More Buster on Old Hardware

After installing Buster on the old TravelMate 2440 earlier this past week, it was time to test it on the trusty Sony Vaio PCG-FRV37.
The lappie it is a beast and it makes a hell of a noise with its ever blowing fan (this is the biggest drawback of this lappie), but, damn if the keyboard isn't amazing...
Installed Buster on it so I don't have to keep updating stuff all the time, obviously i3 as the Window Manager.

Frankuntu Ye Olde Sony Vaio PCG FRV37

A bit of a Frankenstein experiment with the really ancient Sony Vaio... Sort of a continuation of my stupid and time wasting experiments with slimmed down Linux installations on old boxes, just because it can be done.

Installed Ubuntu Server 16.04 from a Mini CD install, and then added a minimal GUI.
The base installation took about an hour choosing: Standard System utilities, OpenSSH server and Basic Ubuntu Server.

As usual, the installer detected the PCIA WiFi card, but after the was over it left me with a system without Wifi and using 1.3 GB of HDD (from a 60 HDD one).

Setting up the WiFi card manually took a minute, and on onto the GUI install we go!
Issued a:

sudo apt-get install xorg

That downloads 44.6 MB of files, and then expands those onto 256 MB.

Executing a startx (and not X you old fart!!!) starts X Window with no window (the thing actually looks like a full screen xterm), the mouse pad works, but I can't type dink on that huge xterm.

Switched to a virtual console, and killed X. or, you know, startx :p

Installed a window manager, and the program to configure it:

sudo apt-get install openbox obconf

That downloads 21 MB of files, and then expands those onto 104 MB.

Installed a little panel and a small Calendar program:

sudo apt-get install tint2 gsimplecal

It downloads 2 MB of files, and then expands those onto 8 MB.

sudo apt-get install thunar thunar-volman thunar-archive-plugin thunar-media-tags-plugin gvfs gvfs-backends

The thing downloads 22 MB of files, and then expands those onto 103 MB.

Logged out of X Window, restarted it, but still no Tint2 Panel nor a way to access Thunar yet.

So copied the file "/etc/xdg/openbox/autostart:  to "~/.config/openbox/autostart".

And then added to the bottom of the file:

tint2 &

thunar &

And then startx once again!

Out of the box, the whole thing looks as if a demon from hell has vomited scorpions on my eyes...

Jeebus Help Us!

I'd like to believe this is a mistake... Otherwise, I'm royally fucked...
And damn summer haven't even started yet...

Say Hello To 2003

So today I got to play a bit with the old (really old) Sony Vaio PCG FRV37...
Wanted to test a bit the whole "Ubuntu Minimal install thing" (once again and just for old time sakes...) and make me a nice, slow, over burned and noisy Openbox lappie.
Well, yeah, no problem at all during the install, pretty much stock setup for nowadays (Encrypted LVM & encrypted $HOME) all things honky dory.
That is until the installation finished and the WiFi driver nightmare started...

Back to 2004 or so stuff...
The dreaded ath5k refused to give an stable connection, not even a ping to my GW, not to mention 8.8.8.8... Drop packets all around, 70% to simply begin with...
And no matter what options I gave to the /etc/modprobe.d/ath5k.conf file and how many times I'd modprobed -r the module back and forth...
The same laptop with Linux Mint 17 works A Ok, will keep shitting with this, just because, since the hardware is way, way more than prehistoric...
Funny thing, once you enable the WiFi Card during the install, it works flawlessly...

Linux Mint 17.3 XFCE on the Vaio PCG FRV37

Made a clean installation of Linux Mint 17.2, XFCE, obviously 32 bits on the trsuty, bulky, noisy and amazingly well built Sony Vaio PCG FRV37 last week, then, after all the updates were installed, updated the whole thing to Linux Mint 17.3.
The whole process was incredibly smooth, less than 30 minutes, and then the mandatory reboot, the system seems to be really snappy, considering the effing old hardware.

XFCE, Mint Style

Installed Mint 17 XFCE on the trusty, noisy and ancient Vaio PCG FRV37.
Impressed at how elegant the whole thing looks.
Will have to keep digging onto it, but the work and effort the Mint team has pour onto customizing it is amazing.
At first sight you can't tell the difference with a plain vanilla Linux Mint MATE session.

What's up, MATE!

Made a Linux Mint MATE install today, on the beloved, sturdy, heavy and really Sony Vaio, need to start looking for options for the upcoming end of shelf life of Lucid Lynx... So there is this or Scientific Linux.

Scientific Linux I know, and I have been using a lot, even as my main day to day distro. but I wanted to take a look at how the MATE thing looked like on Mint.
I have to say it looks awesome, it even performs quite well on the ultra crappy Sony Vaio I use for some testing.
Right now I'm struggling to get the MATE version of the Global Menu up & running... Things doesn't look good...

Shameless BT (again)

No excuse, except, maybe, the lame: "I can't get any of those here"...

Genesis II
Planet Earth

Unattended Minimal Desktop for Ubuntu install, sort of fail

Saturday installed Lucid Lynx on the old, heavy and extremely noisy Sony Vaio.

