Debian live USB persistent di HP Pavillion DV3 laptop

Laptop:

HP Pavilion dv3-2165ee

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/product?lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&document=&product=4029986&

A. Membuat Debian live USB flash:

Source:

http://chalsattack.blogspot.com/2011/03/creating-debian-live-usb-pendrive-with.html

1. Buka website http://live.debian.net/ dan download usb-hdd image dari sini:

http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/release/current-live/i386/usb-hdd/debian-live-6.0.3-i386-gnome-desktop.img

2. Colokkan usb fflash drive, periksa mount point dengan menjalankan perintah di terminal $mount

3. Copy image ke usb flash drive dengan printah:

$ dd if=debian-live-6.0.3-i386-gnome-desktop.img of=/dev/sdd

(Sesuaikan sdd dengan nama device kita)

4. Setelah proses copy selesai, siapkan partisi di sisa space yang ada di usb flash drive untuk keperluan menyimpan data hasil live persistent nantinya.

Jalankan perintah di terminal: $sudo gparted

Dari menu pilihan drive, pilih sdd

Kita harus unmount drivenya, klik kanan dan unmount

Klik kanan pilih: new - Primary partition - ext2 - label: live-rw - add - apply changes

Selesai.

5. Pada saat booting, klik escape dan ketik:

boot: live persistent

B. Enable mouseclick with touchpad

C. Sesuaikan repo untuk mengakifkan contrib non-free

deb http://ftp.debian.org/debian/ squeeze main contrib non-free

D. Kalau perlu, instal Nvidia driver:

VERSION=`uname -r`

apt-get install nvidia-kernel-$VERSION nvidia-glx

apt-get install nvidia-xconfig

nvidia-xconfig

apt-get nvidia-settings

Source:

http://www.unixmen.com/script-to-install-nividia-driver-in-debian-squeeze-with-one-click/

E. Instal flashplugins

F. Instal pulseaudio

sudo apt-get install pulseaudio paprefs pavucontrol pulseaudio-module-hal pulseaudio-module-x11 pulseaudio-utils libasound2-plugins paman pavumeter pulseaudio-esound-compat libpulse0 libsdl1.2debian-pulseaudio

Source:

http://crunchbanglinux.org/forums/post/111432/#p111432

G. Masalah: suara tidak keluar.

Untuk mengatasinya buat hidden file di home bernama .asoundrc dengan isi:

pcm.pulse {

type pulse

}

ctl.pulse {

type pulse

}

pcm.!default {

type pulse

}

ctl.!default {

type pulse

}

Source:

http://www.shcherbyna.com/?p=1059

====

Selesai

Note:

Debian live usb di laptop ini sangat cepat dan responsif.

Debian Lenny - simple fix for Trident video card

My note for my old laptop which has Trident Cyberblade video card.

Reference:
http://www.edugeek.net/forums/nix/32431-omg-xorg-trident-video-4hours-wasted-time.html

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xorg/+question/49247

By default Debian Lenny and Ubuntus (even the latest 9.04 version) can only show 800x600 as the maximum resolution while the correct resolution should be 1024 x 768

To overcome the problem usually I copied the xorg.conf file from any other distros (mostly Mepis and Sidux).

Today I found the above references, and it turns out that the solution is really simple, just add 2 lines in the "Monitor" section of the default xorg.conf as follows:

HorizSync 28-96
VertRefresh 50-75

(The above values I took from sidux's xorg.conf).

Now from the System > Preferences > Screen Resolution menu, I can choose the refresh rate (60, 70 or 75 Hz).

