Ubuntu 15.10

Somehow I never learned.

I had the Ubuntu 14.04 LTS running for a few months, with warts and all, like the most dreaded random reboots.  So again I forgot or ignored the pain I ran through and decided to upgrade to 15.10.  There isn't any direct upgrade path from 14.04 to 15.10 so I had to upgrade to 15.04 first.  And in the process something somehow wasn't done right, I got problems with stability and dependency and something was not installed in the course of the upgrade.  So in the end, the computer won't restart properly or booting into Linux.

Learning, surprise, from my last experience, I figured it's more time effective just to re-install or install the OS from an USB thumb drive than trouble shooting it forever.  So I downloaded the ISO image of 15.10 and made it into a bootable thumbdrive.

I was able to reboot into 15.10.  I thought I had an absolute clean install but I guess not.  I kept my partition as it was and thought I installed 15.10 over whatever I had.  When installing 15.10 it did say I had 15.04 which I guess was actually "installed."  I guess I had absolutely no luck with 15.04.

I experienced one random reboot after 15.10 in the few hours that I was using it.  I almost think it's a hardware issue now.  So it is pretty hopeless.

PCIe WiFi Card that Works with Ubuntu 15.04

My good old Ralink RT2561 card gives me too much trouble on 15.04.  The connection speed has never been great especially when compared to my other computers.  With 15.04, the WiFi is practically unusable.  In the event it got a connection, it can be as slow as 1Mb/s and tops out at 11Mb/s and then before I know it, it msysteriously disconnects.  I tried many cookbook method or snakeoils to fix it, alas to no avail.

So I decided it's about time to give the computer an upgrade.

I have to say since most things worked on my Linux box right up until 15.04, I haven't been following vendors that have been Ubuntu or Linux certified.

Long story short, my facebook friend gave me a link to ThinkPenguin and finally I got myself a PCIe card.  It's a housebranded card using b/g/n standard with dual antenna and allegedly can reach top rate at 300Mb/s.

I just did a iwlist rate and it gave me at 58.5Mb/s.  At times, it says 65Mb/s.  So it's a big improvement compared to the old one which is only b/g with top speed at 54Mb/s, which is simply an unobtainium speed.

The card is not 100% plug-and-play.  The wicd manager doesn't know or doesn't guess right the wlan number.  So I have to manually change that.  The second thing is when the computer wakes up from sleep or suspend, it cannot re-establish the connection.  Even human intervention is hit or miss.  Since I removed network manager--my snakeoil approach to fix my last card, I don't know if network manager would work better with the card.

lspci returns:
02:00.0 Network controller: Qualcomm Atheros AR928X Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)

dmesg | grep AR92 returns:
[   17.965148] ieee80211 phy0: Atheros AR9280 Rev:2 mem=0xffffc900129e0000, irq=16

lshw returns:
           *-network
                description: Wireless interface
                product: AR928X Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express)
                vendor: Qualcomm Atheros
                physical id: 0
                bus info: pci@0000:02:00.0
                logical name: wlan3
                version: 01
                serial: 00:22:43:4c:ad:2f
                width: 64 bits
                clock: 33MHz
                capabilities: bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
                configuration: broadcast=yes driver=ath9k driverversion=3.19.0-25-generic firmware=N/A ip=192.168.1.14 latency=0 link=yes multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11bgn
                resources: irq:16 memory:fdaf0000-fdafffff

ThinkPenguin lists the chipset as
Atheros AR9281 and its model being TPE-N300PCIE4 ($29 PLUS USPS 6.95 = $35.95)

In any event, I can say that it works, 99% of the time, and definitely better than my last card on 15.04.  It no longer drops connection left and right or connects at ridiculously slow rate like 1Mb/s.  The only issue so far is once disconnected, like from suspend, it can't connect automatically or even manually with certain reliability.  Further investigation needed.

Maybe if you just go out and buy any Wifi card with the Atheros AR928X chipset, it would work on 15.04.  Who knows?

UPDATE
8/17/2015
Finally got the chance to remove wicd and reinstalled network manager for GNOME.  Now the wifi can reliably reconnect after suspend.  While I removed wicd, I got no wifi, I have to plug in my RJ45 cable to my MBP to share its wifi connection in order to install network manager--I can't install network manager if I have wicd installed.

