Arch Linux

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi,

currently I'm thinking about purchasing the new Samsung NC10 netbook.

Somebody has already experiences in running Archlinux on it or know about something I have to pay attention to?

Barghest

Last edited by Barghest (2008-10-31 13:00:06)

y4mz

Member

Registered: 2007-06-16

Posts: 16

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

I'm also considering buying an NC10 to run Arch on. This video of someone running Ubuntu 8.10 on one may be helpful, but unfortunately not speaking German I don't really understand much of it.

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi!

The person running ubuntu on his NC10 speaks about what is running out-of-the-box.

He also explains how to get the wlan working (by adding the latest madwifi).

What is not working are the Fn Keys.

I made the step and bought the Samsung. Unfortunately the installation hangs at [autodetect] during mkinitcpio and I don't know how to solve it

I also tried ubuntu but it fails to load grub (made a bootable ubs drive via live cd.

Last edited by Barghest (2008-11-03 20:28:03)

lechuck

Member

Registered: 2008-11-04

Posts: 2

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi!

The person running ubuntu on his NC10 speaks about what is running out-of-the-box.

He also explains how to get the wlan working (by adding the latest madwifi).

What is not working are the Fn Keys.

I made the step and bought the Samsung. Unfortunately the installation hangs at [autodetect] during mkinitcpio and I don't know how to solve it

I also tried ubuntu but it fails to load grub (made a bootable ubs drive via live cd.

Hi I have the nc10 and arch is running fine.
I had the same problem with the installation. You need to set the parameter acpi=off for the installation.
Once arch is installed you don't need the option anymore (perhaps because of the newer kernel).
A lot of things are working out of the box and you can use some tweaks from the eeepc and acer aspire guide (like cpu scaling):

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Acer_Aspire_One

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi I have the nc10 and arch is running fine.
I had the same problem with the installation. You need to set the parameter acpi=off for the installation.
Once arch is installed you don't need the option anymore (perhaps because of the newer kernel).
A lot of things are working out of the box and you can use some tweaks from the eeepc and acer aspire guide (like cpu scaling):

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Acer_Aspire_One

Thank you for encouraging me

Can you explain how to set the parameter acpi=off?

signor_rossi

Member

Registered: 2007-08-24

Posts: 257

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Oh man, that video made me drool showing how good Ubuntu worked on this netbook out of the box (wifi driver is easily installed). I want to have one too now and I wanted to wait for a few months before getting a netbook!
It will be interesting to see how much faster Arch will be than Ubuntu on this netbook (on my notebook Arch is much more snappier than Ubuntu 7.10, haven't tested 8.10 so far on it (and won't), but on my old desktop 8.01 feels faster than 7.10). Will the Nc10 be available without Fenster tax?
About where to use 'acpi=off", this is taken from the 'Beginners Guide':

Boot Arch Linux Installer

Insert the CD or USB stick and boot from it. You may have to change the boot order in your computer BIOS or press a key (usually DEL, F1, F2, F11 or F12) during the BIOS POST phase.

Memory requirements:

    * CORE : 160 MB RAM x86_64/i686 (all packages selected, with swap partition)
    * FTP : 160 MB RAM x86_64/i686 (all packages selected, with swap partition)

Choose Boot Archlive or Boot Archlive [legacy IDE] if you have trouble with libata/PATA.

To change boot options press e for editing the boot lines. Many users may wish to change the resolution of the framebuffer, for more readable console output. Append:

vga=773

to the kernel line, followed by <ENTER>, for a 1024x768 framebuffer. Hit b to boot.

The system will now boot and present a login prompt.

SignorRossi.

Svlad Cjelli

Member

From: dusk till dawn

Registered: 2008-10-21

Posts: 99

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Oh man, that video made me drool showing how good Ubuntu worked on this netbook out of the box (wifi driver is easily installed)

I got this chip (the Atheros Ar242x) and Intrepid should work out of the box with Kernel 2.6.27...

Installing the madwifi-driver you had to do in the previous releases of Ubuntu should be obsolet.

I am runnin Arch with that Kernel and my Atheros-Chip just works fine...

Edith:

For using the ath5k-driver that supports wlan, you have to "unblacklist" it...
But don't ask me how to ;-)

Last edited by Svlad Cjelli (2008-11-04 09:55:23)

Svlad Cjelli

Member

From: dusk till dawn

Registered: 2008-10-21

Posts: 99

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

I wrote bull****

sorry

Last edited by Svlad Cjelli (2008-11-17 18:51:26)

oswaldkelso

Member

Registered: 2008-11-04

Posts: 4

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi. I'm considering a nc10 but have a few queries. What is the battery life like on the 6 cell. Does the hsdpa sim slot have anything in it. or do you need to buy a modem and bits to reach the slot. webcam and sound performance sleep and suspend. I understand its early days but any info much appreciated.
Thanks.

