Ubuntu 9.04 and HP Mini 311 with nVidia Ion LE

[JoeMac42]

My HP Mini 311 Atom 280/Ion LE Netbook arrived 3 days ago, so obviously I had to try installing Jaunty on it The standard 32-bit i386 Ubuntu Jaunty (desktop - not netbook remix) was installed from a Live CD using the HP external USB drive that shipped with the netbook. I wasn't able to find any information on installing Ubuntu on the new Ion netbooks, so hopefully someone will benefit from this.

Most things seemed to work right out of the box (keyboard, backlighting keys, sound up/down keys, sleep/wake). Wifi did not work and sound was somewhat crippled, working only through the headphones but not through the built in speakers.

The Broadcom 4353 wifi was fixed following the instructions posted here:

http://art.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1263730 In summary: 1. Enable the backports repository: Administration > Software Sources > Updates and enable “Unsupported Updates (jaunty-backports)”. 2. Install the linux-backports-modules-jaunty package 3. Install the linux-restricted-modules package 4. Go to System -> Administration -> Hardware Drivers and enable the Broadcom Wireless chipset.

Sound was fixed by upgrading Alsa to version 1.0.21, which was very well documented here: http://monespaceperso.org/blog-en/20...u-jaunty-9-04/

I had difficulty enabling the NVIDIA accelerated graphics driver (version 180) - I could see it listed under the Hardware Drivers menu but could not select it to enable it at first. Updating Jaunty fixed this.

[JoeMac42]

I spoke a little too soon regarding sleep/wake. I can initiate suspend by closing the lid or fn+f2, but it immediately wakes up before going completely down and goes to a password prompt. Hibernate appears to engage and wake fine.

I installed Skype. Received video works great with no perceptible dropped frames from a relatively good source (MacBookPro via DSL both directions). Video sent from the Mini 311 has very noticeable dropped frames but is "serviceable" - it doesn't crash the connection like other netbooks that I've tried with Ubuntu. Sound in Skype was fine in both directions.

[lirchi]

Confirm the same suspend problem on Compaq mini 311 (the euro version of the hp - i think it is identical)
Any solution ?

[lirchi]

Confirm the same suspend problem on Compaq mini 311 (the HP Euro version), any solution ?

[JoeMac42]

I found a solution that will work for now. Neither suspend nor hibernate can adequately shut off the bluetooth. Fortunately, there is a hardware disconnect (round button, above and to the right of the keyboard). If you manually power down the bluetooth/wifi, then sleep and hibernate work normally. I just confirmed that bluetooth/wifi will also reliably power back up by turning the hardware back on either during the resume or after resuming. This should work should work for now until powering down USB is fixed...

[kjacques]

Hi, I have this machine on order. I am wondering compiz works with the nvidea ion chip and if you have any docks installed? I am using cairo-dock now under virtual box and the animations are very jittery.

Thanks,

Ken

[JoeMac42]

compiz appears to be working. I was considering installing cairo-docs anyway, so I'll give it a try tonight and check back in later.

[kjacques]

Great, thanks Joe for looking into this.

Ken

[JoeMac42]

Wow, the cairo dock is some fairly nice eye-candy. I tried one of the OS X themes and it looks and behaves very nicely. I'm using the glx version of the dock with GPU acceleration. Remember to set visual effects to something that triggers compiz on (select "normal" or "extra" under >system>appearance>visual effects). Considerably less ram is used under under "normal". Things get considerably bogged down if running both the dock and "extra" visual effects. There is a free SODIMM slot under the back panel, so I should go ahead and add 1GB DDR3 SODIMM and retest.

[JoeMac42]

Anyone have any idea what the second open slot is next to the hard-drive? It's not filled with anything on my 311. It's not for BT/Wifi, so I'm not sure what it is. It was kind of nice to see HP left an open 204-pin SODIMM slot for RAM upgrade