Ubuntu 15.04 and Ralink rt61pci Problem

update 8/12:
The latest is I removed network-manager and use wicd to "manage" the network.  I think it's better than before but still iffy.  I know it sounds very not scientific but that's me because I am not scientific.  Basically the Wifi support for Ubuntu 15.04 has been terrible ... for me if not for everybody.  I think this article kind of resembles what I experience.  In the last post it says "removed network-manager package, and used netctl for managing wifi, and the problem is gone"  I am not wizard so I have a difficult time figuring how to install netctl in Ubuntu GNOME.  In the end I gave up and installed WICD.  At some point it got stuck at 1Mb/s but if I wasn't dreaming I think it did connect at 36Mb/s.  It now connects at 11Mb/s.  I am not exactly complaining as long as it is double digit.  All in all it's iffy.  Not good.
Before I did all the above I also ordered a card that supposedly works out of the box on 15.04, I will find out soon.  It's a b/g/n card with max rate at 300Mb/s.  I doubt I can reach that but I would be thoroughly thrilled if it reaches 50Mb/s, the top speed of the router.

I guess I was happy too soon.  The connection drops and wouldn't reconnect.  And when connected the rate drops to 1Mb/s, like modem or something.

I am counting on my new card now.

----------------

Basically I have very slow connection rate, from 1Mb/s to 11Mb/s or mostly no connection at all with this combination.  Prior to 15.04, 14.04 LTS or 14.10, the WiFi connection has been pretty stable and the quality has been satisfactory, I don't think I ever reach the 54Mb/s rate but at least I got some where at 20Mb/s.  (My WiFi connected MacBook Pro get more than 50Mb/s and noticeably faster)

I thought ndiswrapper would be the solution.  Alas it was, only momentarily.

So the struggle continues.

PS: I should have left it at 14.10 because seemingly the WiFi is solid and I have no random reboots like I have had on 14.04 LTS

PPS:  In addition to the WiFi problem, I have had a few random reboots in 15.04 already.

PPPS:  Shotwell unequivocally continues to suck.  Part of the library continues to disappear, the import is still very very problematic.  I wonder does anybody ever get it to work like normally?  Part of my motivation to get on board to 15.04 was to see if Shotwell would work better.  Now I know.

PPPPS: So in a nutshell, the 15.04 offers no benefits to me.


NOTES TO SELF:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1433233 back in 2010
https://ubuntu-mate.community/t/solved-ralink-rt2561-rt61-wifi-problem-15-04-beta2/828/7  this is where I got the idea.  Unfortunately just like one of them, the ndiswrapper doesn't quite work for me, it drops connection just like the Linux driver installed originally.

http://us.edimax.com/edimax/download/download/data/edimax/us/download/product/home_legacy_products/home_legacy_wireless_adapters/ew-7128g/ manufacturer's support site

http://www.mediatek.com/en/downloads1/downloads/rt2501pcimpcicbrt61rt2561rt2561srt2661/


http://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/30ish0/ubuntu_14041504_uefi_restartpower_off_problem/

iOS 4.2.1 And Ubuntu 10.10

Despite whatever people say, iOS 4.2.1 (8C148) is not working on my Ubuntu 10.10 AMD64.  It's able to mount, to see everything that is there (i.e. read only) but I simply can't sync it.  No way no how.  This is the conclusive reference for me as of now.  Based on what I read, it's because of libgpod.

Crappy WiFi HardWare That Works with Ubuntu 10.10 AMD64

My crappy Trendnet TEW-228PI has been on its last leg for a long time.  It gives me some connection but I really have to stay on top of it as it takes a long time to see my AP and drops connection randomly.  I was able to get the Windows driver to work with it but only barely.  I don't know if it has to do with its shorty antenna or what.  But bottom line, it doesn't work well at all.

