Difference between revisions of "Installing Fedora Core 5 on a ThinkPad T30"

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Line 5: Line 5:
 
=== What works out of the box ===
 
=== What works out of the box ===
  
* Ethernet
 
 
* Onboard display (1400x1050)
 
* Onboard display (1400x1050)
  
 
=== What needs to be fixed post-install ===
 
=== What needs to be fixed post-install ===
  
 +
* Problems with network
 
* Dual-Head Mode
 
* Dual-Head Mode
 
* NTFS volume mounting
 
* NTFS volume mounting
 
* Keyboard light and brightness control (see notes re TPB and OSD)
 
* Keyboard light and brightness control (see notes re TPB and OSD)
 +
* Automounting of inserted CF cards
 +
* Fast access to terminals
 +
* Additional screen savers
  
 
=== Not tested ===
 
=== Not tested ===
Line 38: Line 41:
 
Instead, you can now use System Tools : ''Software Updater'' to download and install the latest updates for Fedora.  This will take quite a while the first time you do it (the DVD is already quite out of date).
 
Instead, you can now use System Tools : ''Software Updater'' to download and install the latest updates for Fedora.  This will take quite a while the first time you do it (the DVD is already quite out of date).
  
Many web sites also suggest adding external repositories so yum has additional places to look.  FreshRPMs and Livna seem to be the most common, with conflicting opinions as to which should be chosen.
+
Many web sites also suggest adding external repositories so yum has additional places to look.  FreshRPMs and Livna seem to be the most common, with conflicting opinions as to which should be chosen.  For various reasons I selected Livna.  Installation instructions can be found [[ http://rpm.livna.org/configuration.html | here ]] or you can simply enter
 +
sudo rpm -ivh http://rpm.livna.org/livna-release-5.rpm
 +
This adds a number of pre-built packages to yum and enables auto-update.
  
 
== What needs to be fixed post-install ==
 
== What needs to be fixed post-install ==
 +
=== Problems with network ===
 +
I'm finding that a certain percentage of startups fail to activate networking.  The following clues are seen:
 +
* all network-oriented applications fail (e.g. FireFox)
 +
* ''ifconfig'' reports no address assigned to eth0
 +
* attempting to activate the network, either via ''sudo ifup eth0'' or ''system-config-network'' fails
 +
The most interesting clue lies within ''system-config-network''.  If you click the ''hardware'' tab and look carefully, you'll see that the hardware types are reversed:  eth0 shows ''Wireless'', and eth1 shows ''Ethernet''.
 +
I am continuing to investigate this.  One proposed fix will be to edit /etc/modprobe.conf and insert or move
 +
alias eth0 e100
 +
To the top (first line) of the file.
 +
 
=== Dual-Head Mode ===
 
=== Dual-Head Mode ===
 
This was very important for me as I use an external Dell 2000FP monitor (1600x1200) as my primary programming monitor.  When I configured dual-head mode, the screen layed out properly for two pages (spanning mode) but the external monitor never activated.
 
This was very important for me as I use an external Dell 2000FP monitor (1600x1200) as my primary programming monitor.  When I configured dual-head mode, the screen layed out properly for two pages (spanning mode) but the external monitor never activated.
Line 48: Line 63:
 
=== NTFS volume mounting ===
 
=== NTFS volume mounting ===
 
=== Keyboard light and brightness control ===
 
=== Keyboard light and brightness control ===
 +
=== Automounting of inserted CF cards ===
 +
I use a lot of CF memory cards (with a PCMCIA adapter) and on FC3, these would reliably automount when inserted.  On FC5 this seems to be broken.  For now, I have simply created mount points in /media/, e.g.
 +
sudo mkdir /media/cf1
 +
sudo mkdir /media/cf2
 +
And when I need access to a card, I insert it and mount it manually, e.g.
 +
sudo mount /dev/hde1 /media/cf1
 +
Your device names and mount points may vary based on number of mounted volumes and your preferences.
 +
 +
''Can anybody suggest a way to reenable true automount?''
 +
 +
=== Fast access to terminals ===
 +
The gnome folks seem to have removed the ability to open a terminal (shell) window from desktop right-click.  I'm finding this very annoying as I open terminal windows all the time and now they're buried in Menu -> Accessories -> Terminal.
 +
 +
As a workaround, select Menu -> Accessories, right-click Terminal, and select ''Add this launcher to panel''.  You may have to shuffle things around to put it exactly where you want it.
 +
 +
''Does anybody know if it's possible to reenable desktop right-click access?''
 +
=== Additional screen savers ===
 +
They've also removed lots of fun screensavers from the default installation.  There are two options to bring them back.  To simply add more screensavers, enter:
 +
sudo yum install xscreensaver-gl-extras
 +
However, the screensaver control panel GUI has been (somewhat controversially) simplified - most notably, you can no longer edit the settings of individual screen savers.  The situation is described [[ http://forums.fedoraforum.org/archive/index.php/t-107117.html | here ]] and one option presented is to return to the old screensaver system (I have not tested this):
 +
sudo yum install xscreensaver-base xscreensaver-extras xscreensaver-gl-extras
 +
sudo yum remove gnome-screensaver

Revision as of 19:50, 31 May 2006

Installation of Fedora Core 5 (Bordeaux) on a ThinkPad T30 (2366-97U). These notes cover an upgrade (not a fresh install) from a successful working FC3 installation.

