Gutsy Upgrade

So, I upgraded by laptop (hp tx1000z) from Feisty Fawn (Ubuntu Linux Version 7.04) to Gutsy Gibbon (Ubuntu Linux Version 7.10) today. My results are as follows:

Pros:

1. Integrated Wireless support for broadcom chips
2. Ubuntu FINALLY has pidgin.
3. It automatically backed up my overwritten config files.
4. The “Leave Message” feature of Gnome 2.20.0

Cons:

1. The integrated wireless support for my broadcom chip does not work at all.
2. The laptop doesn’t boot unless I press the power button after an erorr, then repeatedly tap a key.
3. It killed virtual box (my virtual machine program)
4. My speakers don’t produce sound anymore
5. My webcam no longer works
6. My touchscreen isn’t working anymore (it’s not misconfigured; it’s not recognized)
7. Computer starts with infinite >97% CPU usage 30% of the time
8. My computer’s screen dims after momentary idle
9. My computer’s screen dims after momentary idle after I turn uncheck the “Dim when idle option”
10. My computer turns off after I have the laptop lid closed for a few minutes
11. The computer isn’t auto-locked anymore when the lid is closed
12. Pornographic screensaver was installed on my computer

More cons (I separated this list from the other because it’s not something that Gutsy broke, but something it didn’t fix that I hoped it would)

1. I still can’t switch to a virtual terminal (ctrl+alt+fx) without X restarting
2. Hibernate still doesn’t work.
3. Suspend still doesn’t work.

…and what the fuck is up with the modified AOL guy in the top right hand corner?

Anyway, as you can tell the cons greatly outweigh the pros on this upgrade.

PROS:

1. Integrated Wireless support for broadcom chips (see con#1 )

As soon as I booted my computer, the friendly “Restricted Drivers Manager” prompted of three non-free drivers that I could install to better support my system. Previously, I had to manually download the nvidia drivers for my graphics card, and THEN enable it in the “Restricted Drivers Manager.” I was very pleased to see that it recognized that I was using an nvida graphics card, Lucent/Agere modem, and a Broadcom wireless card.

I don’t need the modem, but that would be relatively easy to enable (or so it seems). I enabled nvidia drivers for hardware acceleration (yay). –And I enabled the “Firmware for Broadcom 43xx chipset family.” I was happy with this–until I realized that enabling this driver accomplished absolutly nothing. (see con #1)

2. Ubuntu FINALLY has pidgin.

I’ve been pissed at Ubuntu forever for not including pidgin into its primary repositories for a long time. When someone asked me why I didn’t have much respect for Ubuntu Linux, I would respond with a few things–one of which was, “they still fucking have gaim.”

This might not even be that big of a deal for most people, but it made me accept that upgrading to Gutsy was a good idea (despite that the cons greatly outweigh the pros in quantity).

3. It automatically backed up my overwritten config files.

When Gutsy was installing, it warned me (not all at once, which was annoying because I had to babysit the install) that some config files that I’ve changed need to be overwritten. SO, naturally, I run the following commands:

sudo cp /etc/modprobe.d/aliases /etc/modprobe.d/aliases.bak
sudo cp /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.bak
sudo cp /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.bak
sudo cp /etc/services /etc/services.bak
sudo cp /etc/gdm/gdm.conf /etc/gdm/gdm.conf.bak

..and I told the updater it was ok to replace my files. When I go to re-configure my new applications, I also found the following files in addition to my .bak files:

/etc/modprobe.d/aliases.dpkg-old
/etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.dpkg-old
/etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.dpkg-old
/etc/services /etc/services.dpkg-old
/etc/gdm/gdm.conf.dpkg-old

That was nice.

3. The “Leave Message” feature of Gnome 2.20.0

Now I’m getting desperate for pros. But seriously, I think this is a neat feature. When you lock your computer, there’s an option to “Leave Message.” When the owner returns and unlocks the computer, they see whatever messages were left. It’s–well, c’mon, that’s cool, right?

Cons:

1. The integrated wireless support for my broadcom chip does not work at all.

I got all happy that it recognized my broadcom chip. Last time, I had to manually download the .exe from dell’s website and somehow extract some windows driver file from it, then wrap it with ndiswrapper. It was far more of a hack than it should be, and I always prefer it when software, drivers, etc are handled by the OS. Seeing that the “Restricted Drivers Manger” recognized my not-very-linux-friendly Broadcom chip and offered a quick, easy point-and-click solution brighted my day and initial reaction from Gutsy–but it doesn’t work.

I enabled it and rebooted a thousand times. NetworkManager simply could not do wireless. I was stuck with a cable (or should I say chain/shackle) until I re-did the ndiswrapper procedure I preformed in Feisty. The only thing I changed is that I upgraded ndiswrapper from 1.46 to 1.47 (whop-di do)

2. The laptop doesn’t boot unless I press the power button after an erorr, then repeatedly tap a key.

This has got to be the weirdest error in the world–and it has the most ghetto fix.

So, my computer gets stuck before it hits the ubuntu loading screen. In order to get it to GET to that screen, I have to press the power button (NOT hold the power button, as that would shut it off–but press it). Doing so causes it to continue with the startup sequence.