Finally I had had enough.  I bought this super duper Wireless 802.11b/g PCI card from Edimax, model EW-7128G.  Wow.  I didn't have to type any command at all.  What a disappointment.  Perhaps it has this detachable antenna, the signal is much better than before.  The card just works and I feel like why didn't I buy it earlier.  

uname -a
Linux [redacted-desktop 2.6.35-25-generic #44-Ubuntu SMP Fri Jan 21 17:40:44 UTC 2011 x86_64 GNU/Linux

lspci
04:07.0 Network controller: RaLink RT2561/RT61 802.11g PCI

sudo lshw -C network
*-network
description: Wireless interface
product: RT2561/RT61 802.11g PCI
vendor: RaLink
physical id: 7
bus info: pci@0000:04:07.0
logical name: wlan2
version: 00
serial: 00:1f:1f:a8:22:36
width: 32 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: pm bus_master cap_list ethernet physical wireless
configuration: broadcast=yes driver=rt61pci driverversion=2.6.35-25-generic firmware=N/A ip=192.168.1.108 latency=32 link=yes multicast=yes wireless=IEEE 802.11bg
resources: irq:21 memory:fdef0000-fdef7fff

Ubuntu 10.04 64 bit and Wifi Messes Up (RTL 8180L)

Initially it worked like a charm.  But then some where along those automatic upgrades and what not, the wifi became so unreliable that it could hardly be used--it can't be connected, it can't be authenticated, it kept disconnecting.  Basically it can't be used.  I had to resort to get a cross wire RJ-45 to join to my notebook wifi connection in order to fix it.  To make a long story short.  I have to go to realtek's super duper web site and download their Windows 64 bit inf file.  I got the ndiswrapper program in my Ubuntu and the rest is just picking the downloaded inf driver file which couldn't be easier.  But I really don't understand why the original Ubuntu or Linux module doesn't work over time.  It got to do with maybe an upgraded kernel or something because it worked initially.  Now I got my wi-fi back, and the signal seems to be more accurate instead of the like 126% that got shown previously.

update 10/6/2010:
Things just went downhill.  But I stopped it from sliding down further.
Again for reasons I couldn't explain and I hate it when I couldn't explain what happened.  The wifi stopped working again.  I reverted it back to rtl8180 but the connection was extremely iffy.  Very slow and sometimes the connection is no good.  I tried to use WEP still no good.  I wonder.  Because like I said it worked out of the box up until a certain point.

In the end, I reverted back to ndiswrapper using the Windows 64 bit driver, namely netrtw.inf.  I was able to get a realistic reading of the signal instead of something like 126% but poor connection, I got like 68% but pretty good speed considering it's a 11Mb b connection

here is my sudo iwconfig wlan0


IEEE 802.11b  ESSID:"redacted"
          Mode:Managed  Frequency:2.437 GHz  Access Point: 00:21:29:8A:F3:75
          Bit Rate=11 Mb/s   Tx-Power:20 dBm   Sensitivity=0/3
          RTS thr:off   Fragment thr:off
          Encryption key:F400-2D6C-EFAE-76F5-16D2-1751-76A6-A290-C249-8E81-DE00-ECF8-43B1-78F6-C312-5B90   Security mode:restricted
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:67/100  Signal level:-53 dBm  Noise level:-96 dBm
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:0  Invalid misc:2019800144   Missed beacon:0


iwlist scan

lo        Interface doesn't support scanning.

eth0      Interface doesn't support scanning.

wlan0     Scan completed :
          Cell 01 - Address: 00:21:29:8A:F3:75
                    ESSID:"redacted"
                    Protocol:IEEE 802.11b
                    Mode:Managed
                    Frequency:2.437 GHz (Channel 6)
                    Quality:78/100  Signal level:-46 dBm  Noise level:-96 dBm
                    Encryption key:on
                    Bit Rates:1 Mb/s; 2 Mb/s; 5.5 Mb/s; 11 Mb/s; 18 Mb/s
                              24 Mb/s; 36 Mb/s; 54 Mb/s
                    Extra:bcn_int=100
                    Extra:atim=0
                    IE: WPA Version 1
                        Group Cipher : TKIP
                        Pairwise Ciphers (1) : TKIP
                        Authentication Suites (1) : PSK

(note: screen capture on opening window doesn't work ... sigh, either entire desktop or selected area.  what's wrong with these people?)

If I were using the rtl8180 driver sudo iwconfig wlan0 shows I have Encryption key:off which doesn't seem right.  My guess is WPA doesn't work or work well with the native rtl8180 driver, actually the same can be said with WEP or no security.  In other words, it doesn't work well at all, at least that's my experience for the past few days.  The Windows netrtw.inf isn't flawless, there were a couple of times I couldn't get it installed with ndiswrapper but most of the time it takes it all right.  So it's very very weird.  Anyway, I rebooted the system a couple of times and it still works.

