10.04 Install Experience - HP Mini 110-1144nr

[divergex]

Hi, I am a long-time Ubuntu user and wanted to share my experience installing 10.04 on an HP Mini 110 netbook just a couple hours ago. I chose the full install because I prefer the interface over the Netbook Edition.

I downloaded (via bittorrent) the 32 bit ISO and booted my everyday laptop with it. I plugged in a 4GB flash drive. From there I choose Startup Disk Creator from the System... Administration menu. I chose the flash drive as the destination, and the ISO image on the hard drive as the source. I could have used the Live CD, but I figured the image on the hard drive would be faster.

The process was painless, and when done I shut down the laptop and plugged the flash drive into the Mini. Pressing F9 on the Mini during boot brings up a startup menu, and I chose the flash drive as the boot drive.

The first boot stalled, and I had no idea why. I restarted, and remembered from a previous experience to press F5 at the start of the Linux boot process. This brought up a menu where I chose the "nomodeset" option (press F6 for other options, then use the arrow keys to highlight "nomodeset" and press the spacebar to select it.) The Mini then booted successfully.

At this point, everything seemed to work fine, including sound and wireless. However, nothing will install properly for some reason. I would always get a crash of some sort in dpkg or some other module. So I decided to install it, and dual boot Win 7 Starter and Ubuntu. The install went smoothly, or so it appeared.

After restarting, the Mini would stall with just a flashing cursor on a black screen. I had the same thing happen with an Acer Aspire One AOD250, and remembered that it was due to the B43 driver for Broadcom wireless cards. For some reason that module is loaded by default, and it causes a freeze at every boot.

I restarted and when presented with the Grub screen, I pressed "e" to edit the startup options, and added "blacklist b43" at the end of the list of options. This allowed the Mini to boot successfully.

When the desktop appeared, I tested a few things to be sure everything was working. Ethernet was fine, sound was working, and everything seemed good. After a few seconds the Hardware Drivers icon appeared, and when I clicked on it, it offered me the B43 and STA wireless drivers. From the Aspire One experience, I chose and activated the STA driver, and once it was installed, all future restarts were error free.

I'm not sure why the installation assumes the b43 driver, perhaps it's built into the kernel? Whatever the reason, it does not provide a very good out of the box experience for someone new to Linux or Ubuntu. But the fix is simple enough once figured out.

So far, here is what I have tested:

Wireless - working, switch/LED working as well.
Ethernet - working.
Sound - working, but audio jack was not tested, as the Mini 110 has a combo mic/headphone jack and I don't have a proper headset.
Card Reader - working, but I only tested an old 256MB card.
Touchpad - working, I disabled tapping in preferences.
Webcam - working in skype, have not installed Cheese to test otherwise, light works too.
USB - working

EDIT: I have tested sleep and hibernation, and both work well after several sleep and hibernation cycles. However, when restarting from either state, the screen stays blank, and you have to touch a key or use the touchpad to bring up the login screen. Otherwise, it's smooth.

That's about it - I will update this post with more info as I do more testing. I am typing this post on the Mini. So far, it's running great.

[brauliobezerra]

Thanks for posting this. You saved my day.

[divergex]

I have since installed the Netbook Edition and this time, blacklisting b43 didn't help. In this instance I held down the Shift key during boot until I got a Grub menu, and added "blacklist ssb" and got it to boot successfully. Then I installed the STA driver and all is fine.

[PhysEcon]

Hi Divergex,

I am still rather new to linux. I am trying to install the Ubuntu 10.04 Netbook Edition on my HP Mini 110-1144NR. You mentioned in your second post holding Shift, but in your original post about installing full desktop Ubuntu you said to use the F5 key to get the extra options. I know some will consider it rather redundant, but do you mind reposting a full step-by-step for installing the Netbook Edition successfully on the HP Mini 110-1144NR?

Additionally, I would rather use the "install inside windows" option because I have already had an Ubuntu install go bad and require managing partitions, which was quite nerve wracking as a wrong move could have eliminated both the windows 7 and ubuntu partitions. Would I adjust your steps anyway if I was doing this?

Thanks!

[mo79]

Hi divergex,

I have a Compaq (HP) Mini 110c-1120sa and seem to have run into a similar problem. I was able to boot into the live USB fine without any intervention and everything seemed to work bar the wireless driver. I tried to install the suggested Broadcom STA driver from the Hardware Drivers icon but the install failed. I thought I'd address that later and installed to hard disk but on boot up I get the black screen with flashing cursor. Both of the codes you wrote don't work for me, any other suggestions?

EDIT: I found out the solution. I pressed Shift on boot to get to GRUB, booted to safe graphics mode then restarted (I restarted again but the blank screen happened, then restarted again and luckily booted in) and connected an ethernet cable and then followed this http://www.ubuntumini.com/2009/11/broadcom-wireless-driver-fix-in-karmic.html
Once the STA driver was installed everything was fine.

[mo79]

If divergex doesn't reply here's my step-by-step (my netbook's from the same family).

