Ubuntu Netbook Remix on Aspire One
The way this works is that on another machine (or I guess on an existing OS on the netbook) you download a bootable USB key image. With some trepidation (not a whole lot, I did back up first), I put in the USB key and settled in to see how far I could get with the installation.
Well, a short time later I realised I’d finished installing and was really just fiddling! Straight out of the box the wifi worked, the hibernate worked, sound (in and out) worked, the webcam worked, and there is this great window handler thing which amalgamates title bar and task bar into one. There’s also a cute menu on the desktop – all in all its really neat:
The working hibernate in particular has really made a big difference, at home the netbook just gets used for short bursts and lives next to my bed, usually plugged in. When it comes into its own though is at conferences! I can flip this thing open, use it, and flip it shut, pretty much all day. The startup time is really small from suspend and so long as I’m only dipping in and out (at conferences, I’m mostly in talks so I’m only ever checking mail etc), the battery life easily lasts a day.
Thanks to the Ubuntu folks – this is one quality piece of software and now I love my little netbook even more. Anyone else using the netbook remix? Were your experiences as good as mine?
Ooo… Nice.
I didn’t know about that. I may have to look at it for my father’s netbook.
Thanks
I was under the impression that alot of people were returning their Linux netbooks because it didn’t work with their Windows applications. People wanted a netbook they could connect to their printer for example.
Cyberspice: yes, do. Its easy to use and has email/messenger/browser and open office just as you’d expect.
Ambyr: I don’t use windows but the linux netbook has an application to do everything I need. Printer manufacturers do make some models which don’t work with linux but since I already have linux machines, my peripherals are compatible. I haven’t heard of any instances of people returning their linux netbooks, although the version that my aspire one shipped with, “Linspire Light”, was very poor indeed – the Ubuntu installation was a definite upgrade and very painless.
A couple of years ago, I attended ZendCon for the first time. At that time, the only laptop I had was a work machine weighing 5kg, and I was staying in a different hotel from the main conference – so I hastily bought pretty much the first non-ee netbook
So how did you get those handy buttons left and right?
‘Cause those do not seem to come out of the box.