IF after a few days, it messes up again, then perhaps I would get a new PCI card for wifi G that supports WPA or other more advanced encryption technologies--does it make sense?  I guess it doesn't.

UPDATE 12/29/2010
Just to give an update here.  The wifi is still very much iffy meaning sometimes it just doesn't connect and sometimes it just drops the connection for no good reason that I know of.  If you need a solid connection then it is not really working.  One of these days I may just need to spend a few dollars to upgrade the wifi card.  The router seems to be fine as all of my, okay not all as my good old Thinkpad R51 does drop connection like once a week or so, but definitely not as temperamental as the Ubuntu.  Other devices, handhelds and notebooks work pretty flawlessly.  I am on Ubuntu 10.10 64 bit now.

Epson Workforce 610 and Ubuntu 10.4 64 bit Work

Something I thought impossible is working flawlessly.  I was able to print to the Epson Workforce 610 wirelessly.  It's nothing short of magic.  When I have time I will write up the steps.  I don't understand it but at least I am able to follow instructions.  There are some very nice people out there who make things work and make my life easier.  Wow.

To make it work, both printing and scanning, you need to do basically three things:
Download and install by going through Epson support ...

1.  epson-inkjet-printer-stylus-office-tx610fw-series
2.  iscan-network-nt

To add your printer go
http://localhost:631
Now you can print


3.  To scan wirelessly you need to do this (if your 610 is only USB connected, I don't think you need to add this line) (thanks to this thread)
At the terminal type: sudo gedit /etc/sane.d/epkowa.conf
add the below line and save

net 192.168.1.102

replace with your printer IP address.  You can find your printer IP from localhost:631 or I guess by some other means.

And you are done.

The below is a sample scan from a 4x6 print.  All the dust ...  Anyway, I have a V500 USB connected for "real work."  The Workforce 610 is really for printing only.  If I have both the USB connected V500 and wireless connect Office 160 on, Iscan actually lets me pick.  Wow!

Ubuntu 10.04 64 Bit - Cheapo PC Hardware That Actually Works

Antec NEO ECO 520C 520W Continuous Power ATX12V v2.3 / EPS12V 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Power Supply
Item #: N82E16817371030
I am old so I thought the exhaust blow out of the case in the back. But it's on the top or bottom depending how you orient the PSU. Now the exhaust is blowing into the case as my Antec case has the PSU cutout on the top.

MSI N250GTS TwinFrozr 1G OC GeForce GTS 250 1GB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
Item #: N82E16814127445
Expensive and I thought there is mail-in rebate but I don't see it anymore. Anyway maybe there wasn't? You know in the end, I just clicked order. Too tired.

G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL
Item #: N82E16820231277
You thought memory is "cheap," not anymore.

Western Digital Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Item #: N82E16822136319
Now that I look at it, didn't I order the 6.0Gb/s version? I don't know anymore.

AMD Athlon II X4 640 Propus 3.0GHz Socket AM3 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor ADX640WFGMBOX
Item #: N82E16819103871
The chip is tiny like it's work 50 cents. The heat sink and fan are much bigger by comparison. The package is tiny too, guess it's good thing.

Recycled Stuff so old and so cheap that it's a miracle that they actually work:-

Koutech IO-RCM620 USB 2.0 3.5" Card Reader
Item #: N82E16820162016
I have to play with the seating of the reader, because the power cable connecting to the USB header on the MB is just about 1cm shorter than required. But I made it work.


LITE-ON LightScribe Black 20X DVD±R Burner with 12X DVD-RAM write Black IDE Model LH-20A1H-186 LightScribe Support
Item #: N82E16827106045
It works through IDE, or PATA.

TRENDnet TEW-228PI PCI 11Mbps Wireless LAN PCI Adapter
Item #: N82E16833156130
It works, used to use Windows driver and ndiswrapper, now I don't have to do anything--where is the fun? This card is really old, I can't believe it. Signal is good too.

When I did this Frankenstein PC, I spent plenty of time online researching what's compatible with Ubuntu 10.04 64 Bit. And I usually couldn't find any answer that's recent and relevant.