1: Burn the 10.4 netbook image to a USB key (http://www.linuxliveusb.com/ has a great tool for putting ISO to USBs).
2: Plug the drive into the computer to run from and get your computer to boot from it.
3: At the screen where you see two icons at the bottom (figure and keyboard), quickly press any key.
4. Select English. Press F6, press enter beside 'nomodeset', press enter again and then enter 'Try Ubuntu without installing'.
5. Have a play around. See if you can get the STA wireless driver activated in this mode by selecting 'Hardware Drivers' in the Systems tab. If you can, you need do nothing else after installing. Reboot and you'll be fine.
6. If you couldn't get the driver active, you're likely to get a blank screen on reboot. If so, restart and hold down shift. At the GRUB menu select and enter the recovery mode then the fail safe graphics mode. Ubuntu should start.
7. Shutdown normally and restart. Ubuntu should boot normally. Plug in an ethernet cable, go to Terminal and enter:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get --reinstall install bcmwl-kernel-source

This should take about 5-10mins. Once done, shutdown, pull out the ethernet cable and restart. You should be fine.

[PhysEcon]

Hey Mo79,

Thanks for the help. I'll have to try tomorrow as I don't have access to a wired connection right now.

[mo79]

If you make the USB drive with LiLi (reference in point 1) you can ignore points 3 and 4 as you'll simply be asked to boot into persistent/live mode.

[divergex]

For the Netbook Edition I downloaded the ISO, then used the Startup Disk Creator to make a bootable flash drive. Booting from the flash drive was smooth, but when I restarted I got the freeze.

I don't know why F5 worked when booting a normal Ubuntu install. I remembered reading it somewhere, and thought it was only for booting from a Live CD, but it worked in this instance. I did however have to use Shift for the Netbook Edition.

So I would say, boot from the flash drive, install, restart holding Shift, add "blacklist ssb" then install the STA wireless driver when prompted. For some people and situations blacklisting b43 instead seems to work, and I had a laptop that needed both to be blacklisted before I could successfully boot. It's a kind of voodoo I haven't quite figured out yet, but may be due to slight differences in the Broadcom chips.

[PhysEcon]

Hey Y'all, thanks for the help. I had some trouble following the steps because I am installing in Windows using Wubi rather than the traditional dual boot. So what I have ended up doing is downloading UNR 9.10 and installing that (inside Windows), then I updated, but not upgraded. I selected the STA driver and the wifi works fine. I'm a bit apprehensive about upgrading it to 10.04. I might wait till the next edition.

[divergex]

I'm having experiences that suggest that the behavior is somewhat random. I tested installing 10.04 a few more times, and here is what happened:

- needed "blacklist b43" for one install
- needed "blacklist ssb" for one install
- needed "nomodeset" for one install
- needed to boot into recovery mode for one install

At this point, I am completely stuck, as I have just done another completely fresh install, and I can't get the boot to complete no matter what I try. I will keep at it and see if I can get it going.

[divergex]

Ok, after restarting about 10 times, it has now booted successfully with no intervention on my part at all.

It would be nice to know what is causing this. Either way, my Mini is working again.

[PhysEcon]

Ok, after restarting about 10 times, it has now booted successfully with no intervention on my part at all.

It would be nice to know what is causing this. Either way, my Mini is working again.


It's rather weird that 10.04 is so fickle yet 9.10 is running smoothly. Do they not test the netbook edition as well as the full desktop edition?

[divergex]

It's rather weird that 10.04 is so fickle yet 9.10 is running smoothly. Do they not test the netbook edition as well as the full desktop edition?

I had similar experiences with 9.10 on laptops with Broadcom wireless chips. It's really strange...

[blacknymph]

If divergex doesn't reply here's my step-by-step (my netbook's from the same family).

1: Burn the 10.4 netbook image to a USB key (http://www.linuxliveusb.com/ has a great tool for putting ISO to USBs).
2: Plug the drive into the computer to run from and get your computer to boot from it.
3: At the screen where you see two icons at the bottom (figure and keyboard), quickly press any key.
4. Select English. Press F6, press enter beside 'nomodeset', press enter again and then enter 'Try Ubuntu without installing'.
5. Have a play around. See if you can get the STA wireless driver activated in this mode by selecting 'Hardware Drivers' in the Systems tab. If you can, you need do nothing else after installing. Reboot and you'll be fine.
6. If you couldn't get the driver active, you're likely to get a blank screen on reboot. If so, restart and hold down shift. At the GRUB menu select and enter the recovery mode then the fail safe graphics mode. Ubuntu should start.
7. Shutdown normally and restart. Ubuntu should boot normally. Plug in an ethernet cable, go to Terminal and enter:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get --reinstall install bcmwl-kernel-source

This should take about 5-10mins. Once done, shutdown, pull out the ethernet cable and restart. You should be fine.

This work for me, thanks a lot :guitar:

[Ddeath]

I`ve Hp Compaq 615:
F6 - nomodeset

and then edit GRUB loader... but still don`t know how... :-)
But I had a luck - Ubuntu boot fine, so I edit /boot/GRUB/grub.cfg by gedit...

add line:
blocklist b43

it works, "blAcklist" I didn`t try....