Summary

What works out of the box

  • Onboard display (1400x1050)

What needs to be fixed post-install

  • Problems with network
  • Dual-Head Mode
  • NTFS volume mounting
  • Keyboard light and brightness control (see notes re TPB and OSD)
  • Automounting of inserted CF cards
  • Fast access to terminals
  • Additional screen savers

Not tested

  • PCMCIA Slots
  • Wireless
  • Bluetooth
  • Modem
  • DVD / CD-R
  • Controlling the fan and system LEDs
  • What else?

Details

Getting the system booted

I simply inserted the FC5 DVD into the drive and booted into it, and selected a few items to take me into an upgrade-in-place.

When the upgrade completed it booted immediately into FC5.

My system was configured for dual-boot using GRUB (not NT) as the primarly bootloader (MBR) and chainloading back to Windows when necessary. This makes linux installation easier. Returning from the NT bootloader back to linux requires copying the grub boot block into NT, which can be done using commonly-available instructions.

System Updates

Although presented in the System Tools menu, the Red Hat Network and Red Hat Network Alert Icon utilities appear to have been deprecated. They don't seem to work at all.

Instead, you can now use System Tools : Software Updater to download and install the latest updates for Fedora. This will take quite a while the first time you do it (the DVD is already quite out of date).

Many web sites also suggest adding external repositories so yum has additional places to look. FreshRPMs and Livna seem to be the most common, with conflicting opinions as to which should be chosen. For various reasons I selected Livna. Installation instructions can be found [[ http://rpm.livna.org/configuration.html | here ]] or you can simply enter

sudo rpm -ivh http://rpm.livna.org/livna-release-5.rpm

This adds a number of pre-built packages to yum and enables auto-update.

What needs to be fixed post-install

Problems with network

I'm finding that a certain percentage of startups fail to activate networking. The following clues are seen:

  • all network-oriented applications fail (e.g. FireFox)
  • ifconfig reports no address assigned to eth0
  • attempting to activate the network, either via sudo ifup eth0 or system-config-network fails

The most interesting clue lies within system-config-network. If you click the hardware tab and look carefully, you'll see that the hardware types are reversed: eth0 shows Wireless, and eth1 shows Ethernet. I am continuing to investigate this. One proposed fix will be to edit /etc/modprobe.conf and insert or move

alias eth0 e100

To the top (first line) of the file.

Dual-Head Mode

This was very important for me as I use an external Dell 2000FP monitor (1600x1200) as my primary programming monitor. When I configured dual-head mode, the screen layed out properly for two pages (spanning mode) but the external monitor never activated.

An experimental ATI driver update was found [[ http://download.fedora.redhat.com/pub/fedora/linux/core/updates/testing/5/i386/xorg-x11-drv-ati-6.5.8.0-1.i386.rpm | here]]. I followed the directions suggested [[ http://www.redhat.com/archives/rhl-list/2006-May/msg02069.html | here]] and my external monitor works now in spanning mode with 1600x1200 resolution. Hopefully this note can be removed or updated when this newer driver is promoted into the regular FC5 updates system.

NTFS volume mounting

Keyboard light and brightness control

Automounting of inserted CF cards

I use a lot of CF memory cards (with a PCMCIA adapter) and on FC3, these would reliably automount when inserted. On FC5 this seems to be broken. For now, I have simply created mount points in /media/, e.g.

sudo mkdir /media/cf1
sudo mkdir /media/cf2

And when I need access to a card, I insert it and mount it manually, e.g.

sudo mount /dev/hde1 /media/cf1

Your device names and mount points may vary based on number of mounted volumes and your preferences.

Can anybody suggest a way to reenable true automount?

Fast access to terminals

The gnome folks seem to have removed the ability to open a terminal (shell) window from desktop right-click. I'm finding this very annoying as I open terminal windows all the time and now they're buried in Menu -> Accessories -> Terminal.

As a workaround, select Menu -> Accessories, right-click Terminal, and select Add this launcher to panel. You may have to shuffle things around to put it exactly where you want it.

Does anybody know if it's possible to reenable desktop right-click access?

Additional screen savers

They've also removed lots of fun screensavers from the default installation. There are two options to bring them back. To simply add more screensavers, enter:

sudo yum install xscreensaver-gl-extras

However, the screensaver control panel GUI has been (somewhat controversially) simplified - most notably, you can no longer edit the settings of individual screen savers. The situation is described [[ http://forums.fedoraforum.org/archive/index.php/t-107117.html | here ]] and one option presented is to return to the old screensaver system (I have not tested this):

sudo yum install xscreensaver-base xscreensaver-extras xscreensaver-gl-extras
sudo yum remove gnome-screensaver