I have an older Dell 600m that came with 512k memory, Windows XP Home edition, no power supply and a few broken keys. From ebay I increased the memory to 1.2 gig ($34), replaced the keyboard ($17), and bought a new power supply ($11), for a parts cost of $62.

For a friend, I had tried to clean up the Windows installation twice, and tired of tying to make XP Home work right, I decided to install Ubuntu 9.04. It was a very easy install, except that the onboard broadcom wireless card was not recognised by the operating system.

I used this command from a shell to learn some details about the wireless card:

lspci -vnn | grep 14e4

Which gave this result:

02:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX [14e4:170c] (rev 02)
02:03.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4318 [AirForce One 54g] 802.11g Wireless LAN Controller [14e4:4318] (rev 02)

After looking at some forums, I decided to install a program from the Synaptic Pakcage manger called b43-fwcutter, which is described as:

a utility for extracting Broadcom 43xx firmware, fwcutter is a tool which can extract firmware from various source files. It’s written for BCM43xx driver files.

For whatever reason, and I certainly did not understand it, this completely fixed the problem. I rebooted the computer and the wireless worked just fine.

Some time ago, I bought a Dell m1530, with Linux Ubuntu 8.04 pre-installed. I have since moved on and installed a few upgrades of Ubuntu. I am currently using Ubuntu 9.04, which I like very much. But I wanted to make the machine a dual boot with Windows, so I could also do a few things that Linux can’t do yet.

Yesterday and today I spent a huge amount of time trying to understand why Windows would not see my hard drive. I assumed this was a result of the Linux boot loader changing the Master Book Record (MBR), and I spend hours trying different ways of addressing this. But that was not in fact the issue. Instead, the problem was due to the hardware settings, and specially the fact that my SATA hard drive was set to use something called AHCI mode. As described in this blog post on the topic, older versions of Windows don’t have drivers that support AHCI.

I was finally able to fix this problem by entering the Dell Bio setup, and changing my SATA setting to an ATA emulation. After making this change, Windows XP had no problem finding my Sata drive.

Yesterday I installed Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) on two Dell laptops, the XPS m1530, and an Inspiron 1420n. Both installations went smoothly.

XPS m1530,
The XPS m1530 already had a beta version of 9.04, and it upgraded without a hitch. As I indicated before, Ubuntu no longer has trouble with the touch pad on the XPS m1530.

Microphone and Video Cam
I have found that using a USB VOIP phone works well for Skype. The built-in Microphone works poorly, and I had trouble making it work at all with Skype, but a USB headset or an inexpensive USB VOIP phone seemed to work fine. The built-in video camera seems to work fine as well. I did have an initial problem getting Skype to recognise both the USB VOIP phone and the built-in video camera. But the solution was fairly simple. I had to first start up Skype without the VOIP phone, and test the video cam, which worked fine. Then I exited Skype, and restarted with the VOIP phone plugged in. At that point, Skype recognised both devices, and continues to do so without a fuss. I have no problem making a Skype caull with both audio and video.

Twin View
I like to use the laptop with an external monitor, if I can. I have different external monitors at home and at work. Each have lower resolution than the 1920×1200 screen on the laptop. I was able to do this without much trouble at work, when I did not have an external UBS hard drive attached. There seemed to be a hitch when I had both the monitor and the external drive connected. At home, with an older monitor, I was asked to work with the proprietary NVIDIA configuration tool. This failed when it tried to re-write an /etc/X11/xorg.conf file, for lack of adequate privileges, and I had to do this manually, when is not something that you want to have many users do. My guess is that this issue will be fixed at some point. In any event, the laptop now works well with both external monitors, in the Twin View mode, which is basically an expanded desktop.

If the battery life was longer for the XPS, I would be pretty happy with it.

The shutdown/start up time for my machine do not seem to be that much faster than was the case for Ubunbu 8.10. My shut down, with the applications I normally have running (Firefox, OpenOffice, gedit, tweetdeck and the Evolution mail client), took 43 seconds. My boot time, including my login, took 111 seconds.

Inspiron 1420n
The Inspiron 1420n shipped with Ubuntu 7.04. It has Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X3100 integrated graphics. My screen is the 1400×900 14.1 inch version, and it is very nice. Ubuntu 9.04 uses “free” open source drivers, and everything in terms of the graphics works very well, including the Twin View when I connect an LDC monitor for an extended desktop. My 1420n does not have a video camera. Skype works fine, when I use a USB external VOIP phone.

OpenOffice.Org 3.0
Now I finally can use OpenOffice.Org 3.0 with Ubuntu, which is more compatible with Microsoft Office than earlier versions of OOO. This is important when you are collaborating on a document.

Getting Multimedia to work
I recommend people add the Medibuntu repositories. If you can, start up a terminal window, and copy and run these commands:

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/`lsb_release -cs`.list –output-document=/etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list; sudo apt-get -q update; sudo apt-get –yes -q –allow-unauthenticated install medibuntu-keyring; sudo apt-get -q update

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/jaunty.list –output-document=/etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install medibuntu-keyring && sudo apt-get update

Then from the System/Administration menu on Ubuntu, at the top left of the screen, look for the Synaptic Package Manager. Make sure in the setting menu that Synaptic is using both free and non-free repositories, from Ubuntu and third parties.

