Installing Linux (Lubuntu) on a Sony Vaio P netbook

There is nothing to do, but rather from the desire to get hold of a device, a bit more functional than a tablet on Android, I decided to buy myself a used Sony Vaio P netbook, and he really drew me with his dimensions.

I got a VGN-P39VRL model with an “Atomic” processor with 2 GHz speed and 128 GB SSD-drive. Below is my experience in installing Linux (more precisely, Lubuntu) on this device:

1. The choice of distribution

Lubuntu Everything else in my opinion is heavy - after all, we need not checkers, but go. So here: lubuntu.org

2. Installation

Since the standard image failed to start in graphical mode, X.Org did not start, I had to use alternate.
The installation is a standard, special moment: in order to use hibernate in the future, you need to create a swap-partition with a size not less than the amount of RAM.
')

3. Update

After installation - the Update Manager starts automatically. Before you start checking for updates, it is better to go to the Manager settings and connect all available repositories - it won't be worse, all the same, in the course of the play you will have to connect a bunch of ppa.
Then - update.

4. Network configuration.

During installation, the installer asked to specify the network to be used. I specified my home WiFi (network name and WPA-key). A side effect - this interface is registered in
/ etc / network / interfaces (the key is plain text!) and is no longer available for managing the Network Manager. To correct this flaw, you need to do the following things:

4.1.

Delete (or comment out using #) the interface description from the / etc / network / interfaces file

4.2.

In the Network Manager settings (/etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf file) specify:
[ifupdown]
managed=true

Reboot.

5. CPU frequency control

For some reason, the CPU frequency control module is not installed by default, so it sharashit at the maximum frequency. To fix this, install:
sudo apt-get install cpufreqd cpufrequtils

6. Installing drivers for video

Information here: ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php and here: wiki.ubuntu.com/HardwareSupportComponentsVideoCardsPoulsbo
For version 11.10, the best option is the EMGD driver. Since at 12.04 - the new version of X.Org, you have to use PCB-GFX instead of EMGD, which does not yet support 3D hardware acceleration and video, which depresses me.

6.1.

We put the driver
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gma500/emgd110
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install emgd-support

6.2.

Change the configuration file. Due to the exotic screen resolution (1600x768), the standard config is not suitable. Therefore, we take the config from here: paste.ubuntu.com/877399 , call 10-emgd.conf and copy to /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/ (with replacement if there was something of the same name).

6.3.

Setting sleep mode.
Install acpi-support package:
sudo apt-get install acpi-support
Download the paste.ubuntu.com/878451 file, call it acpi-support and replace the file in / etc / default

6.4.

Adjust the brightness adjustment.
We check that the kernel module responsible for brightness adjustment (emgdbl) is added to / etc / modules. If not, add.
In /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-emgd.conf we add the poulsbo module, which prevents us:
blacklist poulsbo
We make changes to the bootloader config to pass the correct parameter to the kernel:
the / etc / default / grub file, in the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT line, write acpi_backlight = video. Accordingly, if it was written something else, change.
Update bootloader settings by running
sudo update-grub
Setting up everything related to the video is complete, you can try to reboot

7. Power Consumption

7.1.

Good site lesswats.org

7.2.

Powertop is a good utility that shows power consumption

8. Optimization for SSD

8.1.

File system mount options. It is recommended to add noatime,nodiratime,discard to all ext4 sections in / etc / fstab
I have the truth when adding discard to / the system stops loading, so here you need to be more careful

8.2.

Set up a deferred entry. Add lines to /etc/sysctl.conf
vm.laptop_mode = 5
vm.dirty_writeback_centisecs = 6000


8.3.

Change the I / O scheduler to noop:
in / etc / default / grub in the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT line add elevator = noop, then run
sudo update-grub

8.4.

We transfer temporary file systems to memory. To do this, open / etc / fstab and add the lines there
tmpfs /var/lock tmpfs defaults 0 0
tmpfs /tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0
tmpfs /var/tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0


8.5.

We tell the system to use more operative than swap: add the line to /etc/sysctl.conf
vm.swappiness = 10

8.6.

Practically all these tips with a more detailed description are in the article: habrahabr.ru/post/129551 , from where I got them

9. Optimization

9.1.

Good article vasilisc.com/speedup_ubuntu

9.2.

Add in / etc / fstab for sections in ext4 options commit=100,barrier=0

9.3.

Turn on zRam (compressed swap partition in memory):
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:shnatsel/zram
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install zramswap-enabler

9.4.

A workaround for the kernel bug for increased power consumption:
In / etc / default / grub in the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT line add
pcie_aspm=force
Do not forget to do
sudo update-grub

9.5.

We put the core from Liquorix with useful patches:
echo "deb liquorix.net/debian sid main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/liquorix.list
echo "deb-src liquorix.net/debian sid main" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/liquorix.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install '^liquorix-([^-]+-)?keyring.?'
sudo apt-get install linux-image-liquorix-686 linux-headers-liquorix-686


There is one feature. In the 3.2 kernel, the parameter of the zram num_devices module in the zram_num_devices was renamed, so after the update, zRam stopped working. Repairing is simple: in the /etc/init/zramswap.conf file
modprobe zram num_devices=$num_cpus
change to
modprobe zram zram_num_devices=$num_cpus

9.6.

Power optimization with laptop-mode-tools.
We put the actual package
sudo apt-get install laptop-mode-tools
Oddly enough, the package from Ubuntu 11.10 does not support 3.x kernels. Fix it up: in the / usr / sbin / laptop_mode file we are looking for strings
case "$KLEVEL" in
"2.4" ) ;;
"2.6" ) ;;
*)
log "ERR" "Unhandled kernel version: $KLEVEL ('uname -r' = '$(uname -r)')" >&2
exit 1
;;
and between the lines
"2.6" ) ;;
*)
insert rows
"3.0" ) ;;
"3.1" ) ;;
"3.2" ) ;;
"3.3" ) ;;
(for sure).
After that, you can search the configuration files in /etc/laptop-mode/laptop-mode.conf and /etc/laptop-mode/conf.d/*

10. Anything is different

10.1.

Lxpanel bug with empty space
After waking up the laptop in lxpanel, an empty space appears in the system tray. To remove it in /etc/pm/sleep.d, create a file with an arbitrary name (I called 10_lxpanel-restart) and paste it there:
#!/bin/bash
case "$1" in
suspend|hibernate)
#do nothing
;;
resume|thaw)
export DISPLAY=:0
sleep 5 && lxpanelctl restart & #Delayed so the battery icon can finish wrecking shop.
;;
*)
exit 1
;;
esac
exit 0

Just in case we make the file executable:
sudo chmod a+x /etc/pm/sleep.d/10_lxpanel-restart

At the moment, for now. I tried unsuccessfully to start the built-in GPS, but since I didn’t really need it, I left it.