Below is the complete xorg.conf

# xorg.conf (X.Org X Window System server configuration file)
#
# This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using
# values from the debconf database.
#
# Edit this file with caution, and see the xorg.conf manual page.
# (Type "man xorg.conf" at the shell prompt.)
#
# This file is automatically updated on xserver-xorg package upgrades *only*
# if it has not been modified since the last upgrade of the xserver-xorg
# package.
#
# If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated
# again, run the following command:
#   sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg

Section "InputDevice"
 Identifier    "Generic Keyboard"
 Driver        "kbd"
 Option        "XkbRules"    "xorg"
 Option        "XkbModel"    "pc104"
 Option        "XkbLayout"    "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
 Identifier    "Configured Mouse"
 Driver        "mouse"
EndSection

Section "Device"
 Identifier    "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
 Identifier    "Configured Monitor"
 HorizSync      28-96
 VertRefresh    50-75
EndSection

Section "Screen"
 Identifier    "Default Screen"
 Monitor       "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Yamaha YMF-754 sound card problem on Debian Lenny, my easy workaround.

I have installed Debian Lenny on my old laptop and everything works nicely except one very important thing: the sound did not work.
The sound card is Yamaha Corporation YMF-754.

This is my workaround which works for me:

Go to sidux's online manual, click on the left menu link:
Graphic Cards, Monitors & miscellaneous Drivers > Hardware needing non-free drivers

Scroll down and find this line:

Yamaha YMF724/740/744/754 audio devices:
fetch the firmware from http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/dwmw2/linux-firmware-from-kernel.git
and place it under /lib/firmware/yamaha/.



I do not know what is "fetch" means, so I just click the above link and then click "snapshot" to download the firmware (the file is compressed in tar.gz).



Extract the file to get these three files:
ds1_ctrl.fw
ds1_dsp.fw
ds1e_ctrl.fw



Create a directory for the firmware:
# mkdir /lib/firmware/yamaha/

Copy those three files to that directory.

Restart the computer, and the sound card now works.


Problem solved.

Mencoba Debian Lenny di Laptop Jadul

Setelah mencoba Mepis Gnome, jadi kepingin juga merasakan induknya yaitu Debian Lenny :)
Akhirnya saya download cd net install nya dan menginstalnya di laptop jadul (Toshiba Tecra 8200, P3 850 Mhz 256 MB RAM, 20GB HD).
Dengan mengikuti beberapa panduan dari website (seperti Howtoforge, Deviceguru dsb), instalasi berjalan cukup lancar.
Dengan koneksi ADSL netinstal selesai dalam waktu sekitar 1,5 jam.

Berikut beberapa catatannya:

Repositori:
Setelah proses instal selesai, saya tambahkan repositori “contrib non-free” dan “debian multimedia” di file /etc/apt/sources.list sehingga hasilnya sbb:

# deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.0 _Lenny_ - Official i386 NETINST Binary-1 20090214-16:03]/ lenny main

# deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 5.0.0 _Lenny_ - Official i386 NETINST Binary-1 20090214-16:03]/ lenny main

deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ lenny main contrib non-free
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ lenny main contrib non-free

deb http://security.debian.org/ lenny/updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ lenny/updates main contrib non-free

deb http://volatile.debian.org/debian-volatile lenny/volatile main
deb-src http://volatile.debian.org/debian-volatile lenny/volatile main

deb http://www.debian-multimedia.org lenny main

Kemudian dari terminal saya jalankan:
# apt-get update
# apt-get install debian-multimedia-keyring
# apt-get update

Wireless:
USB wifi adapter tidak dikenali karena Debian tidak menyediakan firmwarenya berhubung lisensinya non-free.
Namun firmware tsb masih tersedia di repositori contrib dan non-free sehingga sangat mudah diinstal, cukup dengan membuka terminal dan jalankan:
# apt-get install zd1211rw

Multimedia:
Untuk menginstal “flashplayer-mozilla”, pertama2 harus dimatikan dulu flashplayer versi 9.0 bawaan yang ada di browser Iceweasel.
Caranya buka Iceweasel, klik menu > Tools >Add-ons > Plugins > Shockwave Flash 9.0 > Disable Kemudian buka terminal dan jalankan:
# apt-get install flashplayer-mozilla

Setelah terinstal, lanjutkan dengan:
# cp /usr/lib/flashplayer-mozilla/libflashplayer.so /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/

Selanjutnya install file2 ini agar Debian Lenny dapat memainkan aplikasi multimedia standar:
# apt-get install mozilla-mplayer , w32codecs , libdvdcss2

Aplikasi tambahan yang saya instal:
# apt-get nautilus-open terminal , nautilus-gksu , gdebi

Resolusi layar:
Resolusi layar hanya tampil 800x600, padahal seharusnya resolusi normal adalah 1024 x 768.
Laptop ini menggunakan video card "Trident Microsystems CyberBlade/XP", dan sebenarnya drivernya (trident) sudah terinstal, namun Debian tidak bisa menampilkan resolusi layar dengan benar.