Since I just got the box running, at least for the most part, so I hereby share the components with you so you know they work. I went through the pain and maybe you don't have to.  The way Ubuntu goes, chances are they may just work and it may not make a difference whether you do any research or not.

Ubuntu 10.04 64 Bit

Wow I didn't know it would be this easy.

I have to say this is the most painless install I ever have.

I order from Newegg, it's shipped from Edison New Jersey, so I got it the following day, that's today.  I think Newegg really lives up to the e-commerce promise.  Let's just not to talk to any sales person, just order it online.  It works.  And if you need to talk to somebody you sure can, or you prefer to live chat, that's also doable.  Anyway, I sound like I am a spokeperson for Newegg, but I'm not.  I like quite like their system.  Order I ordered back in 2002 I can see it online, still.  Wow.  They are doing something right.

 The CD there is a bit misleading.  I actually downloaded my 64 bit and burned the ISO on a CD for installation.  The pictured CD is there just to confuse people something I am naturally good at.

Wow, cheapo PC hardware from Newegg.  Thumps up.  (actually it gets a bit pricey now ...)
I just downloaded the latest upgrade and now I am going to reboot ... (Gee that's seems so Windows to me, OKAY, something I just have to put up with, reboot, well because of a new kernel I think.)

Ubuntu 10.04 64 Bit

Downloading the ISO, it's going to take more than 2 hours.

Newegg got my order today and shipped today from Edison, NJ. I am going to receive tomorrow. It beats hauling the stuff yourself.

Ubuntu 10.04 and Epson V500 Photo

The above award winning beautifully taken picture is originally in Kodak positive.  It was scanned by scan master me and myself using sucky Epson 500 Photo and Image Scan! for Linux running on Ubuntu 10.04.  Auto color "corrected" in GIMP.  The Kodak slide is of unknown expiration date.

Shot in Bryant Park, NYC.

Ubuntu 10.04 has been pretty stable.  My wireless configuration is still funky and finicky.  But for the most part it works though there is no way to know to get it work consistently, but as long as it works I am not going to touch it.  Switching between users still hit and miss.  Searching and installing new software doesn't seem to be as good as before.

Anyway.

I was able to hook up my Epson V500 god awful scanner.  It wasn't exactly plug and play.  But it isn't too hard either.  If I can do it, you can too.

Go to Epson website or simply Google it, search for Epson V500 Photo and go to support
Go to download driver.
You will be prompted to go to outside Epson, that's go to avasys for the files.  You need to pick your scanner and platform.
Here's how to get Image Scan! for Linux to work:-
Download the deb data, core and plug-in packages, at present 32bit versions are called iscan-data_1.0.1-1_all.deb, iscan_2.25.0-l.ltdl7_i386.deb, iscan-plugin-gt-x770_2.1.1-2_i386.deb.  Install them in that order by simply double-clicking them.  Wow, don't even need to do command line.  I know you're going to miss that.
For me I need a reboot for it to recognize the scanner.  Image Scan! for Linux is pretty straight forward and has a clean interface that I like.  For the kind of scan I do, the simpler the better.  Download the Image Scan! for Linux pdf guide userg_revL_e.pdf for more details.

update 9/25/2010
The 64 bit install works just as well.

Backup Finally

I just gave myself an excuse to buy a sata harddrive and an enclosure ... so that I can finally do some backup as I don't want to spend some $800 like r&e did ....

I bought a discounted 500GB harddrive (I am too cheap to go for any bigger plus I really don't have much to backup) and an alumininum enclosure that has an internal sata connection and external sata, FireWire 400 and USB2 connection. I think I have pretty much everything covered that is with the exception of a FireWire 800 connection. Well I rather have sata instead of FW800, anyway I don't see that happening any time soon given how old or backward all my machines are and how unlikely I am going to go for a new desktop.

I don't know how long it's going to take as my data files are about only 100GB or less. Anyway, I am sort of testing the backup process from Ubuntu as I really have no idea how things exactly work. I am using Simple Backup via FireWire.

To get the massive harddrive ready, I used GParted to do all the grunge work so I didn't have to. I proceeded kind of slowly given that I really don't know anything about disk and stuff. But I got it done, I formatted the drive to three partitions, ext3, NTFS and FAT32. So I can go around and back up stuff if I want to. Boring.