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi I have the nc10 and arch is running fine.
<snip>
A lot of things are working out of the box and you can use some tweaks from the eeepc and acer aspire guide (like cpu scaling):

http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Acer_Aspire_One

Can you please specify your expiriences? Are your Fn Keys working (did you do anything?) What is with S2R or S2D?

Thanks

Barghest

lechuck

Member

Registered: 2008-11-04

Posts: 2

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Can you please specify your expiriences? Are your Fn
Keys working (did you do anything?) What is with S2R or S2D?

Thanks

Barghest

Hi,

First of all I have to say that the nc10 is really nice (good
keyboard, bright display and amazing battery). Here are some infos (not complete)
The Fn keys for sound are working.
I haven't figured out how to get the brightness keys to work.
However, after installing xorg-server-utils you can use xbacklight to
set the brightness from the terminal.
S2R is working but for some reason the power button has to be pressed
twice to bring the system back up. S2D doesn't work yet.
One other thing is that the speakers are not automatically switched
off when headphones are plugged in. Everything else works fine.

I guess its just a matter of time until the other things will be
figured out by someone...

theloz

Member

Registered: 2008-11-08

Posts: 3

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi everybody. I got the NC10 working, more or less. Still struggling with audio and Fn keys. Any tip lechuck? Thanks in advance.

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi,

meanwhile I can post my experiences, too.

After setting acpi=off the installation worked well.

Wifi runs out-of-the-box with the ath5k module (I have a "wmaster0" too but I don't know what it is).

As others mentioned above the Fn Keys don't work. But with openbox you bind xbacklight +-10 to any keys.

The battery status says the duration was shorter than WindowsXP (I don't know who's the liar ;b)
Powertop gives out 9.5 to 13 W. One thing it complains about is that the webcam is active all the time and that I should use usb autosuspend. I've set it accordingly to the wiki and I don't know if it works. Maybe someone knows how to deactivate the webcam at all (I'll never need it)? I blacklisted the module uvcvideo and cheese now says that there is no camera but according to powertop it is still active.

How many W do you consume?

All things considerd I'm very satisfied with the NC10. Maybe we can write a first small wiki article about our achievements (e.g. installing, xbacklight)

Kind regards

Barghest

moose jaw

Member

From: Milwaukee

Registered: 2007-08-20

Posts: 104

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

I've also now had a successful Arch installation on the NC10.  Wireless works great with wicd, and thanks for the xbacklight tip.

One question: I've managed to successfully suspend-to-ram using "pm-suspend"; when I resume, the monitor will happily show my X session (after I ask for it by hitting Alt-F7), but if I switch back to a console the screen goes dark.  I can still issue commands ("reboot" from my root console worked fine), so it's just a video issue, it would seem.  hwd -s tells me that I'm still using the xf86-video-vesa driver, though I've tried to change this by installing xf86-video-intel and entering "intel" in place of "vesa" in my xorg.conf.  Any thoughts on how to get the consoles back after resume?  And, relatedly, any thoughts on how/whether I can/should actually get the intel driver (or another appropriate one) functioning?  I'm obviously kind of inexperienced when it comes to X stuff.

Many thanks.

Update: I've now solved the problem by adding the option "pm-suspend --quirk-vbestate-restore".  All consoles come back normally, as well as xbacklight's value in my X session (it had defaulted back to 100% before).  Perhaps this will be of use to someone else as well.

Last edited by moose jaw (2008-11-16 01:47:20)

Evoreth

Member

Registered: 2007-06-09

Posts: 15

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Sound doesn't work for me. Which modules do I have to load? edit: It works now. I had to remove every snd module in my rc.conf except for two: snd_hda_intel and snd_pcm_oss.

Installing Arch from the new 2008.10 archboot image went smoothly. I didn't have to set acpi to false or anything else. There was only one problem: The setup tried to install a 64 bit environment. Inkaine had the same problem and posted a workaround: http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php? … 42#p448042

Last edited by Evoreth (2008-11-17 21:01:24)

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Anyone knows how I can deactivate the webcam? Powertops says it is active all the time even with options usbcore autosuspend=1 in /etc/modprobe.d/options (doesn't it work?)

As I never need the webcam I would like to deactivate it. I already have !video and !uvcvideo in my "Modules" in rc.conf. Cheese says, that there is no webcam now but powertop tells something different.

