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Apreche
Starting Member
USA
17 Posts |
 Posted - 03/16/2007 : 10:39:27
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I recently got a P7230 and I'm running Ubuntu Edgy on it. I was careful to select the Intel wireless card, and I am glad I did because almost absolutely everything on this laptop "just works" out of the box.
One thing that does not work, sadly, are the keys which change the monitor brightness. When booting the computer the brightness keys Fn+F6 and Fn+F7 work as normal. As soon as grub finishes loading the kernel in memory, that is no longer true.
I am able to change the brightness using the video module through /proc/acpi/video/GFX0/LCD/brightness. They keys, however, don't do anything. I can see in /var/log/acpid that when I push Fn+F7 an even t is received and passed to X and hal, but nothing comes of it. Pushing Fn+F6 shows nothing in acpid. If I watch the tail of dmesg I can see "video device notify" events when I push either button, but those events don't result in the brightness ever actually changing.
Also, less important, the A and ECO buttons don't register anywehre at all. I can't figure out how they work or how to get them to do anything at all in Linux.
Everything else works great. If you are looking for an Ultraportable to run Linux, this is a good one. As soon as this brightness issue is solved, it might be the best one. |
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tmt
Advanced Member
2760 Posts |
Posted - 03/16/2007 : 10:51:34
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Wow thanks for the report. I'm surprised you are having success with the Intel card,
I'm having quite the opposite, ipw3945d is prone to looping and it is nearly impossible
to have everything work automatically at boot in both AC and battery. I have to start
it all by hand to be sure it works. This is running FC6 x86_64, a heavily patched
2.6.20 kernel and ipw 1.2.0 from sourceforge though.
What can you tell us about the machine overall? Are you satisfied with the hardware
and what about the fan, etc?
Tom. |
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Apreche
Starting Member
USA
17 Posts |
Posted - 03/16/2007 : 11:39:33
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I blame the problems you are having on FC6. In Ubuntu, it really does just work :) Even suspend and hibernate just work. It's terrific.
As for the machine itself, it definitely beats my expectations. I had a hard time deciding between this and the ThinkPad X60s. I don't need lots of processing power, but I wasn't sure that the Core Solo would be enough. I ended up choosing the Fujitsu because it was smaller, yet the screen had higher resolution than the Lenovo. 1280x768 at 10.6" vs. 1024x768@12" is no contest. I'm glad I chose the Fujitsu because the Core Solo is certainly fast enough. Don't expect to do any 3D, gaming or encoding, but for web browsing and the usual, it's actually fast. I can play YouTube videos without lag, that's good enough for me. The single gigabyte of RAM is actually twice a much as my 4 year old desktop, so no complaints there.
As for the fan, it is obviously not perfect, but nothing to cry about either. Basically, whenever you get the machine working hard it starts to blow lots of hot air out the side, and that makes noise. It makes more noise than our Mac mini, but it makes less noise than just about any other computer I've had. The only problem would be if trying to use the speakers while the fan is going. I think that is more a problem of the speakers being too quiet than the fan being too loud. I mostly only use the sound on the laptop in situations where it is quiet around me or I am wearing my etymotic 6i isolation earbuds. The only thing about the fan is that maybe it isn't working hard enough. The left side of the machine can get pretty warm.
The only complaint I have with the hardware itself is that the screen gets pretty dirty. I have to clean it a lot and avoid touching it. It's only really a problem because this is a computer I plan to carry around and give quite a beating over the years.
If you run Linux, don't need high performance and care about battery life, weight and screen resolution more than other features, then this is the machine to buy.
That is, as soon as we can figure out how to change the brightness of the screen. |
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genehilton
Starting Member
USA
29 Posts |
Posted - 03/20/2007 : 22:16:32
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I think the answer may be to get a new (2.6.20.x) kernel.
I just bought one of the p7120s fujitsu is clearing out on ebay and have observed the same problem with the brightness. It works under windows and before in the bios but not in linux. I tried both the old FUJ02B1 patches and the acpi video module in the stock Debian etch kernel (2.6.18). I even went so far as hacking the video.c acpi source with a bunch of printk statements and figured which events actually trigger with the brightness keys. I figured out enough to either email the author or write it myself, but decided to get the latest kernel. It seems to have incorporated all I had learned and more. Now the brightness keys just work.
Maybe it works on the 7230 too. |
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Apreche
Starting Member
USA
17 Posts |
Posted - 04/12/2007 : 00:00:47
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Yep, the brightness works with a newer kernel. I'm running the Feisty beta now, which has 2.6.20, and it's great. It's not perfect though. I'm maintaining a laptop testing page on the Ubuntu Wiki about my progress. It should be helpful to anyone else who wants to run Linux on this machine.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LaptopTestingTeam/FujitsuLifebookP7230 |
Edited by - Apreche on 04/12/2007 00:02:24 |
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argotnaut
Starting Member
USA
24 Posts |
Posted - 04/21/2007 : 21:23:05
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| Apreche, does this model have the built-in webcam? If so, is it working? The latest Feisty has gspca drivers included by default and I'm hoping that it might work with those. |
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