Then make sure the following packages are added:
ubuntu-restricted-extras
Linux-restricted-modules

And to make sure everything you need is working, check to see if these are installed:

libdvdcss2
w32codecs (for an intel i386 installation)

I always add few extras right away, since I have come to depend upon them.

acroread (the Adobe Acrobat reader)
adobe-flashplug-in
bluefish
gftp
gimp-data-extras
gpass
openoffice-base (the sql database program).
p7zip-full
skype
vlc
wine

And other favorite programs. I have grown found lately of tweetdeck, which requires an installation of Adobe Air (which you can get for free from Adobe).

Update 1. Below is the xorg.conf file from my Dell Inspiron 1420n.

# 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.
#
# Note that some configuration settings that could be done previously
# in this file, now are automatically configured by the server and settings
# here are ignored.
#
# 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 “Monitor”
Identifier “Configured Monitor”
EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Default Screen”
Monitor “Configured Monitor”
Device “Configured Video Device”
SubSection “Display”
Virtual 2880 900
EndSubSection
EndSection
Section “Device”
Identifier “Configured Video Device”
EndSection

Update 2:
The following is the xorg.conf file for my Dell XPS m1530:

# nvidia-settings: X configuration file generated by nvidia-settings
# nvidia-settings: version 1.0 (buildd@palmer) Sun Feb 1 20:21:04 UTC 2009

# 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.
#
# Note that some configuration settings that could be done previously
# in this file, now are automatically configured by the server and settings
# here are ignored.
#
# 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 “ServerLayout”
Identifier “Default Layout”
Screen 0 “Screen0″ 0 0
InputDevice “Keyboard0″ “CoreKeyboard”
InputDevice “Mouse0″ “CorePointer”
EndSection

Section “Module”
Load “glx”
EndSection

Section “ServerFlags”
Option “Xinerama” “0″
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
# generated from default
Identifier “Keyboard0″
Driver “kbd”
EndSection

Section “InputDevice”
# generated from default
Identifier “Mouse0″
Driver “mouse”
Option “Protocol” “auto”
Option “Device” “/dev/psaux”
Option “Emulate3Buttons” “no”
Option “ZAxisMapping” “4 5″
EndSection

Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Configured Monitor”
EndSection

Section “Monitor”
Identifier “Monitor0″
VendorName “Unknown”
ModelName “Seiko”
HorizSync 30.0 – 75.0
VertRefresh 60.0
EndSection

Section “Device”
Identifier “Configured Video Device”
Driver “nvidia”
Option “NoLogo” “True”
EndSection

Section “Device”
Identifier “Device0″
Driver “nvidia”
VendorName “NVIDIA Corporation”
BoardName “GeForce 8600M GT”
EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Default Screen”
Device “Configured Video Device”
Monitor “Configured Monitor”
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection “Display”
Virtual 3600 1200
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section “Screen”
Identifier “Screen0″
Device “Device0″
Monitor “Monitor0″
DefaultDepth 24
Option “TwinView” “1″
Option “metamodes” “DFP-0: nvidia-auto-select +0+0, DFP-1: nvidia-auto-select +1920+0″
SubSection “Display”
Depth 24
EndSubSection
EndSection

I just installed Ubuntu 9.04, beta, on a Dell M1530. The install program asked if I wanted a dual boot configuration with the older 8.10 version, and I said yes. That resulted in a longer install, but it worked fine. Then I was asked if I wanted to migrate my data settings from the older partition. This was a nice option, but since I didn’t have much on the older partition, I couldn’t evaluate how well it works.

I did notice right away the cursor worked fine, without having to tweak the grub loading commands, as was necessary for the m1530 for Ubuntu 8.10. Open Office 3.0 is also supported, which is a good reason to consider upgrading when the final version is ready.

I turned on the “partner” repositories, and installed the “Ubuntu restricted-extras” packages, which I highly recommend.

I next went to www.medibuntu.org, and followed the directions for adding the medibuntu repositories.

I installed Cheese to see if the webcam worked, and it did, without any problems. More important for me, I used the Synaptic Package Manager, to install Skype, which I tested with a USB Logitech headset and also a USB VOIP phone. Skype recognized and used both devices without any problems. The voice quality from the USB Logitech headset was particularly good, which show shows the value of a good microphone. It also found and worked well with the m1530 webcam. The built-in webcam seems to work quite a bit better with skype than with cheese.

So far, the beta version looks pretty polished, and it works better on this machine than did final 8.04 or 8.10 releases.

The Dell XPS m1530 is in some ways a nicely designed machine. Mine has a very high resolution screen 15.4 inch screen, 1920 x 1200 (16:10), and a fast NVIDIA video card. It has a fingerprint reader you can configure for log-in, an SD/MMC (8 in 1 they claim) memory card reader, built in web cam and microphone, bluetooth and lots of I/O, including HMDI and S-Video for video. It is also pretty light, and has a decent keyboard.

Despite all of this, right now I am using my older Dell 1420n, which is heavier, and has a smaller, but still pretty decent screen. The reason I switched back was that when using Ubuntu 8.10, the m1530 was not as dependable as the 1420n when I used suspend. And even more important, the battery life for the m1530 has been terrible for me, and this is a big deal when I travel.

If I can resolve the battery issue, I would probably switch back to the XPS m1530. But for now, I am more comfortable using the older laptop.