HP Pavilion dv5-1020ep (Ubuntu 64 bits)

2008/09/16 by Paulo Pereira

~/categories/Linux ❯ #Linux #Ubuntu #HP Pavilion dv5-1020ep

My old laptop’s battery is dying, and I used that as an excuse to buy myself a new on :-)

I had a HP Pavilion zt3240EA, and have been very happy with it. Nice machine. Still, age weights on every one.

I’m gonna be installing Ubuntu 8.04.1 LTS Desktop Edition, 64 bits version, on my new HP Pavilion dv5-1020ep.

Download and Burn a CD

md5sum ubuntu-8.04.1-desktop-amd64.iso

Running the live cd

Hardware to check (during the live cd session)

Hard Drive Partition Layout

/dev/sda
  /dev/sda1   ntfs   Vista         		36002 MB
  /dev/sda    ntfs   Vista Recover   8450 MB
  /dev/sda3   ext3   /        	    10240 MB
  /dev/sda5   ext3   /home        	10240 MB
  /dev/sda6   ext3   /storage      	94072 MB
  /dev/sda7   swap                 1028 MB

Post-install: Graphics Card

I installed EnvyNG using the Synaptic Package Manager (look for envyng-gtk) and just had to run it (Applications > System Tools > EnvyNG), after closing Synaptic (important), and choose to “Install the ATI driver (Automatic Hardware Detection)” option.

I now have a normal 1280×800 screen resolution and some desktop effects are already active.

There is an ATI Catalyst Control Center under Applications > Other, where you can tweak things up.

Problems to Solve: if I have Compiz on, there’s a terrible flickering when playing back movies.

Post-install: CPU Frequency Scaling

After installing Ubuntu I noticed that the frequency of both cores was always at 2 GHz (the cpu max frequency in my case).

Because this is a laptop I want the cpu to scale that frequencies as needed.

Useful tools:

sudo apt-get install cpufrequtils

You can check this behavior by:

cpufreq-info

Reference: How to use CPU frequency scaling (cpufreq)

After some time of research here’s a very simple method (read the Reference for much more details):

sudo vi /etc/rc.local

modprobe powernow-k8
sudo cpufreq-selector -g userspace
/etc/init.d/powernowd restart
exit 0

sudo vi /etc/default/powernowd

OPTIONS="-q -n"

Useful tips:

cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_available_frequencies

cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor

cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_available_governors

Problems to solve: restarting powernowd always change the governor to ondemand.

Post-install: Wireless Network card

A warning in the Notification Area showed that a Proprietary Driver is enabled (Atheros wireless card).

Check the driver name:

lspci | grep Atheros

Followed this instructions from Ubuntu Forums, now I can use the wireless card, I found several networks, the signal is good, I connect with my password, but I can’t get an IP… This means no Internet.

Problems to solve: connect to the Internet with sucess.

Post-install: Laptop Optimizations

Here’s some useful tips if you’re running on a laptop:

sudo vi /etc/default/acpi-support

ENABLE_LAPTOP_MODE=true

sudo apt-get install powertop
sudo powertop

Post-install: Sound Card

Sound works fine, but the Master mute button doen’t mute the Front. This means that the columns still output sound.

To fix this go to System > Preferences > Sound and select the Front device in the list below.

Post-install: File System

Besides the / and /home partitions, only root have permissions to write in every other partitions. In my case /storage.

So, we have to add permissions to our user:

sudo chown -R youruser:youruser /storage
sudo chmod -R 755 /storage

Click here for more info.

Post-install: Updates

Update Manager warned me about 120 available updates. Just letting it go…

Post-install: Multimedia

References:Complete Streaming, Multimedia & Video How-to and Medibuntu

sudo wget http://www.medibuntu.org/sources.list.d/hardy.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/medibuntu.list
wget -q http://packages.medibuntu.org/medibuntu-key.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add - && sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get purge flashplugin-nonfree && \
sudo mkdir /usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree && \
sudo cp -f ~/Desktop/libflashplayer.so \
/usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree/ && \
sudo nspluginwrapper -i \
/usr/lib/flashplugin-nonfree/libflashplayer.so && \
sudo ln -sf /usr/lib/nspluginwrapper/plugins/npwrapper.libflashplayer.so \
/etc/alternatives/firefox-flashplugin && \
sudo ln -sf /etc/alternatives/firefox-flashplugin \
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/plugins/flashplayer-alternative.so && \
sudo rm -f /usr/lib/firefox/plugins/npwrapper.libflashplayer.so

sudo apt-get remove gnash gnash-common libflash-mozplugin \
libflashsupport mozilla-plugin-gnash swfdec-mozilla && \
sudo apt-get install alsa-oss faac faad flashplugin-nonfree \
gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad \
gstreamer0.10-plugins-bad-multiverse gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly \
gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly-multiverse ia32-libs icedtea-gcjwebplugin \
liblame0 non-free-codecs openjdk-6-jre unrar

sudo apt-get remove kaffeine-mozilla mozilla-helix-player \
mozilla-mplayer mozilla-plugin-vlc totem-mozilla xine-plugin && \
sudo apt-get install gnome-mplayer gecko-mediaplayer

sudo apt-get install libdvdcss2 libdvdread3 libdvdnav4 build-essential debhelper fakeroot regionset

sudo regionset

Check the reference link, because it as many other things you’ll want.

Post-install: Preferences and Look and Feel

Here’s some things I changed right away:

Post-install: NFS file sharing

To configure two Ubuntu machines to share files using NFS, check here.

Post-install: SAMBA Server

Go to Applications > Add/Remove and install Samba.

Go to System > Administration > Samba to add shares and define samba users.

Also check this post.

Post-install: LAMP Server

To install Apache, MySQL and PHP, check here.

Post-install: extra software

List of extra installation software installed: