBR before installing ubuntu and restoring it afterwards. Of course this is only necessary if someone like me is keeping XP with Rescue and Recovery or any other Windows software which is changing the MBR. In any other case just install grub in the MBR.

[would]

i also have ubuntu 5.04 running

used suse 9.2 until last week

ubuntu is fantastic - nearly everything works out of the box

>i only had to install the fglx driver for 3d accel. - no problem
>also a little problem with the soundserver - was solved fast (only one task could use the sounddevice - device busy).
>and now i'm trying to set the spin-down time of my harddisk to 5 minutes - not to 10 seconds (default) - while on laptop-mode! Seems to be a little bit more difficult.

Ubuntu is really a good piece of software/linux

good resource: http://aaltonen.us/archive/2005/03/02/u ... nkpad-t42/

[ohman]

I too just updated to kubuntu 5.04 (I prefer kde to gnome, sue me), and I was blown away by the quality of the distro overall. I solely use wireless, so while I fishing for a cat5 cable I noticed the installer trying to configure the ipw2200 module. "Hmm..." lo and behold, I fed it the Essid and the wep key, and it worked!

Install lasted all of 15-20 minutes, and the text based installer was very nice. Coming from gentoo, and debian before that, it was really a walk in the park.

There was a problem with the way the kaffeine package was built, but I don't use it (but there is a fix on ubuntuforums.org). I noticed cpufreqd worked on the first boot (yes!), and after enabling ACPI support in the control center I was able to set hibernate and suspend properties.

I was easily able to use the fglrx driver (closed source ati), but it would crash X11 when I would try to resume from standby (something thats really more the driver's fault as it did the same thing in debian and gentoo), but the open source ati driver was able to resume without a problem.

The only problem I had with suspend/hibernate/resume was after 4 or 5 cycles, sometimes the ipw2200 module would crash.

would - to get the disk to spin down after 5 minutes, open up /etc/hdparm.conf (I believe thats the file) and at the bottom there will be a command_line method. Uncomment that and make sure it looks like this:

Code: Select all

command_line {
hdparm -S 60 /dev/<insert drive here>
}

You will need to use sudo, and the 60 is because the -S option counts by 5 seconds (so -S 1 = 5, -S 2 = 10, etc).[/b]


And to try to tempt the OP to move to KDE, here is my desktop

[benplaut]

I too just updated to kubuntu 5.04... <snip>

i also came from KDE, and still love it for its customizability, but i chose to stick with Gnome becuase that's where the community, and it is alot faster (for me).

BTW- post links to pics... many of the Thinkpads.com members are still on dialup...

(actually, a thumbnail is probably OK)

[baraider]

ohman,

Can't wait so i decided to install ubuntu 5.04 on my compaq x1000 machine...
It works perfectly now....for most part...i'm still trying to customize and install apps.

I install the kde so now i have a Kubuntu with Ubuntu underneath. I think this route is better than going kubuntu from get go.


I like your desktop, can you tell me where you get your theme and how you customize them that way?

I want them..

[ohman]

ohman,

Can't wait so i decided to install ubuntu 5.04 on my compaq x1000 machine...
It works perfectly now....for most part...i'm still trying to customize and install apps.

I install the kde so now i have a Kubuntu with Ubuntu underneath. I think this route is better than going kubuntu from get go.


I like your desktop, can you tell me where you get your theme and how you customize them that way?

I want them..

The dock along the bottom is called Ksmoothdock, you can get it at http://ksmoothdock.sourceforge.net - they should have a .deb package that you can install using

Code: Select all

sudo dpkg -i <file>

The background was some random minimalist I pulled down from deviant art, I think its called Flower Macro.

The amaroK theme comes when you install it, its just the alternative one. Its in the configure menu. (amaroK is the best mp3 player you will probably ever use).

The theme is actually the default one, all I did was move it up to the top, delete the quick launch menu, trashcan, and clock. I tried deleting the system tray because ksmoothdock can emulate it, but it wouldn't pick up the battery applet (which I need for my laptop).

The text is a transparent Eterm, do an 'sudo apt-get Eterm' and then run the following command

Code: Select all

Eterm --trans --buttonbar 0 --geometry 70x22+120+50 &

You can play around with the values for the geometry to get it placed where you want it.

To get Eterm you might have enable alternate repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list

Use mine as a starting point, but above all remember it isn't MY computer, its YOURS. Go nuts, I like mine simple - you might not.

Sorry if this was a little fast, but I think I got all your questions. If you have anymore, you know where to get a hold of me.

[baraider]

Ohman,

got Kubuntu on my T23 mostly running...there are some questions left

How do i autorun ksmoothdock everytime i login...and how do i delete the old KDE taskbar at the bottom...i can hide it to the left or the right....but can't just delete it?

i have some error when running ksmoothdock

andy@kubuntu:~$ X Error: BadWindow (invalid Window parameter) 3
Major opcode: 20
Minor opcode: 0
Resource id: 0x3400007


Anotherthing is I want to use Thunderbird...i have it installed in my XP box...how can i import all the old mail and settings on my kubuntu...thanks

[Merlyn_3D]

Has anyone tried SUSE 9.3 on a thinkpad? It runs KDE by default, and I thought the install went pretty painlessly. I like the distro, but I wonder if Ubuntu is better. I just really like YaST and how every configuration thing is in that panel.

[benplaut]

Has anyone tried SUSE 9.3 on a thinkpad? It runs KDE by default, and I thought the install went pretty painlessly. I like the distro, but I wonder if Ubuntu is better. I just really like YaST and how every configuration thing is in that panel.

i came from SuSE 9.2 to ubuntu, and YaST was the main thing i missed. Once you figure out how to set things up, which will occasionally require editing text files (it isn't too hard... i'm a newbie too), the only use for YaST is installing packages. Synaptic is the Ubuntu tool for packages/programs, and it is far better than YaST, for that task.

As a rough estimate, Ubuntu runs about twice as fast as SuSE+KDE... try it out!