Samsung n220 netbook running Ubuntu Netbook Edition
I've made my mind up about the travel netbook and gone for the Samsung n220 with the long battery life.
First Impressions
It's small, light and good looking; everything you need in a netbook. Running Windows 7 Home Starter with only 1GB of RAM is not a good idea. It also came with so much bloatware that it was running at between 50% and 80% CPU at all times. This was not going to be good news for the battery. So time to break out the Ubuntu 10.10 netbook edition installer.
Ubuntu on the n220
I wish installing Ubuntu on this was a painless process, but as usual with Linux there are a number of hardware issues that need to be resolved before the machine is usable.
- The wireless works maybe 20% of the time. It can see the AP's but will not associate. This is down to the r8192e_pci and r8192se_pci modules that come with Ubuntu.
- The brightness of the screen when off battery is set a 50% and the slider bar and Fn+UP/DOWN keys do not change it.
- Multi touch gestures on the track pad do not work.
After some searching I came across this post by Stewart Pratt. If you follow the instructions there it will get you up an running in no time. The only thing I am still having issues with is the multi touch gestures, but I'll keep on at it and post an update when I figure it out.
Update I should have paid closer attention to the post I linked, you need both the Vert/HorizTwoFingerScroll and the EmulateTwoFingerMinW/Z settings for the two finger scroll to work.
In conclusion, Ubuntu 10.10 runs much faster than windows 7, and uses much less system resources. I'm hoping this will have a positive effect on the battery life, which so far seems to be as advertised.
Weaponisation
As far as running the cool toys goes, there is not good news on that front. A USB bootable version of BT 4 R2 does not have the modules for the Intel GMA3150 or the Realtek r8192s wireless card. With some playing around you could get these working but it would have to be on a persistent USB install or a HDD install. I'll pass for now.
I can report however that like the other versions of Ubuntu it will run Metasploit just fine ;) Do you think my daughter will be more interested in watching Disney princesses or playing around with MS08_067? Next up is seeing how it handles Kismet and airpwn-ng.
