Lucid looks so nice that I cannot resist and just decided to install it although it obviously won't work out of the box. The installation itself went very smooth. ASUS thankfully partitioned the disk in two visible partitions and one invisible which probably contains the recovery system. Then I shrunk the empty visible partition by 4 GB and created a swap partition in that space. I still think about installing 2 GB RAM, so I thought 4 GB swap might be good. So my partition table looks like this:
Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
1 32.3kB 85.9GB 85.9GB primary ntfs boot
2 85.9GB 149GB 62.7GB primary ext4
4 149GB 153GB 3999MB primary linux-swap(v1)
3 153GB 160GB 7345MB primary fat32 hidden, lba
Installing from the USB pen drive was quite fast. After reboot it came everything was the same as in the live system. So still no wireless and unpredictable brightness controls. But beautiful.
Are you saying you did not have to shrink the main windows partition to get a large partition to put linux on? I was under the understanding one had to shrink the windows partition. What was on this large empty partition? Does Windows 7 have a shrink non-empty partition utility in case one doesn't get the netbook with this large empty partition?
ReplyDeleteSorry, I didn't notice your comment. Well, I didn't shrink and left the preloaded windows as it is as well as the recovery windows partition.
ReplyDeleteI mean you only need to shrink if you want most of the disk space for Linux natively. For me that's totally OK to leave windows as it is and I use it from Linux as a storage for not so often needed files like video files.
Thanks for your reply. I did not explain myself well enough. I do not have one of these yet so I don't know how it comes and I was trying to find out. I assume you mean that when you got it there were two ntfs partitions and one hidden fat32 partition ALREADY there. The second ntfs one was not "empty" exactly, but intended to be used for all user data in Windows or something like that. It must have had something in it, like empty user directorys? All of the actual windows and app code was in the 85G windows partition, but I can't believe there was a "totally empty" second partition!
ReplyDeleteSo your "shrinking" could be done with any standard tools? In fact what you actually did was not shrink but rather delete the second ntfs partition and replace it with a swap partition and an ext4 partition, right?
Can you say, though, if there is a true "shrink partition" included in windows 7, that would allow one to shrink the 85G windows partition without data loss? I don't think standard linux tools will do that. And I am a little worried that perhaps not all asus netbooks come with this empty ntfs partition at the start, so I will either have to shrink the windows partition or reinstall windows after installing linux.
(Anyway, this is a minor issue. I am a lot more concerned with other ones, like the problem noted where USB does not wake up after suspends induced by closing the lid, or the accessibility of the Super Hybrid Engine. I don't see where you mentioned these, so I assume they have not been a problem for you)
Yes, AFAIK EeePCs always are partitioned like this. What I didn't cover here was the EFI partition (aka Boot Boost) which I just deleted because I don't need that. IMHO the machine boots fast enough and anyway I don't shut it down unless I have to. I usually just close the lid and suspend the computer. Modern computers consume in suspend just little bit more compared to a completely powered down machine. Yes, noteboks/netbooks also drain the battery when shut down unless you take out the battery.
ReplyDeleteThe 2nd partition was really completely empty.
Actually I repartiotioned the drive with the ubuntu installer which uses gparted I think. If you defragment the windows partition from windows before ubuntu installation it should be pretty much safe to shrink this partion from linux. I didn't do that with my 1001p but I did that on other machines.
I don't have any problem with USB devices. I'm using a USB mouse and it's just there after resuming without any problems. Same with a USB pen drive.
Concerning the Super Hybrid Engine IMHO it's not needed as the normal CPU scaling (1GHz, 1.33 GHz, 1.66 GHz) and the ondemand governor of linux just works out the box. The SHE enables you to overclock and underclock even further but for me the normal scaling is enough. When idling I get down to 6.8 watts and 7.4 hours runtime which is enough for me. 720p playback works without SHE.
Thanks, that is useful. Sounds like it might not be too risky to get it. (I am skeptical of the ability to shrink the windows partition with linux tools. I guess I would just use the windows partition for data storage like you say -- I was not even aware that Linux now has reliable ntfs writing, which it did not have for a long time. Apparently windows 7 has a built in shrink partition, but perhaps it is not in windows 7 "starter" (what an atrocious but sadly suggestive name)).
ReplyDeleteThe biggest risk now seems to be the pure hardware issue of the frequent charger failures...
I want to ask, how about the battery consumption in ubuntu? I also use ubuntu at 1001p and can only last about six hours with the battery .. What can be up to 11 hours, such as Asus promised? How do you about the super hybrid engine? What can be installed also in 1001p? thanks sorry if my English not good...
ReplyDeleteDoes anybody have a clue why I can't use ex2 3 or 4 or ntfs or fat 32 in garted ???
ReplyDeleteHi, i'm only getting 6 hours of batt life in my asus 1005P with ubuntu lucid installed. anyone who can help?
ReplyDeleteasus promised 11hrs batt life anyway. i'm clueless.
@Chingy: After a while you won't get the 11 hours under windows, too. But there is an issue with the current linux kernel. Just install powertop and see the wakeups - It's way too much. I hope it will get fixed up stream soon and then backported. See this thread:
ReplyDeletehttps://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/524281