75 lines
4.0 KiB
Markdown
75 lines
4.0 KiB
Markdown
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date = "2006-11-15"
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title = "Ubuntu 6.10 Live DVD on the Apple MacBook"
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tags = ["General", "Everything", "Blog", "Linux", "Ubuntu"]
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slug = "ubuntu-610-live-dvd-on-the-apple-macbook"
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Since I teach various Linux courses at Fontys Centrum IT, I want to run a live CD or DVD on my MacBook. First off, here are my specs:
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<ul>
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<li>Apple MacBook (White)</li>
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<li>Intel Core Duo 2.0Ghz</li>
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<li>1.0Gb RAM</li>
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<li>13.3" 1280x800 TFT</li>
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<li>60 Gb Internal Harddisk</li>
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<li>300 Gb External FireWire harddisk</li>
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</ul>
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As my Live medium I chose the Ubuntu Linux 6.10 Live DVD. This DVD has several nice options (install server, for example) that I like. It also can boot up in a live desktop environment.
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~
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As a matter of fact, everything I need works out of the box. Wireless works fine, my mouse (USB Logitech) works, the FireWire harddisk (which has a FAT32 filesystem, so I can hook it to my girl friend's Windows PC) works perfectly.
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There are only two things that didn't work.
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1. Xvid codecs are missing, so I can't watch my Prison Break episodes from the Live environment, but that's perfectly fine. That's not what I need the live environment for.
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2. The screen resolution can only be set to a maximum of 1024x768. As I mentioned before, the TFT has a native resolution of 1280x800. Because of the scaling, my screen doesn't look as sharp and sexy as it should.
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In order to solve this problem I had to take a few, rather easy, steps.
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To get started, let us assign a password to the default ubuntu user.
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sudo passwd ubuntu
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Now enter something that you'll remember easily, twice.
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In order to get Ubuntu to recognize the native screen resolution automatically, we'll need a special package: 915resolution. Since the MacBook has an Intel 945 graphics chipset, we can use this tool. But, this tool is not in the default package respository. It's in the Universe.
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So, we now need to change <strong>/etc/apt/sources.list</strong> and add the universe repository. This is rather easy, because these repositories already exist, but are commented out. Just open up /etc/apt/sources.list and uncomment the two universe lines. Make sure your sources.list looks like this:
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deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy main restricted
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deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy main restricted
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## Uncomment the following two lines to add software from the 'universe'
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## repository.
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## N.B. software from this repository is ENTIRELY UNSUPPORTED by the Ubuntu
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## team, and may not be under a free licence. Please satisfy yourself as to
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## your rights to use the software. Also, please note that software in
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## universe WILL NOT receive any review or updates from the Ubuntu security
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## team.
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deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy universe
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deb-src http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy universe
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deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy-security main restricted
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deb-src http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy-security main restricted
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Now, we can update our system and install the 915resolution package.
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apt-get update
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apt-get install 915resolution
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You'll notice that 915resolution spits out a lot of information on your chipset and native resolution. You should check here that the 1280x800 resolution has been detected.
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Now you're all set. Well, you'll need to restart the X Server in order for it to recognize the newly discovered resolution. I basically pressed CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE to kick the X Server. I'm presented with a login screen. Here I login as 'ubuntu' with the password I specified earlier.
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If everything went fine, you'll now get a clear and sharp display of your Ubuntu life desktop.
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I also turned on sub-pixel smoothing in System -> Preferences -> Fonts to get some sexier and smoother looking fonts.
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That's all. I can now boot-up the Ubuntu Live DVD and get the native resolution for my MacBook.
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For those who want to keep the native resolution on their installed Ubuntu, just install the 915resolution package mentioned above and you're set. Easy as that.
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