Saya kurang tahu bagaimana sebenarnya masalah resolusi layar ini di atur di linux (xorg.conf), karena beberapa distro yang saya coba di laptop ini secara otomatis akan mengatur dan menampilkan resolusi dengan benar (Mepis, Puppy Linux, Mandriva, dsb).
Sedangkan beberapa distro lain seperti Ubuntu dan semua derivatifnya tidak dapat menampilkan resolusi layar dengan benar.
Untuk mengatasinya, sementara saya lakukan dengan cara mengcopy file xorg.conf dari Mepis.

Update: masalah resolusi layar ini juga bisa diatasi dengan cara yang ada postingan ini.


Agak lambat:
Selain itu Debian Lenny juga terasa agak lambat dan sedikit kurang responsif dibandingkan dengan Mepis Gnome.
Ini agak aneh karena menurut beberapa review, Debian cukup ringan dan cepat.
Sampai saat ini belum ketemu kenapa Debian terasa lambat.

Update: setelah memakai Debian beberapa lama, ternyata tidak terasa lambat lagi, normal2 saja. Bahkan terasa cukup responsif dan sangat stabil.


Sound Card:
Masalah lain adalah: sound card tidak dikenali oleh Debian.
Laptop ini menggunakan sound card “Yamaha Corporation YMF-754 [DS-1E Audio Controller] ”
Kabarnya karena masalah lisensi juga, maka Debian tidak dapat menyediakan firmwarenya dan sayangnya firmware tsb juga tidak terdapat di repositori contrib dan non-free.

Sebenarnya sound card tersebut didukung oleh alsa-project dan firwarenya juga tersedia di sana, namun sayangnya cara instalnya kurang jelas.
Dari hasil googling kelihatannya banyak juga yang dipusingkan dengan kasus ini.
Seharusnya paling tidak Debian menjelaskan cara yang mudah untuk menginstalnya.
Jadi untuk sementara laptop berjalan tanpa suara :(

Update: masalah sound sudah teratasi, lihat postingan ini.




Kesimpulan:
Ternyata cukup mudah menginstal Debian dan mengaturnya dengan hasil tidak jauh berbeda dengan distro2 yang user-friendly seperti Ubuntu atau Mepis.
Hanya sayangnya di laptop ini Debian terasa agak lambat dan yang sangat mengganggu adanya masalah dengan sound.
Mungkin lebih baik instal Mepis Gnome lagi.

Tampaknya Debian akan bertahan lama di laptop jadul ini :)

Update:

Ternyata ada CD netinst Debian yang sudah memuat non-free firmware:

http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/unofficial/non-free/cd-including-firmware/

Unofficial non-free CDs including firmware packages

These images are equivalent to the normal "netinst" CDs that we produce regularly, but they also include non-free firmware to make installation easier on some systems requiring proprietary but redistributable firmware.

See http://wiki.debian.org/Firmware for more details.

Mandriva One 2008.1 and old laptop: it works \o/

Yes ! Eventually Mandriva One 2008.1 works in my old laptop !
(And it means I have to apologize to Mandriva for my previous post).

This is what happened:
- out of curiousity, I created the CD again, this time I burned it at the slowest speed
- run the CD and, same as previous, after three second of initial boot splash, the booting instantly stopped, the screen become blank and the laptop remain silent
- previously at this stage I would reset the laptop, but this time unintentionally I left the laptop on, I forgot to reset it
- then after about 3 minutes, suddenly the screen showed the initial boot splash again the cd started to spin, the booting process continued !
- about 7 minutes later, the desktop came alive perfectly :)




I knew it. I knew that somehow Mandriva would work, I just did not know how.