Mini Rant

My hp6910p continues to underperform or perform just as expected. There is no surprise on the upside only on the downside. I got myself a Kingston SDHC 8 GB card, and just as expected, it won't read it. So no surprise here as the reader only says SD. On another unrelated note, one of the keys on the keyboard just gone bonkers. So when I type, a letter just won't show up like it's supposed to be. I have to press it in a special way. It doesn't sound like a big deal but it actually is. It gets really annoying. On the other hand, my Linux cheapo hardware continues to surprise me on the upside. My super cheapo SOHOUSB reader/writer just reads the 8GB without any problem. And yes, the reader just says SD no HC there but it just swallows the card in whole and gives me an icon on the desktop that says 8.0 GB Media. It just works.

Ubuntu 8.10 64 Bit

I wonder if anybody can shed some light on running Ubuntu 8.10 (or 8.04) in 64 Bit. My plan is to run Cinelerra and Kino. I don't know if it's going to be too much of a pain (though I can almost feel it already, I could have bought a Dell or a Mac, but I am such a masochist). My excuse for a possible new system is so hardware won't be holding me back to be the greatest one man movie maker ever. My preferred or compromised video format is the going to be HDV, I think. I have researched online for a day or so, and I couldn't find a lot of timely information. If anyone has experience, please drop me a few lines. Much appreciated.

Ubuntu And Flash Finally Work Together

This has been long plaguing my system from day one. In the beginning when it was at its very worst, it could actually bring down the browser, yes, the plugin actually brought down the browser. Then things got a bit better since Firefox 3 and Flash 9 onward, only the plugin went crazy, like totally gobbled audio, without bringing down the browser. But still, almost all web sites unfortunately use some form of Flash to pretty up themselves, sometimes to make up for lack of contents. So without a working Flash plugin, my Linux box is greatly handicapped. That's until today when I got some time in hand and did another search to solve this issue. Some of the resolutions, you just knew are basically mid wife's tale with no technical sophistication or merit like you call the help desk, the guy on the other end keeps telling you it's your fault or you have been playing with the computer and his sole resolution is to ask you to reboot the machine a hundred times.

OKAY enough of my bull. Here is the real McCoy for fixing this perennial problem.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=4928900 Apparently it has something to do with PulseAudio. "Apparently" that is after 20/20 hindsight. psyke83 is a genius and he or she is from Ireland. I just followed the instructions and now I can play all the Youtube video without problems. There are still great people out there.

Ubuntu 8.10 Is Here

I did not even know about it. I must have moved on to other distractions. My PC is really old and I don't want to do anything new with it anymore. My AMD chip is I believe not well supported under Flash so my problem with flash has greatly diminished my web browsing experience. Anyhow, I still haven't backed up any of my pictures or video. I am living dangerously. The good thing about shooting film is I don't have to worry about any hard drive failure or computer failure or backup. My negative is my archive and I only need to file them accordingly like scattering them everywhere. I am hopeless.

Internal Card Reader

SYBA PCI USB 2.0 & FireWire/1394a combo card Model SD-COMBO-02
A 10-pin USB header. Cut the yellow pin, i.e. pin 9, so it can take a 9-pin connection cable. If you screw up, don't blame it on me. You've been warned.
JPEG from Adeltek

This is a continuation of my Crappy PC hardware that works in Ubuntu
[WARNINGS: If you follow any of the instructions on this blog and cause some major or minor screw-up, like, but not limited to, PC blow-up or bodily harm or death, it's not really my problem. You have been warned.]

My latest additions to my ever expanding Ubuntu rig consist some big ticket items. A Koutech IO-RCM620 USB2.0 3.5" card reader and a Kingston 4GB USB drive.

The Koutech thing can read like 1,000 different cards. Actually "card reader" is an understatement. This thing can write between media as well. I tested that at least on two different media types. I was able to copy and paste a 5MB file between a 4GB CF card and a 4GB USB drive, which took no time at all.. The thing comes with a mini CD and no paper documentation whatsoever.

Installation:
Let's get the Kingston 4GB USB drive out of the way. The thing doesn't need any installation. It's just plug and play. It's a FAT32 file system so I guess Linux is just fine with it. I am not that technical.

The Koutech card reader is a bit involved, meaning I have to open my beautiful big ass beige box. To secure it on my empty 3.5" bay and connect the USB cable to my existing USB card.