Made a CLI only install first, and then installed the Minimal Desktop for Ubuntu, one thing, tho, after the initial setup questions left the install and got out, returned about 2 hours late, to find the whole thing still going on.

Since the laptop already had an OpenSSH server up & running, connected to it to see what a hell was going on with install... The problem was the banner for the installer for some Microsoft font (bundled on the "Restricted" package) did a time out or similar, so, I simply killed the given PID, and the install process end A Ok.

The process was this chunck:

root     15088  0.0  0.2   5176  1852 pts/0    S+   16:35   0:00 whiptail --backtitle Package configuration --title Configuring ttf-mscorefonts-installer\
--output-fd 11 --msgbox TrueType core fonts for the Web EULA??END-USER LICENSE AGREEMENT FOR MICROSOFT SOFTWARE??IMPORTANT-READ CAREFULLY: \
This Microsoft End-User License Agreement ("EULA") is a legal agreement between you (either an?individual or a single entity) and Microsoft Corporation for\

Another Squeeze

Installed last Sunday on the lovely, heavy, noisy and hot Vaio laptop.
No problem at all during the install, did a net installation, only thing, using the graphical tool doesn't seem to offer the possibility to encrypt the user's home directory.
Of course, one of the first things I've installed it is the Global Menu applet for the Gnome Menu, it worked exactly as it did the last time I tested this.
And, as usual on this lappie, Suspend & Hibernate doesn't work (it only does on Windows...)

Windows 7 on the Acer TravelMate 2441 (2)

Time for a little comparison...
The Windows Experience from Argos, the Acer TravelMate 2441, to be compared with the one from the ancient Sony Vaio.

I'm not a gamer by any standard, but the Acer 128 MB ATI card seems to be delivering quite a nice job handling Aero, also, of course, the Acer has 2 GB of RAM an ocean of memory compared to what the Sony has.
The Acer's screen, even tho only 1280x800 in resolution, does a pretty good job for Windows 7.

Restore to infinity

Either I have way too much stuff, or the Sony Vaio it about to have its final round...

Re-installed Lucid on the antique Sony Vaio yesterday (had to, but that's another story), and today spent, literally, the whole day copying back files onto the little lappie...

Took me about 9 hours to get those files from the USB drive to the box... And we are talking about 250 GB of files...

Hibernate a Sony Vaio PCG-FRV37 on Ubuntu

BTW, this is specific -or better yet, tested- to Lucid Lynx 32 bits...

1- Logout Gnome
2- Swtich to Virtual Terminal
3- Login to the shell
4- Issue the commands:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop

or

sudo service gdm stop

This last one kills the X Window Server.

5- And then, actually put the lappie to sleep:

sudo pm-hibernate

Presto, the beast sleeps, or hibernates... Until you wake it up.
Does this beats shutting it down? Not sure, since you are actually login out from your Gnome session there is not much of a speed gain, nor there is on the time it takes from waking up from hibernation. The only advantage I can think of is that the HDD make a few pulls during the "spin-up from hibernation" than from a full boot.

Updates dujour

An important one for this Monday morning... Will see how it goes... Testing it on Viking (with its new HDD)

Changing HDDs

Got me a new hard disk drive,a 2.5" 320 GB IDE/ PATA to replace/ upgrade the 250 GB one that was on Viking and place it on Hercules.
As of today Viking came to be the Sony Vaio PCG FRV37 and Hercules ceased to be.
The new HDD will be placed on the Thinkpad T43, will see how I name it.
It is not the first time that I've switched HDDs from Linux to box to Linux box w/o a single scratch, particularly since this is Ubuntu, and there isn't any compile time hardware specific options that tie the hardware to a particular box, and also, both of the boxes are pretty damn standard -hardware wise- so there isn't any other surprise on that as well.

The current Ubuntu Trisquel desktop

Been using Trisquel quite a bit, specially today.
Seems really nice, and of course, the mighty Hercules makes an amazing laptop, even after all these years.
It is a pleasure to type on it, the body/ chassis of this beast of a laptop feels as sturdy as a block of dried cement.

A Trisquel touch of class

A nice touch, at least using the text install, of the Trisquel installer is that it lets you choose some optionals during the install.
The picture shows the dialog that allows you to choose what type of installation you want to make on your box.

No sound for you!

The Realtek builtin sound card on Hercules wasn't detected by Windows 7 upon installation, but no biggie, after a couple of Windows Update it come out alive & kicking...

The current Ubuntu Trisquel desktop

Sort of a slow Friday, making way to a long weekend with a Holiday on Monday... So...
Just installed Trisquel's LTS release, 4.0.1, on Hercules, just for spite ;)
Placed it on a 40 GB IDE HDD I had laying around for a while.

The distro itsefl seems really nice, polished to the max; of course the hardware is really sub par for todays standards, but the first impression is that it holds pretty much A Ok while running "the Trisquel".
Of course I have a lot of things to configure now...

A bit of ye olde Windows (7)

Changed the hdd on Hercules and used a bit Windows 7 today...

So far this is, by a loooong shot, the Windows release that looks the best right out of the box.
Of course I had to install a ton of updates and reboot (after all I haven't used this Windows 7 since October 2010...) and the poor little Hercules has its fans constantly spinning to keep the beast happy with all the CPU it needs.