If you thought that was weird, get this: Once I’m to the Ubuntu Loading Screen, it stops loading and the only fix is if I repeatedly tap any key. I wish I was kidding. I wish I was an impatient bastard who only “claimed” this was the fix, but it wasn’t JUST taking a “WHILE.” No, it STOPS until I “remind” it to continue by pressing a key.

Conclusion: Gutsy gave my computer ADD.

3. It killed virtual box (my virtual machine program)

I can’t run virtual box anymore. I get errors about the vboxdrv kernel module not being loaded. Apparently I’m supposed to fix this by running /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup as root. This command finds the linux sources and automatically compiles it with the proper modules.

Oh, wait. I’m running Ubuntu.
Since everything is binary based, just how the fuck do I do that?

Well, it turns out that it didn’t apply anyway. I saw virtualbox was actually added to the standard repos (I had to do it through a .deb file last time). However, just another con inside of a con, it didn’t natively work; I had to add a repository from the virtualbox website:

deb http://www.virtualbox.org/debian gutsy non-free

Then I was able to install the mystery “virtualbox” package, and everything works! Oh, but it bitches that it can’t find an audio device–oh, thats because Gutsy killed my sound. Moving right along…

4. My speakers don’t produce sound anymore

This is another thing that, like the wireless, I had to do some hacking to get working in the first place. Well, I did the same hacking (manually compiling alsa drivers) and it worked again. Thanks for the set-back, Gutsy!

5. My webcam no longer works

I have to admit it: I was very impressed with Feisty that my webcam worked with Ekiga Softphone OOTB with V4L2. That is no more; Gutsy murdered my webcam functionality.

6. My touchscreen isn’t working anymore (it’s not misconfigured; it’s not recognized)

Ugh, I’m REALLY procrastinating on fixing this one AGAIN :-/

7. Computer starts with infinite >97% CPU usage 30% of the time

I still don’t know why the hell this is, but about 1/3 of the times I star my computer, nautilus–the little bitch that it is–decides to max out my cpu. Until I kill the process, my processor usage literally never drops below 97% CPU usage.

Trackerd does the same thing, but at least with IT I saw my CPU usage get down to 87% once.

When I get rid of those two processes, I idle between 4-25% CPU usage. This is still far too high IMHO.

8. My computer’s screen dims after momentary idle

One thing that has always pissed me off about computers is when they automatically do things for you. I’m fine with a program with tons of features (so long as you don’t sacrifice performance), but what I’m NOT fine with is automatically turning those features on for you.

Edgy never did this. I’ve always been pissed at windows for automatically dimming the screen after being idle, and imagine how I took it when linux did it to me! *gasp* ..I actually use this feature now, but I still think it’s a con because you can’t set the amount of time an “idle” is. Annoying..

9. My computer’s screen dims after momentary idle after I turn uncheck the “Dim when idle option”

What the fuck!

I mean, c’mon people! I tell it NOT to dim my screen after being idle, and after a minute or so of being idle, it sets it the screen brightness to the “set display brightness to” setting.

Personally, I like to set my brightness myself. I use my computer to take notes in lectures. In dark rooms, I set the brightness low to save battery life. If I don’t touch my computer for a minute, it kicks the brightness up to 100%.

Having to reset my brightness manually every 60 seconds is getting to be a real bitch.

10. My computer turns off after I have the laptop lid closed for a few minutes

I discovered this before I found out about the “you have to press the power button and repeatedly tap a key in order to boot your system.” After class, I put my laptop in my bag without turning it off (afraid it wouldn’t boot again). When I got back to my room and opened it, I got the last glimpse of the shutdown screen. What the hell? I couldn’t find a feature that would cause this; I still don’t know why it did that.

11. The computer isn’t auto-locked anymore when the lid is closed

This was a brilliant option. Think about it: Every time you step away from your laptop, you shut the lid, right? I do. It’s a perfect event to lock the computer. Now, as I stated before, I don’t like it when features like this are automatically turned on, so I wasn’t mad when the feature wasn’t automatically turned on in Gutsy. What I WAS mad about is how there is no feature to turn it back on. I searched EVERYWHERE: Sessions, Screensaver, Power Managment, Login Window, Screens and Graphics, etc. I eventually found how to turn it on with the help of an ubuntu thread. Apparently you have to run “gconf-editor” and go to “apps > gnome-power-manager > lock” and check the “black_screen” checkbox.

Alright, now, what the fuck. Like I said, I don’t mind that they made a feature no longer automatically enabled, but why the hell did they have to take it away, then make it so god damn difficult to re enable. Surely there’s more people out there that say, “hey, it used to do this; I want it back.” Hey Ubuntu, how the hell was I (and them) supposed to think “hmm, why don’t I just check under apps > gnome-power-manager > lock” for the arbitrary “blank_screen” checkbox in gconf-editor?? And I thought ubuntu was supposed to be user-friendly.

13. Pornographic screensaver was installed on my computer

No, I’m not kidding. It’s called WebCollage.

Warning: mature audiences only: You can read all about it in my other post.

Michael Altfield

Hi, I’m Michael Altfield. I write articles about opsec, privacy, and devops ➡

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