And I found some very interesting stuff:

1. When I inserted my USB flash, one application called "Drak Snapshot" came out. It is a back-up application and it is very nice and user-friendly.



2. My USB wifi adapter recognized out of the box and I think the wifi setup in Mandriva is the easiest ever.



3. The Control Centre is superb, it even has Parental Controls !



Also I have to mention that some Mandriva users have been kindly tried to help me.
In my previous post, meta and fabrice immediately dropped their comments offering some suggestions.

When I posted my problem on their forum, immediately it also got attention and very nice responses from Reebus (a very active and helpful user) and the famous moderator himself: Adam Williamson.
Thank you guys !

Well. now this is the hard part: shall I install Mandriva to replace Mepis....

Mandriva One 2008.1 and old laptop: alas ....

Several months ago, I had a chance to try running the live cd version of Mandriva One (version 2008) on my old laptop.
At that time I was very impressed, it was beautiful, very user-friendly and everything just worked flawlessly. I really like it so much that I decided to install it permanently replacing Ubuntu Gutsy.
Later on I postponed the plan in view that the new version (2008.1 Spring) was under development, I thought I better wait for it.
So when Mandriva One 2008.1 Spring was out several days ago, I was very excited.
Although I prefer the Gnome version, I also downloaded the KDE version to try this beautiful distro.

Alas, my excitement did not last long.

Both CD did not manage to boot, all I got was initial boot splash and then the booting instantly stopped, leaving the screen in black.
(Strangely both CD works fine on my desktop).

I have tried many distro on this laptop and that was the first time it failed to boot, so I was very curious.
I tried to boot using boot parameters combination (adjusting the screen resolution, set the acpi off, remove splash, etc) without any success.
For several days I tried and tried, searching any information on the net, hoping to find any clue, but so far I could not find any.

Well, for now I have to give up and forget installing this beautiful distro on my old laptop.
I guess this time I am not lucky :(

xorg.conf - Ubuntu Gutsy for Toshiba Tecra 8200 Laptop

Content of xorg.conf file of Ubuntu Gutsy for my laptop:


# xorg.conf (xorg X Window System server configuration file)
#
# This file was generated by dexconf, the Debian X Configuration tool, using
# values from the debconf database.
#
# Edit this file with caution, and see the xorg.conf manual page.
# (Type "man xorg.conf" at the shell prompt.)
#
# This file is automatically updated on xserver-xorg package upgrades *only*
# if it has not been modified since the last upgrade of the xserver-xorg
# package.
#
# If you have edited this file but would like it to be automatically updated
# again, run the following command:
# sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg

Section "Files"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Generic Keyboard"
Driver "kbd"
Option "CoreKeyboard"
Option "XkbRules" "xorg"
Option "XkbModel" "pc105"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Configured Mouse"
Driver "mouse"
Option "CorePointer"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2"
Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"
Option "Emulate3Buttons" "true"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Synaptics Touchpad"
Driver "synaptics"
Option "SendCoreEvents" "true"
Option "Device" "/dev/psaux"
Option "Protocol" "auto-dev"
Option "HorizEdgeScroll" "0"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "stylus"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom"
Option "Type" "stylus"
Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Tablet PC ONLY
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "eraser"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom"
Option "Type" "eraser"
Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Tablet PC ONLY
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "cursor"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom"
Option "Type" "cursor"
Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Tablet PC ONLY
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Trident Microsystems CyberBlade/XP"
Driver "trident"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Generic Monitor"
Option "DPMS"
HorizSync 28-51
VertRefresh 43-60
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Default Screen"
Device "Trident Microsystems CyberBlade/XP"
Monitor "Generic Monitor"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Modes "1024x768"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Default Layout"
Screen "Default Screen"
InputDevice "Generic Keyboard"
InputDevice "Configured Mouse"

# Uncomment if you have a wacom tablet
# InputDevice "stylus" "SendCoreEvents"
# InputDevice "cursor" "SendCoreEvents"
# InputDevice "eraser" "SendCoreEvents"
InputDevice "Synaptics Touchpad"
EndSection

Old laptop and Mepis 7.0: very nice indeed :)

This is my note for Mepis 7.0 installed on my old-linux-friendly laptop :)
(it's Toshiba Tecra 8200 PIII, more here).