Last edited by Barghest (2008-11-17 16:09:00)

moose jaw

Member

From: Milwaukee

Registered: 2007-08-20

Posts: 104

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

I've also tried using the modprobe.d options suggestion from the wiki, but it seems not to have any effect.  On my latest boot-up I followed powertop's suggestion and appended "usbcore.autosuspend=1" to the Grub kernel line, and that seems to have done the trick; powertop is no longer complaining about USB stuff.  [EDIT: Actually, it's not working consistently; bummer.]  Currently drawing 9.5W according to powertop.

A few other tricks you maybe already have discovered:

i. if you're using a journaling filesystem like ext3, append the option "noatime" to the relevant lines in /etc/fstab (i.e., so that your options on those filesystem mounts are now "defaults,noatime")

ii. blacklist the bluetooth kernel module ("!bluetooth" in the modules array in /etc/rc.conf) if you're not using bluetooth

iii. add the following lines to /etc/sysctl.conf: "vm.dirty_writeback_centisecs=1500" and "vm.laptop_mode=5" (also from the wiki)

Haven't yet experimented with cpufreq stuff, but presumably that could help bring down the wattage as well.

Last edited by moose jaw (2008-11-17 21:04:55)

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Thanks for the hint, but when I tried to append "usbcore.autosuspend=1" to the Grub kernel line it says unknown option at startup.

I'm a little bit annoyed about the power Arch is consuming compared to the preinstalled Windows system. This only comsumes 6-7 W. With Arch I can be happy if powertop goes down to the 9 W.

I've already done what you have suggested and I'm already using cpufreq (ondemand).

moose jaw

Member

From: Milwaukee

Registered: 2007-08-20

Posts: 104

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Yes, I can't seem to get USB autosuspend to work consistently (edited post above).  I'm currently at 8.6W.  I didn't test it out with Windows (I installed Arch right away), so I can't say whether it was also less power-hungry on my machine, but 6-7W would certainly be nice.  Even so, at ~9W I'm getting about 6 hours out of the battery, which I'm certainly happy with (though of course if I could drop to 7W and get 7.5 hours that would be nice too!)

Update: So, maybe this is obvious, but I've found that one can disable all USB functionality simply by blacklisting the relevant module in /etc/rc.conf (specifically, put "!usbcore" in the modules array).  This is obviously not a perfect solution, but you could presumably modprobe it back in if you wanted to use one of your ports later.  The thing is, though, that it doesn't seem to affect power consumption.  Powertop still gives me 9.0 to 9.5W on average, though it's now out of suggestions, since it's no longer detecting those usused USB devices.  So perhaps blacklisting usbcore is more trouble than it's worth.

Perhaps wireless is the culprit?  This is pure speculation on my part.  I haven't tried "modprobe -r ath5k" yet, since I need the connection.  But maybe the Windows wireless driver is less power-hungry than ath5k, and that's why Windows was only drawing 6 or 7W?  I'd love to be set straight on this.

Last edited by moose jaw (2008-11-18 03:04:46)

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

The problem with ath5k is that I couldn't figure out how to change the powerlevel as stated here: http://www.lesswatts.org/tips/wireless.php (first point).

Powertop also shows that the most interrupts come from "Rescheduling Interrupts". I googled this issue but only found a patch for the old kernel 2.6.24. Another thing that is responsible for a lot of wakeups is acpi but I guess that I can't remove it(?)

I also put !uhci_hcd in my rc.conf as I don't need support for ubs 1.1

qstreb

Member

Registered: 2008-11-15

Posts: 20

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi,

Could you please provide your noise/watt (laptop-mode) reduction configs for the nc10

I am somehow not able to put off the fan, it is working almost all the time, even that i am on cpufreq_ondemand and hdd temp is 37C, quite unsatisfing compared to the windows silent mode

the usb powertop issue can be fixed with:
echo "auto" > /sys/bus/usb/devices/1-8/power/level
Regards

signor_rossi

Member

Registered: 2007-08-24

Posts: 257

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hi,

Could you please provide your noise/watt (laptop-mode) reduction configs for the nc10

I am somehow not able to put off the fan, it is working almost all the time, even that i am on cpufreq_ondemand and hdd temp is 37C, quite unsatisfing compared to the windows silent mode

the usb powertop issue can be fixed with:
echo "auto" > /sys/bus/usb/devices/1-8/power/level
Regards

Isn't it most likely that silent mode in Windows uses a fixed lowest possible frequency?

SignorRossi.

