Last updated: 2008-01-02

Linux FC2-6 on a HP Pavilion zt3000 Notebook

I got HP Pavilion zt3000 in Sept 2004, with Windows XP Home preinstalled. I installed Fedora Core 2 from the CDs with no serious problem. A number of WWW pages provided useful hints:

  1. //www.ratna-lab.ch/papers/hp-pavilion-3000
  2. //www.silfreed.net/articles/hpzt3000cto
Writing this page I used the page 1 as a template.

The bottomline: I like this laptop and it works well with Linux. Later, I upgraded to FC4 and FC6 (see below).


Specs

Processor IntelŪ Centrino™ Mobile Technology IntelŪ PentiumŪ M 1.5 MHz
Memory 512 MB DDR SDRAM (two slots, 2 GB max.)
Harddisk 60 GB (4200 rpm)
Display 15,4" WVA WSXGA+ Widescreen (1680x1050)
Graphics Card64MB ATI MOBILITY™ RADEON™ R250 9000 M9
CD DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive
Network Interfaces built-in V92 modem, built-in 10/100 LAN Ethernet, built-in Intel Pro Wireless 2200 802.11b/g WLAN

Here is the output of lspci -v.

Installation

I made a double boot machine. In order to shrink the XP partition I used Partition Magic. But first I had to run defragment and chkdsk /f   3-4 times.

I booted with the CD, selected graphic screen (1400x1050) and chose "Manual Installation". Before going to "Druid" I went into the console, called fdisk /dev/hda and repartitioned the disk as follows:

   
Disk /dev/hda: 60.0 GB, 60011642880 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 7296 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
 
   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1   *           1        1530    12284968+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda2            1530        1543      105840   83  Linux
/dev/hda3            1543        1665      982800   83  Linux
/dev/hda4            1665        7296    45231480    5  Extended
/dev/hda5            1665        2517     6841768+  83  Linux
....... etc ..............

Then I returned to "Druid" and assigned filesystems to the partitions. The rest went smooth, apart from the offered choice of the screen resolution, which missed the 1680x1050 value. I selected the standard LCD screen at 1400x1050 for that moment, and changed it later.

I upgraded all FC2 packages including the kernel.

My Experience With the Subsystems

I mark the functionality status I achieved by a scale 0-3:
  1. Does not work at all
  2. Works somehow, but an important functionality is missing
  3. Mostly works with some small inconveniences
  4. Works fine, no problem noticed
I also indicate approximately the efforts I spent with the subsystems (needless to say, this is a highly subjective parameter):
  1. No time spent - worked out of the box
  2. Less than 1 hour spent
  3. More than 1 hour spent
The experience I have so far with various subsystems is as follows:
Subsystem Status Efforts
Display   3 1
VGA output to projector   2 2
Ethernet   3 0
built-in WLAN   3 2
PCMCIA WLAN Orinoco   3 2
Sound   3 0
Sound buttons   0 0
USB   3 0

Display

Using a FC2 graphic tool I was able to change the monitor resolution to 1680x1050, which added a line "LCD Panel 1680x1050" in the "Monitor" section of xorg.conf. I had to add the 1680x1050 resolution in the "Screen" section of this file by hand. There was a problem - after that the GNOME panel images went sick and I had to remove all the GNOME directories which had been created so far in my personal account and start X again. This copied different images, I presume, and everything worked fine.

Here is the file xorg.conf.

VGA Output to Projector

It is not straightforward. The Fn-F4 key does not work consistently with Linux. Normally, it changes nothing, though once or twice in some instances, which I can not clearly identfy, the key really turned the VGA on/off. There are several problems:
  1. The aspect ratio of the laptop screen is not standard for projectors - the left side is cut off (also in Windows!)
  2. The resolution selected on the VGA output is poor. If the projector is connected to VGA when X starts, the resolution goes to 640x480. If it is not connected during the X startup some resolution is chosen, which typically does not match the projector parameters.
  3. Since the typical projector resolutions is 1024x768, this should used for the laptop's display, otherwise the projector displays only a fraction of the screen.
After messing around with single/double video heads, I found a more or less satisfactory configuration. It uses a different X session for projector presentation. Here is the configuration file
xorg.conf.double. I start it with:
startx -- :1 -config xorg.conf.double
Unfortunately, at this starting moment the projector has to be plugged into the VGA connector! This is an inconvenience, but not a disater.