KDE fonts
By default Mepis already rendered the fonts correctly on the laptop's LCD screen, but I did some mess.
To restore the correct displayed fonts, open from menu: Control Centre > Appearance & Theme > Fonts go to "Use anti-aliasing" and select "Enabled" then click "Configure" check "Use sub-pixel hinting: RGB" and select "Hinting style: Full"



Firefox fonts
At first I was a little confused because Firefox rendered horrible fonts of the websites.
After several trial and error, it turns out that the trick was very simple.
This is what I did: in Firefox menu go to Edit > Preferences > Content and go to Fonts & Colors section and click Advanced.
Then un-check this box "Allow pages to choose their own fonts, instead of my selections above"



Wireless
My usb wireless adapter (it is 3Com OfficeConnect Wireless model no: 3CRUSB10075) works out of the box with Mepis.
But first I had to activate the Network Manager (it was not activated during system boot).
This is what I did: from the main menu, open System > Mepis > MEPIS Network Assistant.
In the General Tab go to "Interface Configuration Mode" section and check "Automatic (networkmanager)". I left other sections as it is.



In the Wireless Tab: because I am using WPA encryption in my wifi set-up at home, I fill in the SSID name and WPA-key.



In the Interfaces Tab: choose "Start at boot" and "DHCP".



To connect to other available Wireless Network, just right-click the KNetworkManager applet and click the desired network from the list.



(Later on I found this detailed and excellent guide by Zerias).

Suspend to RAM
At first suspend to RAM did not work, then I found the work around from Mepislovers.org forums, which is very simple:

open /etc/powersave/sleep
find this line:
SUSPEND2RAM_FORCE=""

insert the word "yes" between the quote marks, so it looks like this:
SUSPEND2RAM_FORCE="yes"

Save it and reboot (in my experience, it seems reboot is compulsory in this step, otherwise suspend to RAM will not work).

To suspend just right-click the KPowersave applet and click Suspen to RAM



Suspend to Disk
Works out of the box.

OpenOffice Impress
By default OpenOffice Impress is left out in Mepis and since sometimes I need to open presentation files, I just installed it from Synaptic.

Over all
This laptop works great with Mepis 7.0, it feels light and stable.
I have no problem with sound and video.
I feel it is faster than Ubuntu, yet with 256MB RAM, running Firefox and OpenOffice together is still not that fast :)
Over all, with Mepis on it, I must say the laptop is very nice indeed.

The Laptop

I bought this refurbished old laptop very cheap 2 years ago from one premium online shop, with the help of my friend.
I received it in very good, clean, polished and complete condition (along with its original accesories, user manual and recovery cd).
The laptop is very nice built and robust. It must be a top line during its lifetime :)
The installed operating sistem is Original Microsoft® Windows® 98 SE.
I resized the Windows partition to 5 GB, and alocated the rest 15 GB for swap and linux.
All in all I am happy with this laptop, I have tried many distros on it and I can say that this is a nice and linux-friendly laptop.

Specifications:
- Model: Toshiba Tecra 8200

- Intel® Pentium 3-M 850Mhz

- Memory 256 SDRAM

- Hard disk: 20GB

- Display: 14.1 inch (1024x768)

- Video Card: Integrated Graphics Trident XP4

- Internal Optical Drive: DVD ROM

- Sound: Yamaha YMF 754

- Network: Integrated 10/100 Network Card and Modem (AC 97)

- Wireless connection:

The laptop does not come with internal wireless card, so I bought this USB wireless adapter:
3Com OfficeConnect Wireless 54Mbps 11g Compact USB Adapter (model no: 3CRUSB10075) using Zydas / zd1211 driver.

I guess I am lucky because this USB wireless adapter just works on most distros I tried (including the WPA encryption).