Ubuntu Feisty Fawn Wireless

[MadMarc]

I just installed Feisty Fawn on a Gateway notebook dual booting Windows Vista 32 bit version.

The install went fairly smooth, had a bit of a time with the partitioner (I prefer the text based partitioner used in the Dapper 6.06 Alternate), but finally got everything installed without fragging my Windows partitions.

The only fly in the ointment is the wireless setup which I am having a devil of a time figuring out. There is too much information and not enough information all at the same time!

Here are some specs of the notebook:
Gateway MT6460
Windows Vista Home Premium/Ubuntu Feisty Fawn 7.04
AMD Athlon 64x2 Dual-Core TK-53 1.70 GHz
2GB 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM PC25300
ATI Radeon XPress 1150 graphics (integrated)
Mainboard chipset - ATI Radeon RS482
Network card - Marvell semiconductor Yukon 88E8038 PCI-E Fast Ethernet Controller
Realtek RTL8187 Wireless 802.11g 54mbps USB2.0 Network Adapter
Northbridge - ATI Radeon RS482
Northbridge - AMD K8 Bridge
Southbridge - IXP SB400 PCI-ISA Bridge

I was using a D-Link EBR-2310 wired router with a Linksys WAP11V28 Wireless-B Access Point but just changed that out for a Linksys WRT54GL Wireless-G Broadband Router.

When I booted the Ubuntu Feisty Live CD I was able to see my WAP11V28 setup and connect to it but it would not stay connected. After installing Feisty on the hard drive I could not connect at all. Strange.

After changing out my router setup and configuring it with my XP machine via ethernet cable I tested the setup with my notebook booted into Vista. Presto, whammo, connected just fine! So, I know everything works. Boot into Feisty - thud - hit a wall, no go.

Now I am researching and trying to find info about setting up the wireless in Ubuntu. I'll post back with what I find out in a few hours (days, weeks, months).

If anyone may have any helpful suggestions I sure would appreciate it.

One item of interest, the notebook touch pad works a little funky in Ubuntu Feisty. Wonder if there is any way to tweak it?

[Seth W. Klein]

My first suggestion is searching for the laptop model to see if anyone has it working with any distribution. http://www.linux-laptop.net/ often has stuff, and Google knows (almost) everything :) Even if you don't understand the information you find, one of us might.

It's hard to describe good funk, and nothing does funk like a touch pad, but can you have a try at describing what it's doing differently than in Windows?

[Corey Osgood]

About the touchpad, if it's a Synaptics touchpad, get gSynaptics (not to be confused with the Synaptic package manager) from the repos. There's also a line that has to be added to your xorg.conf, in the "Input Device" section, add Option "SHMConfig" "on". Works great on my hp laptop, the touchpad was way to sensitive by default.

EDIT: on the wireless, there's a driver available from realtek here. I have no idea how to install it or if it works. There's also ndiswrapper, which uses your windows drivers, and is available in the repos. It's pretty straighforward to set up, and there's even a GUI for it, although I don't remember what it's called. A search for ndiswrapper in synaptic should turn it up.

[MadMarc]

Hey Corey, thanks for the info!
I think that is what I was experiencing, too sensitive. Also the thing would lock onto the scroll function and I would have to repeatedly tap the pad to free it.
I just found the synaptics touchpad app in the repos the other day. Haven't had time to configure the touchpad and wireless on the notebook though because I just got done setting up an "old beige box" for my mother-in-law. Going to try and get her to use Ubuntu! She's using Win98 now and her PC is too feeble to run anything newer. So now I am getting her set up with a dual boot Win98/Feisty alternate machine. I'll be interested to see how she takes to it.
Managed to frag my own back-up PC (old beige box triple booting Win98/Kubuntu6.06_alt/Ubuntu6.06_alt) so I just gave it up and installed Freespire. I kinda like the Freespire.
I also installed PC LinuxOS 2007 on a different old beige box and am giving that a test spin.
Seems like PC LinuxOS 2007 would be a good choice for someone switching from Windows.
I'm about done playing. Time to get down to brass tacks and get that notebook configured so I can use the Ubuntu on that!
Thanks again.