My Fujitsu S7020 is a fine example of Linux friendly hardware, but recently I had the “opportunity” to install Ubuntu 7.04 on a Fujitsu Amilo Pro V2035.

Things didn't go so smoothly with this machine..Read below for my notes.

The main contributor to my pain and suffering is the Via Graphics Chipset. This laptop has taught me that this chipset (which is prevalent in the cheaper end of the market) is best totally avoided, particularly if you ever want to run Linux and even more so if you want any sort of 3D performance.

To be fair on the Fuijitsu it is/was the cheapest model in their line up. Yet it still has more than reasonable build quality and impressive (at this price level) battery life.

Just don't be wanting to install Linux on it...or if you do prepare for some “fun”

First thing you will notice as the live installer for Ubuntu starts is that you are stuck at 800x600 with a vesa driver, you could try installing the Via drivers but personally I wouldn't bother and instead head over to the openchrome project (here).

But before you do that you will have to learn how to move windows about without using the title bars. (alt and left click to move the windows about so you can get to the buttons on a 800x600 screen and then go and file a Ubuntu bug for the installer being broken at vesa resolutions)

Video

Complete the installation and get the machine on the internet (wired only will work at the moment) and then drop to a terminal and complete the following steps

sudo apt-get build-dep xserver-xorg-video-via

sudo apt-get install subversion autoconf automake1.9 libtool

Now get the Openchrome source.

svn checkout http://svn.openchrome.org/svn/trunk openchrome

This will creat an copenchrome folder in your home dir, move into it with "cd openchrome" Now build openchrome

./autogen.sh --prefix=/usr

make

Now if that worked, install openchrome

sudo make install

Now we edit the xorg.conf file to use the new driver. Look in the "device" section and change the Driver line to "via" where it currently says "vesa" While you are in the file you should also add the following lines. In the same section where you just changed the driver add the following (it is caase sensitive)

Option “EnableAGPDMA” “on”

Option “SWCursor”

The first one of these improves performance, the second one solves a problem with the mouse pointer vanishing sometimes. Next scroll up a bit to the section for the synaptics input device and add the following line.

Option          "SHMConfig"             "On"

Next scroll down again until you find the screen section and add "1280x800" to the mode line for your default colour depth (probably 24) Save this file and restart X, if all goes well you should now be running with the correct resolution and some degree of 2D and 3D acceleration

Touchpad

The reason we added the shared memory option in the touchpad configuration is that we need to make some adjustments to the touchpad, you will probably have already noticed that it is way over-sensitive to tapping left clicks. Again from the terminal type

sudo apt-get install gsynaptics

Once done you will have a touchpad icon under "System, Preferences" where you can adjust the tap to click behavior  oe just turn it off completely.

Wireless

Good news here, the support for the broadcomm wireless chipset is already in the kernel, no need for ndiswrapper or other nastiness here, all that needs to be done is to add the chipset firmware and it is good to go, even better there is a tool to do this for us. 

sudo apt-get install bcm43xx-fwcutter

Follow the instructions during the installation and this will download, extract and install the firmware for you. One reboot later you should have wireless.

Speed Scaling

To get better battery performance and run at a lower temperature you need to have a bit of a poke around with the CPU frequency scaling as by default this isn't working. /etc/modules needs a line adding to as as follows.

p4-clockmod

Then you can either manually add the module or reboot. Next add the CPU speed monitor to your Gnome panel and then by right clicking it you should see that the clock speed has slipped down and goes up again when you make the machine do some work.

However I wanted some more control over this and I wanted the speed scaling to be turned off for maximum performance if the machine was on mains power.

Open gconf-editor and have a poke around in apps,gnome-power-manager. There are plenty of things to play with but the ones you will really want to change are "show_cpufreq_ui" and "show_actions_in_menu"..tick both of these.

Once this is done you will find options in "System" "Preferences" "Power Management" from the Gnome panel for CPU speed both on and off mains power.

The remaining issues I have are as follows.

3D is very unreliable and sometimes hangs machine, this is a known openchrome bug on some chipsets, For now I have given up on 3D and commented out  Load "DRI" from my xorg.conf

No video overlay modes on internal screen, again an openchrome bug on some machines, use software rendering options in your video players.

CPU fan runs all the time.