Getting Everything Working in Lucid Lynx (Ubuntu 10.04)
on Dell Alienware m11x-R2
I recently got a m11x-R2 laptop, and it's a complete powerhouse. Most things did work out of the box under Ubuntu. The following procedure managed to get everything working:
- Installed via Unetbootin and a handy jump drive (make sure it is FAT formatted)
- After install be sure to enable to Broadcom wireless drivers (System -> Administration -> Hardware Drivers)
- The automatic updates will pull down a fairly large number of packages, none of which break anything else.
- The remaining issues (wifi instability, sound coming only through headphones, and not through speakers, use of "optimus" dynamic video card switching, and full use of Core i7 features) are solved by forcing a kernel update. Which is done by doing the following:
- Download the three files that constitute the new kernel (2.6.34-020634), one, two, and .
- In the folder containing all three, run the following:
sudo dpkg -i *.deb
- Rebooting will reveal that the wifi no longer works, as bcmwl-kernel-source fails to install under 2.6.34. This can be fixed (note that the version I installed was 2.6.32-31, use locate linux/autoconf.h if you're not sure where your old version is).
sudo cp /usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.32-31-generic/include/linux/autoconf.h /usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.34-020634-generic/include/linux/autoconf.hlinux/autoconf.h /usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.34-020634-generic/include/linux/auto sudo dpkg-reconfigure bcmwl-kernel-source
- This should yield a system with all the problems solved and vastly improved battery life under Ubuntu.
- Download the program from here.
- Open a terminal in the directory with the jar file and run the following (assuming you don't have jdk and the usb libraries installed already):
sudo apt-get install openjdk-6-jre sudo apt-get install libusb-1.0-0 sudo java -jar AlienFX-0.4b.jar
- All the effects can be changed within the GUI that opens, and persist once it's closed.