The reader has a USB cable that needs to plug in some USB header which I know I have but not exactly sure how. My USB card is the legendary SYBA PCI USB 2.0 & FireWire/1394a combo card Model SD-COMBO-02. Turns out the card has a 10-pin USB header. And the reader USB cable is for 9-pin. So I don't know which pin to cut in order to plug the cable into the header. The SYBA site generally lacks those information but they do have some not so active forums and someone is nice enough to post a link that leads to a picture indicating what pin to cut. You know a picture is really worth a thousand words. With that picture, I cut the extra 9th pin. And I plugged in the USB cable onto the card. I plug the USB card back onto the motherboard on a different PCI card slot which is closer to the card reader. Power up the box. And everything just works. Instead of using my D70 as a mass storage device to read my CF card, I can now just remove the CF card and plug that into the reader. The D70 is just USB 1.1 (12Mbps) so I am gaining some serious USB 2.0 (480Mbps) speed too. Plus the reader has the a front USB so that's convenient for some iPod and thumb drive action. My hp w2207 has two USB ports on the left side, access is not very good as I can't really see sideway.

Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron

I got my Vista to download the iso ... don't you think Vista is good for nothing. md5 to check sum and burned the image onto a CD-R. All by following Ubuntu's instructions which are usually are OKAY if you can find them. I find their site generally pretty hard to navigate.

My rig is a dinosaur machine with two harddrives with Ubuntu 7.10 running pretty well from the smaller 40GB drive. My whopping 160GB drive was pretty much unmolested. (The other earlier post using Update to update from 7.10 to 8.04 was for another machine all together. This is done via a CD-R burned LiveCD installation)

wifi using Realtek 8180, resolved.

So I decided to install Ubuntu 8.04 onto my whopping 160GB drive and see what happens. The installation takes about 15 minutes and it all went well except I still can't get my wifi works out of the box. My cheapo wifi PCI card uses realtek 8180 chipset and never worked out of the box. I was hoping the ndiswrapper (Windows wireless driver program) would be automagically installed in 8.04 to make life less painful. Alas, life is not a bed of roses when it comes to Linux. And how the hell am I going to get the 7.10 ndiswrapper back....I really forgot how I found this one out even though it was only yesterday. It's via Synaptic manager of course. I just need to put the LiveCD into the drive and let it be a source and then search for the string "ndis". Then installed the packages from the CD. I mounted my 40GB drive and find the INF file I downloaded from way back when I did Ubuntu 7.10 and copy it to my drive (what was I thinking? I could have just installed the INF from there why did the copy and paste). I then run the Windows wireless driver program from the System Administration menu and it's almost painless. I got my network connection back. Once I got the Internet under my thumb, I rule.

GRUB error 18, resolved.

Well things went kind of downhill and straight to hell when I tried to get the ATI graphics driver to work somewhat better like in 7.10. For some peculiar reason, after a couple of add and remove, my system or actually GRUB can't even boot to 8.04 nor 7.10 any more. That's major.

The error was like GRUB error 18 and the system just stopped cold.

Again I somewhat forgot how to fix it ... even it's only yesterday.
OKAY I will try to recall ...

I even tried to re-install the system again. But to no avail, thank goodness it took about 15 minutes....

Okay, more Googling....

Boot up from the LiveCd again,
get to the terminal
type some crap like
>sudo grub
grub>root (hd0,0)
grub>setup (hd0,0)
grub>quit

then reboot system
and magically, now grub gives me back my 7.10 boot menu.

But I am not happy with 7.10. I was but once you got it, you wanted to be at 8.04...
So more trial and error and more Google.

I tried to change hd0 to hd1 but again no good. I tried to re-install the system again, no good.

OKAY, re-installed again, but this time after some Google and some insights or sixth sense actually, when in partitioning, I clicked on the advance button, and changed the default hd0 to hda from the drop down and went through the rest of the 15 minutes installation process. Reboot, now I am in business, the GRUB menu now gives me the option of picking 8.04. I have yet to fully understand the mistake I've made and how I actually got it corrected. My primary drive is the hda where the boot takes place. My second drive is where 8.04 is. So far after 24 hours, a half dozen reboots, GRUB is still working properly so I guess I must have fixed the problem.

