Thinkpads Forum

Hello everybody!

I am on the very verge of purchasing a brand new R61. The only thing holding me back is that I do not know how it will do with Ubuntu on it. I do not plan to use Vista, you see...

I have googled for several days without finding any relevant information or user experiences. I've found some concerning the T61 - that one is pretty much the same as the R61 with the intel X3100 and intel wireless, right?

If Ubuntu does not work for now, I can live with that until 7.10 or 8.04 comes around. But I need to know wether or not I can expect the R61 to become more and more Linux compatible over time. If X3100 and the wireless thing is going to be seen in more and more laptops, surely that must lead to R61 compatability becoming better?

Any takes on the issue would be highly appreciated. For real, even if you dont have an R61 I'd like to hear what you have to say...

Cheers

So far there is no easy driver for the Intel 4965ABG wireless card.

Hi there, thanks for replying!

I am eventually getting THIS computer. As you can see, allthough it is written in norwegian, it has the Intel 3945 a/b/g wireless card. Are there any easyer driver for that one?

And the X3100 worries me... If just someone could say "Go ahed, buy it! Eventually it'll work just fine!", I'd buy it

You should be fine. It seems that the drivers for both 3945 and X3100 are released already.

While I don't have and R61, I do have a T60p and I just switched to Ubuntu from SuSE (within the last week). WOW! Ubuntu has a feature called "Restricted Drivers" and it automatically loaded/came with both my Intel wireless driver and my ATI driver. I had almost zero configuration to do. Given that I'd say you shouldn't have too much of a problem with Ubuntu, although I don't know what else the R61 may have in the way of "restricted drivers".

Then I am ordering as of NOW...

Thanks guys, it is ordered. Ubuntu will be the flavour. I'll be ready with the discs on first boot

Is this 64 bit? Or both?

Edit:
Sorry about doublepost, but I just thought this event deserved its own post

You might want to boot it up and make a set of recovery cd's before you smoke windows. They could be useful when you go to sell it someday.

I think the R61 is 64 bit but in using 64 bit Ubuntu you will be limiting your software selections. I would use 32 bit for now until the software for 64 bit catches up.

How is performance then? I understand that there are litterally four processors in the core 2 duo - they will all work in 32 bit mode, correct?

Core 2 Duo has two processor cores -- that's effectively a dual processor built into a single physical CPU. And, yes, both cores will work in both 32-bit and 64-bit modes.

So the previous "Core Duo" has only one processor in the physical CPU?

Hi Toba,

CoreDuo has two cores into one physical CPU too, but CoreDuo runs only 32bit. Core2Duo can run both 32bit and 64bit O/S's

I'd probably give 64-bit ubuntu a go on that before going to 32-bit. Yes, there's plenty of software that you just can't do 64-bit (adobe flash comes to mind) but you can run the 32-bit version. Then the complication is you can't use 32-bit flash with 64-bit firefox, but you can just run 32-bit firefox and flash and still take advantage of most of the stuff on the system being 64-bit.

Drivers might be a bit more tricky with 64-bit too

Is 64 speedyer? What is the benefit of 64 bits?

The 4965 driver is a bit tricky to install right now, but works for me. If you can wait until the distributions include it then I would go for it. On the other hand side, when you finally decide to go with N wireless you can probably get the 4965 minipci card for cheap...

The X3100 drivers are nice, worked out of the box for me (but not optimally, needs a patch for the autoscaler to behave correctly).

The main benefit of 64bit is that you can use >~3 GB ram. Other speed benefits are pretty much marginal. You can run 32 bit software, only mixing 64bit and 32bit code is a no-no. The only problem I encountered so far is the flash plugin, and that worked eventually with nspluginwrapper.

Tobba25 wrote:Is 64 speedyer? What is the benefit of 64 bits?

Increased memory space consumption (aka. uses more ram)

I have it now!

I am writing this from my R61 ThinkPad right now. This machine is beautiful! I simply love the "sturdyness" and black design of this thing.

Install of Ubuntu worked beautiful. It came with Vista, but that OS was a resource hog. Internet Explorer to FOREVER to load, and Norton & Co. bugged me with all kinds of outdates and whatnot the minute the machine was started.

I went off and burned a Ubuntu Alternate CD. Boot and install worked flawless, as well did wireless. A few things is not perfect yet, though:

Sound!
..and Compiz beryl.

Sound is the most important issue for me. If someone here could point me to the right direction on how to fix it, id be very, very glad!!

This site may help you. It is for a T61, but it is similar to an r61.

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Installin ... inkPad_T61
http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Installin ... inkPad_T61

edit: I can't figure out the linking thing, but the top one should work if you cut and paste