HOW TO: Install Ubuntu on a HP TC1100 tablet pc

[Randy Winchester]

I just booted my TC1100 from the "official" 10.10 CD (I collect Ubuntu CDs) and OpenOffice.org works fine.

This isn't my endorsement of 10.10 on the TC1100. I'm pretty happy with 10.04 for now. I won't upgrade to 10.10 until the Nvidia 96 driver is updated.

Cheers,
Randy

[MyR]

10.04 will no longer suspend. Is anyone else having this problem?

[Aearenda]

Throwing caution to the winds I downloaded and manually installed the nVidia 96.43.19 pre-release driver, using instructions found here. It reverts to the text mode Plymouth screen (on account of 'nomodeset') but does work, including compiz - and I have successfully gone into standby and resumed!

I'm not recommending this path - better to wait for the official package, as this driver is pre-release and installing it manually means you have to reinstall it every time the kernel changes version number, so if you try it, don't ask me for help! But at least there is a sign of improvement on the way.

[MyR]

After a fresh install of 10.10 suspend and stylus work perfectly. I have not attempted to install the nvidia driver because I don't need compiz.

Sad that once again the stylus buttons don't work. Does anyone here know how to submit the patch upstream??

I will be posting a guide shortly. Not many things to fix though.

[Aearenda]

That's interesting - Nouveau was reporting a GPU lockup on my 10.10 as standby took place. I wonder if it was related to my ongoing heat/motherboard problem, and today with the new nVidia driver it's just cooler all round!

I'm so tempted to order a refurbished motherboard and a new battery. I can't find anything like the TC1100 at the moment, so in theory I'm using a netbook for mission-critical work while Android tablets come of age. Just imagine if HP had persisted with this form factor and got the price and weight down, there would have been no need for iPads to be invented at all!

Update: Another interesting discovery: echo 0 > /sys/devices/platform/tc1100-wmi/wireless now seems to only turn off Bluetooth, not wifi. The brightness jogdial works as before.

Also, xbindkeys does 10 cpu wakes per second. That's not good for battery life!

Update 2: a day later, I still haven't had to reboot because standby is working perfectly so far! I wonder whether the 'nomodeset' entry is part of the reason, and whether it was attempts to get Plymouth working properly on 10.04 that broke standby there. The side effect of this is that the console has reverted to 640x480, and it uses the text-mode Plymouth screen, but that only shows briefly anyway and it's a low price to pay for working standby & resume.

Update 3: echo 0 > /sys/devices/platform/tc1100-wmi/wireless seems to prevent wireless turning back on if turned off using the Network Manager, so it doesn't only affect Bluetooth, it has a delayed effect on wifi.

Update 4: I'm now using the Nvidia-96 driver from the PPA mentioned in this bug comment 97. This should result in automatic updates when the kernel changes. So far so good!
I think all TC1100 users should click on the "This bug affects x users" link on that bug if not already done so.

Update 5: It seems that going into standby with the screen rotated can often lead to an X crash on resume. Rotating back before standby works around the issue. Maybe this will be fixed when the Nvidia-96 driver is no longer 'pre-release'.

I just got a pair of new batteries for the TC1100, so now I'm set to see if this is reliable enough for mobile use again

[gauravm]

if anyone is interested....i'm on 10.04 on the tc1100 with the netbook-launcher-efl package running.

I was getting REALLY ANNOYED that whenever i used MyR's rotate script here the launcher would not fit into the screen when I went from landscape to portrait.

my fix:

#!/bin/sh
killall netbook-launcher-efl

if [ -n "$(xrandr | grep 768x1024)" ]; then
        xrandr -o normal
        xsetwacom set "Serial Wacom Tablet" Rotate NONE
else
        xrandr -o left
        xsetwacom set "Serial Wacom Tablet" Rotate CCW
fi

netbook-launcher-efl

not the most elegant solution I agree but I couldn't figure out how to edit the width and height of netbook-launcher-efl without delving into source code so I figured just shutting down and restarting it will force it into the new dimensions *automatigically*

and it does =)

[MyR]

Also, xbindkeys does 10 cpu wakes per second. That's not good for battery life!

I was going to mention that too but my battery life isn't any better with it gone, so it must be inconsequential.

[Aearenda]

I was going to mention that too but my battery life isn't any better with it gone, so it must be inconsequential.

I suspect you're right. I was running my TC1100 on battery last night and it seems that screen blanking, turning wireless off and CPU speed stepping make a significant difference to power consumption, but overall it's unfair to expect a 7-year-old machine to match a modern netbook in power usage.

Gauravm said

if anyone is interested....i'm on 10.04 on the tc1100 with the netbook-launcher-efl package running.

I've never seen that launcher running - does it look significantly different from the standard 10.04 one? I guess you have to install a load of Enlightenment libraries along with it.

The issue of programs not responding to screen size changes is one of those things that annoys me too. It's sort of like those programs that won't work on Windows XP and later without admin privilege - the Windows 95/98 developer never foresaw a change in the circumstances of the running program, and should have revised programming practices to suit the new environment but didn't. Dynamic screen size changes, plugging in projectors and external screens, changes from landscape to portrait are all things that should be easily catered for now, I reckon. But then, I haven't done any serious programming for 20 years, so what would I know?

[gauravm]

I've never seen that launcher running - does it look significantly different from the standard 10.04 one? I guess you have to install a load of Enlightenment libraries along with it.

The dependencies I can't comment on but the beauty I can.

Enjoy video here!

[yeppp]

I downgraded back to 9.10 a good while ago so that I could get the tablet pen buttons working again. I still have problems with seemingly random freezes after resuming from suspend (Aearenda were you refering to this when talking about not having to reboot after suspending?). I was wondering how 10.10 was looking now that there is discussion of the nvidia driver finally coming out.