Now I have to go on solve the display problem...the thread I got for it didn't quite help.

UPDATE 4/27/2007

Display, nvidia-glx-new, resolved.

At least I got my display back to 7.10 performance.
The nvida-glx-new package was I guess never installed. Under System, Administration, Hardware drivers, the nvidia-new was marked enabled, but not used. It's really the pinnacle of message, what the hell is it trying to tell you? I have no idea. I googled a bit, and some easy but doesn't make sense solution was like unmark to disable. Reboot. Then mark enable. I tried a few times wouldn't do anything. And I even monkeyed with Synaptic manager to change the Repository to Other and let the manager find the fastest servers for download. But no go. BUT, the strangest thing happened. After I actually shut it down, and boot up, and marked it enable, actually the system went to download the package nvidia-glx-new this time and got the sucker installed. And now with a system reboot, I got my 1600x1000 back at least where it was. I could never get my 1680x1050 back and I read maybe I have to use the non-dvi plug for the HP w2207. So I am always 400 pixels short.
UPDATE: 4/28/08
Finally I unplugged the dvi cable and used the vga cable instead. And guess what, I got my 1680x1050 pixel back but the refresh rate is either 50 or 51hz, that's a bit mind boggling, why the 1 hz difference? The ideal 60hz is unattainable as of now. The DVI is supposed to give better graphics but I can't tell the difference. So I will stick with the VGA cable.
YET ANOTHER UPDATE: 4/30/2008
Via Add/Remove, I got the Nvidia server and the System Info. And System Info I can configure using the Nvidia Server to make the display on spec, that is 1680x1050 @60hz. But I have the impression that it might not be very stable. Why, because I was doing that in Ubuntu 7.10 and for some inexplicable reason, or things I don't know enough I call inexplicable, when I changed it to 1680x1050@60hz, between users, the screen blackout. I haven't do a few reboots in 8.04 so I don't know if the setting will stay and reliable, but it's doable.
YET STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: 5/5/2008
Seems like the 1680x1050 @60hz is sticking just fine in Hardy Heron. Well, I haven't tested it when I switch between users as I don't have any other users setup there.
YET YET STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: 8/2/08
the 1680x1050 @60mhz is doable but you have to use the VGA plug. The DVI plug wouldn't work. That's my experience with my LCD monitor. That's not a new piece of information, just to recap.
YET YET STILL ANOTHER UPDATE: 3/11/09
The video card is GeForce FX 5500 with 128MB, the DVI just max out at 1600x1000


First impressions
The fonts look better from Firefox 3 in Hardy Heron, actually much better, much better.
Even got yahoo! blog display correctly.
You still need to download Gstreamer extra plugins to simply play mp3.

Ubuntu 8.04 Is Here

Perhaps it's time to crank up my hardware just a notch so I can have a better experience with the OS and the applications.

I am doing the upgrade now ...

For packages:
65 are to be removed.
193 to be installed.
903 to be upgraded.

[I began this upgrade at 9.30AM]

And together 702M to be downloaded. It goes on to estimate that it will take 2 hours and 2 minutes. Wow, how does it get to the 2 minutes part?

But of course, that was an overly optimistic estimate, with the traffic and unpredictable nature of the Internet, now it says it's going to take more than a day to download the packages. The download speed varies quite somewhat, from 70kb/s to 200kb/s. So there you have it.

This one is code named Hardy Heron, and it's LTS, WTF is LTS? Well, it's long term support, meaning for server it's 5 years free upgrade and desktop 3 years from Canonical. Wow, that kind of make it a must have upgrade, isn't it?

[2.20PM]
It took about 3 hours to download the packages. Now it's installing the upgrades.

[3:48PM]
The system is done and needs a reboot.

So the entire upgrade didn't take 2 hours 2 minutes or did it take a day. It took 6.5 hours in all. The whole process went so smooth that it seems rather unreal. Most notable change is the default desktop picture. Other than that Firefox is now version 3 Beta 5. Oh, I am so shallow in Ubuntu. I think I will upgrade my other monster Ubuntu rig when I have more time or maybe when their server is faster, I don't know. Maybe 6.5 hours isn't bad I really don't know.

Ubuntu 8.04 Is Coming

Ubuntu 8.04 is coming to a computer near you.