Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Fixing Asus t91 Microphone on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

After installing skype on my asus eee t91 running ubuntu 9.10 karmic koala i was unable to get the microphone working in skype(although the web cam worked straight away).

I fixed the problem by doing the following(you'll need to enable backports repositories if you haven't already):
open a terminal and type:

sudo apt-get install linux-backports-modules-alsa-karmic-generic

then reboot.

after rebooting open a terminal and type:

pavucontrol

after running pavucontrol select the input tab and then you can unlock channels and adjust levels etc.

You need to upgrade your alsa version to fix this issue. Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala comes with alsa 1.0.20 in order for the mic to work you need to upgrade to version 1.0.21

To check your current version type this at the terminal:
cat /proc/asound/version

you should get something like this:

Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Driver Version 1.0.20.
Compiled on Dec 2 2009 for kernel 2.6.31-16-generic (SMP).

You can install the latest 1.0.21 version by doing the following.

open a terminal and type:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ricotz/unstable

then type:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

After this jump into skype and make a test call, the mic should now be working.

Thanks to this post for the instructions:

*Note: before finding this solution I had fiddled with some other sound settings so short of doing a fresh install i can't guarantee these are the only steps to getting the mic working. If this solution does not work for you please leave a comment.

Saturday, November 28, 2009

Touch Screen for Asus eee T91 on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

Getting your T91 touchscreen in Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala requires the following steps.

When i did this i configured the graphics card first and the the resolution to 1024x600. I'm not sure if this is a required step but i'd recommend doing it. To find out how you can see my blog post here.

First you need to install the evtouch drivers, open a terminal and type the following

sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-input-evtouch

then reboot, after that the touchscreen will be working but most likely not correctly calibrated. There is an issue with the evtouch screen calibration in 9.10 so you need to run the calibration with no X server running.

The first command will stop X and take you to a terminal so either remember the steps after it or have another computer handy. Open a terminal and type:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop
after this you will be asked to log in.
then :

cd /usr/bin

now run the calibration utility.

sudo calibrate_touchscreen

There were no instructions when i ran the calibration tool so here is what you need to do.
once it opens run your stylus around the edge of the screen then hit enter.
The top left cross will then go red, press the center of it and then release, the next cross should then go red. Do this for all 9 crosses and the configuration utility will exit when you click the last one.

next restart X by running

startx

Note, if i didn't restart X and just rebooted from the command line the new configuration was not saved, not sure why.

hope this helps, good luck!

Desktop Effects and Compiz for Asus eee T91 on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

To enable advanced desktop effects/compiz on your Asus eee T91 in Ubuntu 9.10 you will first need to install the Poulsbo(psb) drivers. For instructions on installing the psb drivers check out my post here

Once you have the drivers installed you need to tell Compiz to use them
Open a terminal and type the following:
sudo gedit /usr/bin/compiz

find the "Driver Whitelist" (around line 61) it will look something like this
# Driver whitelist
WHITELIST="nvidia intel ati radeon radeonhd i810 fglrx"

add psb to the front of the list so it looks like this:
# Driver whitelist
WHITELIST="psb nvidia intel ati radeon radeonhd i810 fglrx"

Then reboot

You will now be able to enable desktop effects via System->Preferences->Appearance->Visual Effects.

If you want to have the full Compiz including desktop cube etc open a terminal and type:

sudo apt-get install compiz compizconfig-settings-manager compiz-fusion-plugins-main compiz-fusion-plugins-extra emerald librsvg2-common

Then reboot

You can now access Compiz settings via System->Preferences->CompizConfig Settings Manager.

Fixing screen resolution for Asus T91 on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

After a fresh install of Ubuntu 9.10 on my new Asus T91 the screen resolution is set to 800x600 and can't be changed. To fix this problem you need to install Poulsbo(psb) drivers.


NOTE: while the following instructions will still work there is a newer method available which is recommended please see:


I followed the steps over at this page http://poulsbo-karmic.angelfire.com/
for convenience i'll repost them up here in english but all credit for the fix goes to the original author.

Open a terminal and type:

wget http://poulsbo-karmic.angelfire.com/files/poulsbo1.tar.gz

tar -zxvf poulsbo1.tar.gz

cd poulsbo1

sudo ./install.pl
Then reboot, you should now be able to set the screen resolution to 1024x600.

Fixing wireless network card for Asus eee T91 on Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala

After doing a fresh install of Ubuntu 9.10(Karmic Koala) on my new Asus eee T91 i was pleased to notice the wireless was working out of the box. However after a few days of use i noticed the wireless networking was very slow and would drop out while working with large files. After a bit of research and reading about similar problems in Ubuntu 9.04 I came up with the following solution.

While the wireless will work out of the box it will run slowly and intermittently drop out.
to fix this do the following:
Open a terminal and enter the following:

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

and then uncomment(remove the hash at the start of the line) these two lines.

deb http://au.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ karmic-backports main restricted universe multiverse
deb-src http://au.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ karmic-backports main restricted universe multiverse

then save the file and close it.
next type:

sudo apt-get update

then:

sudo apt-get install linux-backports-modules-karmic

then reboot

Since doing this the wireless has worked perfectly, no drop outs and good speeds.

Hope this helps, i will have guides on setting up the screen drivers, touchscreen and compiz coming soon.