Ethernet

It worked out of the box.

WLAN

It did not work out of the box, and required a couple of hours of work. I had to copy the ipw2200 driver (I started with IPW2200-0.7, then used the next version 0.8 when it appeared a week later) and the appropriate firmware (see the same site), compiled it following the instructions from the package. The firmware had to be copied to a place used by hotplug: /usr/lib/hotplug/firmware/ . There was no need to recompile the kernel. I used the system-config-network tool to set up the ifcfg-eth1 configuration file. I did not install the driver to /lib/modules/..., but load it every time explcitly, using the tools provided with the driver (load / unload ).

I encountered a problem with the driver version 0.7. It worked fine in some environments (at home and in my office) where there was only one access point nearby. It did not work in the conference room, where several accesss points are visible. It saw the access points, but indicates a very low signal and fails to connect. With Windows XP (this is a dual boot laptop) there was no problem with wireless connections in these locations, the reported signal is strong. This problem, fortunately, was fixed in the driver version 0.8!

Eventually, it works fine. The file ifcfg-eth1 looks as follows. The KEY is kept in the file keys-eth1.
# Intel Corp.|Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 2200BG
DEVICE=eth1
ONBOOT=no
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
NETMASK=
# HWADDR=00:0e:35:XX:XX:XX
HWADDR=
DHCP_HOSTNAME=
IPADDR=
DOMAIN=
USERCTL=no
PEERDNS=yes
GATEWAY=
TYPE=Wireless
IPV6INIT=no
ESSID=XXXX
CHANNEL=
MODE=Managed
RATE=Auto
The result of iwconfig eth1 is here:
eth1      ieee 802.11b  ESSID:"XXXX"  Nickname:"localhost.localdomain"
          Mode:Managed  Channel:6  Access Point: 00:E0:63:XX:XX:XX
          Bit Rate=11Mb/s
          RTS thr:off
          Encryption key:XXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XX   Security mode:restricted
          Power Management:off
          Link Quality:92/100  Signal level:-213 dBm  Noise level:-144 dBm
          Rx invalid nwid:0  Rx invalid crypt:0  Rx invalid frag:0
          Tx excessive retries:3  Invalid misc:0   Missed beacon:4

PCMCIA WLAN Orinoco

Since at first I had problems with wireless connections in some environments with the built-in WLAN, I got a PCMCIA card 802.11b Orinoco Gold Classic. Eventually, it worked fine. At the beginning I had problems. First, I removed the IPW2200 modules for the build-in WLAN from the kernel. Then, I plugged in the PCMCIA card, which was recognized and associated with eth1. I used the same ifcfg-eth1 as for the in-build WLAN, removing the MAC definition HADDR=00:... It worked, but, for some reason, ifdown eth1 would not finish. After that a file /var/lib/pcmcia/stab was left. This file caused an attempt to close the interface eth1 at the next reboot of the laptop (called by the starting pcmcia daemon). This hung up the booting procedure. I had to go to the single user mode, investigate the problem and remove the file. I also cleaned up the ifcfg-eth1 file.

It works fine now.

Sound

It worked out of the box.

Sound Buttons

There are buttons on the laptop to control the sound volume or turn the sound off. They did not work with Linux. I did not inverstigate.

USB

It worked out of the box. I use an optical mouse and an external hard drive.

Upgrades

Later, I upgraded to FC4 and then to FC6. I also upgraded the HD to 120 GB and dumped the double boot. In general, things ran smoother with the newer Fedora releases. The Wireless still requires some attention. One needs to install the firmware package for the appropriate version of ipw2200 driver to /etc/firmware. See the instructions of that page.