Sony Vaio P: Finding the right Linux Distro

This tutorial shows how to install Linux Mint on the Sony Vaio P (VGN-P21Z) netbook.

It took a while to find a distro that boots, supports the GMA500 (poulsbo) chipset, has some multimedia capability and the best: is debian based!
Ubuntu 10.10 did not even boot, Jolicloud needed a trick to start by tricking the RAM size still did not support the 3G modem, did not read any SD or MemoryStick cards inserted, and it seemed that once booted, the distro does not care about any usb drive plugged in the USB ports. Further, Flash (youtube) playback was interrupted and it was impossible to resize the video, etc.

So, here it is: Linux Mint on the Sony Vaio P

1. DownLoad Unetbootin to create a bootable live USB drive:

http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/

2. Prepare a 1GB+ USB drive.
SD cards plugged into a multi-format card reader did not work..

3. Fromat the USB drive to WIN32 bit LBA mode

-first fdisk: del all, create new, partition type: “c”, set boot flag, write partition table to Flash, and exit fdisk.
-then mkfs.vfat /dev/sdx….

more here.

4. Run Unetbootin, choose  Linux Mint, version 9 (this version is based on Ubuntu 10.4).
Choose the usb drive and create the usb…

5. Switch the vaio off, plug into AC power. Plug in the usb into the Vaio, righ side USB plug. Slide the power button to right. Breathe…

6. Press several times F2, until the BIOS appears. Set external drive booting active, save bios, restart.

7. Boot the Mint Linux into mode 3 (compatibility mode or sthng like that in English). The other mode (mode 2) did not work, probably needs the same trick, as JoliCloud did, ie. pressing TAB at -grub time, and setting the memory size to 1900MB or less by using the following trick:

memmap=1K#0x7f800000 –

Now, Mint seems to be installed, but we need to fix some thing in order to have a real tiny multimedia PC:

Fix.1:. Connectivity:
try the 3G UMTS Modem, WiFi connections. WiFi should work out of the box, while the 3G modem needs a little trick:
Important:
do not forget to  deactivate the PIN of your SIM by using a mobile phone, before inserting it inot the Vaio.

How to make the modem appear in the list of wireless connections (thanks, elastic!):
- download this file and unzip it (creates a new folder),
- open terminal, switch to the newly unzipped folder, and execute the following one-by-one:
make => sudo make test => sudo make install
(the last one will do the depmod -a trick)
- restart and look for the Mobile broadband option under the Connectivity options:

Fix.2: Graphics, resolution, 2D, 3D acceleration:
Although screen resolution will be ok, glxGears will indicate only about 105 frames per second. Solution: install poulsbo support. Do not forget: the 9 version of Mint is based on Ubuntu 10.4!

Important: First edit the Grub parameters, and only then install the poulsbo drivers, otherwise you will get black screen after booting, and invoking command line (Alt-Ctrl-1) will also not work! So, pls change the grub params and THEN install the poulso drivers:

 

1) limit the amount of RAM used by the system so that there will be more available for the videocard:

sudo gedit /etc/default/grub

add the following parameters to grub configuation if you have for example 1GB RAM:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=”mem=896mb”

or if you have 2GB RAM:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX="mem=1920mb"

next run:

sudo update-grub

2) Install the poulsbo drivers:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gma500/ppa && sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install poulsbo-driver-2d poulsbo-driver-3d poulsbo-config

more details here. After the driver installation, glxGears should run at 800-1000 frames per sec (10x faster as w/o the driver). Below a compatibility table, screen-shot of the Ubuntu HW support page from 24.01.2011:

Fix.3: Install supported Video Player applications
… that are supported by the recent Poulsbo driver (vaapi backend):

mplayer, gnome-mplayer and vlc

Now: vlc seems to provide wrong video screen ratios, meaning that the whole video image is compressed into the left half of vlc window. The rest of the window is black. Acc to some sources, this poulsbo-related vlc bug has been already reported to the vlc team…

But luckily mplayer performs well, at least when opening a file by using the following parameters:

mplayer -vo vaapi -va vaapi %F

By trying smplyer (the graphical interface of the command line mplayer application), the situation is almost as good s using vlc: you need to play a lot with the settings, and even using x11 as output the -vo and -va parameters as above .. do not lead to fluent video playback. Reason unknown, pls give feedback if you manage to succeed..

Possible fix: to edit mplayer conf file, and not to use any options in smplayer setting window..

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1229345&page=152

Fix.4: Sleep and hibernation
… do not work right after installing the distro, so i did chose the simplest solution:

Menu > All applications > Preferences > Power management > When laptop lid is closed: Blank, When battery power critically low: shut down, Put computer to sleep: never

There is a way to solve the hibernation and sleep mode problem, solution here (session: tweaks). The following direct command (through command line) works…

Suspend by using uswsusp (alternative)

1. run:
sudo apt-get purge vbetool && sudo apt-get install uswsusp

2. …. and suspend using:

sudo s2ram –force

… but the trick by creating the defaults file …: the wake-up phase seems to be problematic (very long) on the vaio… Hope it helps. Cheers!

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