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

I also noticed that the fan is active most of the time under arch.

Maybe there is another solution without laptop-mode-tools (anyhow I don't like them ^^) ?

Thanks for your solution with the usb issue. I'll try it when I'm back at home.

martin_herndl

Member

From: Austria

Registered: 2008-11-24

Posts: 21

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

hey guys,

I've also installed arch on my new samsung nc 10 and everythink works fine at the moment except the intel graphics driver in combination with my xorg.conf. I'm very new to those intel drivers (used to the simplicity of nvidia) and I never had to build my own xorg.conf (only modify it a bit).
My problem is, that the screen flickers with the intel driver and I guess the refresh rate is the bad thing, because with the intel driver gnome tells me, that it's 60 Hz large, while using the vesa driver (without problems) gnome told me 73 Hz. So, does anyone know, how I could fix my problem?

I'm looking forward to any replies
btw. S2R and S2D works for me

Last edited by martin_herndl (2008-11-24 17:54:05)

---

last.fm

Barghest

Member

From: Hanau/Germany

Registered: 2008-01-03

Posts: 563

Re: Arch on Samsung NC10 ?

Hm, I didn't notice any issues with the screen/graphics.

Here's the xorg.conf I use:

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "X.org Configured"
    Screen      0  "Screen0" 0 0
    InputDevice    "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
    InputDevice    "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
    InputDevice    "Touchpad"  "SendCoreEvents"
EndSection

Section "Files"
    RgbPath      "/usr/share/X11/rgb"
    ModulePath   "/usr/lib/xorg/modules"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/misc"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/TTF"
    FontPath     "/usr/share/fonts/Type1"
EndSection

Section "Module"
    Load  "dbe"
    Load  "extmod"
    Load  "dri"
    Load  "glx"
    Load  "record"
    Load  "xtrap"
    Load  "GLcore"
    Load  "freetype"
    Load "synaptics"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier  "Keyboard0"
    Driver      "kbd"
    Option    "XkbLayout" "de"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier  "Mouse0"
    Driver      "mouse"
    Option        "Protocol" "auto"
    Option        "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
    Option        "ZAxisMapping" "4 5 6 7"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier      "Touchpad"
       Driver          "synaptics"
       Option  "Device"        "/dev/input/mouse0"
    Option  "Protocol"      "auto-dev"
    Option  "LeftEdge"      "1700"
    Option  "RightEdge"     "5300"
    Option  "TopEdge"       "1700"
    Option  "BottomEdge"    "4200"
    Option  "FingerLow"     "25"
    Option  "FingerHigh"    "30"
    Option  "MaxTapTime"    "180"
    Option  "MaxTapMove"    "220"
    Option  "VertScrollDelta" "100"
    Option  "MinSpeed"      "0.06"
    Option  "MaxSpeed"      "0.12"
    Option  "AccelFactor" "0.0010"
    Option  "SHMConfig"     "on"
EndSection


Section "Monitor"
    #DisplaySize      230   140    # mm
    Identifier   "Monitor0"
    VendorName   "CPT"
    ModelName    "4c4"
    Option "DMPS"
EndSection

Section "Device"
        ### Available Driver options are:-
        ### Values: <i>: integer, <f>: float, <bool>: "True"/"False",
        ### <string>: "String", <freq>: "<f> Hz/kHz/MHz"
        ### [arg]: arg optional
        #Option     "NoAccel"                # [<bool>]
        #Option     "SWcursor"               # [<bool>]
        #Option     "ColorKey"               # <i>
        #Option     "CacheLines"             # <i>
        #Option     "Dac6Bit"                # [<bool>]
        #Option     "DRI"                    # [<bool>]
        #Option     "NoDDC"                  # [<bool>]
        #Option     "ShowCache"              # [<bool>]
        #Option     "XvMCSurfaces"           # <i>
        #Option     "PageFlip"               # [<bool>]
    Option    "NoDRI"
    Identifier  "Card0"
    Driver      "intel"
    VendorName  "Intel Corporation"
    BoardName   "Mobile 945GME Express Integrated Graphics Controller"
    BusID       "PCI:0:2:0"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
    Identifier "Screen0"
    Device     "Card0"
    Monitor    "Monitor0"
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     1
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     4
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     8
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     15
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     16
    EndSubSection
    SubSection "Display"
        Viewport   0 0
        Depth     24
    EndSubSection
EndSection

#Section "Extensions
#    Option "Composite" "Enable"
#EndSection

I can't remember if I changed that much (beside of the entries for synaptics.

I hope this helps you.