[mdlug] Toshiba P205-S6347 openSUSE 10.3 VMWare Player Running Sims on XP Pro Review

[Peter Bart]

Hi Everyone,
	What follows were my experiences to date with this machine. I'm not
really sure if I would buy another Toshiba, the amount of OEM Linux
support is laughable. You can see it here
<http://linux.toshiba-dme.co.jp/linux/index.htm>. Getting some of the
stuff to work can be trying. The basic specs of the machine are as
follows:

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo Processor T54504
o 1.66GHz, 2MB L2, 667MHz FSB with 64-bit C1
o Mobile Intel® 965GM Express Chipset
• Integrated Wi-Fi® compliant wireless LAN
o Intel® Wireless WiFi Link 4965AGN (802.11a/g/n)
• Configured with 2048MB PC2-5300 DDR2 SDRAM (both memory slots
may be occupied). Maximum capacity 4096MB
• 200GB Serial ATA hard disk drive
o HD DVD-ROM/DVD9 SuperMulti (+/- double layer) drive (in one
optical drive), supporting 12 formats
o Maximum speed and compatibility: HD DVD-ROM (1), ,CD-ROM
(24), CD-R (24), CD-RW (10), DVD-ROM (8), DVD-R (4), DVD+R
(4),DVD-RW (4), DVD+R (Double Layer (2.4)), DVD-R (Double
Layer (2)), DVD+RW (4), DVD-RAM (3)
• 17.0” diagonal widescreen TruBrite®TFT LCD display at 1440x900
native resolution (WXGA+)
o Native support for 720p content
• Mobile Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator X3100 with 8MB-256MB
dynamically allocated shared graphics memory

Detailed specs can be found here
<http://www.csd.toshiba.com/cgi-bin/tais/su/su_sc_outFrm.jsp?moid=1757721&rpn=PSPB3U&ct=DS&soid=1793884&BV_SessionID=@@@@0606075315.1206666016@@@@&BV_EngineID=cccfadedjimjkfjcgfkceghdgngdgnj.0>.

	I did attempt to install the 64 bit version but there were just to many
loose ends for me to cope with. The base install was fine, "extras" like
Java would be trouble. After the basic install of the .32 bit version I
followed the directions here
<http://www.softwareinreview.com/linux_optimizations/hacking_opensuse_10.3.html> to complete the install. I used only half of the 200GB hard drive for the linux installation. The other half is/was for a possible Windows install. The Linux install is partitioned with /root, /boot, /usr, /swap, /var, /tmp, /opt, /home. All went very nice. Ygl was enabled and works very nicely. That's a good thing because gdm has been messed up for a while now. The notebook is noticeably quicker than the previous notebook, a P4 single core. "Screamin fast" is what I overheard, but sorry no benchmarks. There should be plenty of those around. Wireless works very well and speed increases are again noticed when I upgraded our AP to a Linksys WRT54GL running dd-wrt from an 802.11b AP. Streaming news played in a flash player now plays uninterrupted, from MSNBC no less! The CD/DVD drive is unremarkable, just works. It supports so many different formats, but I still only use cd-r or dvd-r media because a lot of other peoples players and my own may not. The display is, well, BIG! It's gorgeous! And big. The Intel graphics adapter is unremarkable. Sound works and is adjustable with the mechanical wheel, a graphic even pops up to show the level. The Touchpad is incredibly sensitive, I haven't yet found the disabling button. It might be one of the non functioning Fn keys. The "internet" button does launch the default browser, as defined in Yast. I do not know if the cd/dvd buttons and the webcam work. I have not yet used either express card slot. The media adapter just works, pop in a media card and either Nautilus opens or I'm asked whether I would like to import the pictures. Depending on what's on the media card. I haven't played with any of the ports, except for the usb and fingerprint reader. Usb works and the fingerprint reader works in many instances. I can log in, authenticate the updater applet, log in as root in a terminal window, but I can't use it from the screensaver if it's locked.

	VMWare player was installed and runs XP Pro and the Sims Deluxe Edition
game runs on that. The virtual machine was created on another machine
with Workstation 5 and was transferred w/o incident via rsync. The
virtual machine was created with Workstation 5. The installation of
VMWare Workstation 5 on an unsupported distribution as well as enabling
3D are covered in that machines review coming soon. The installation and
patching of XP Pro into that virtual machine was long but uneventful.
The Sims I am running is one of the early versions of the game. It seems
to run okay. I don't play it but I'm watching and have heard no
complaints.

	Some of the sticky points still to be worked out. Any help with these
would be very much appreciated. Suspend/resume. It works from console
and from terminal as described here <http://en.opensuse.org/S2ram>.
However it does not work on lid close/open or via the power applet menu.
The Fn keys do not work despite having the package fnfx installed which
is supposed to add that functionality. XP Pro seems very sluggish.
Networkmanager. It only supports wep, I would like to move up to wpa now
that I have an AP that supports it. The special keys across the top that
control the movie player. I've heard that they allow a movie to be
played w/o booting MS. I only booted Vista to flash the BIOS so I don't
know. They do play movies, but only after booting the OS. Opensuse won't
allow me to log in multiple users at the same time. Huh??? 

	Some of the sticky points resolved. The touchpad is very sensitive, the
package gsynaptics is a must. This allows the touchpad to adjusted with
a gui, very nice. 
The after market power supply from Targus does not allways charge, I got
it because I used the OEM charger to set up a permanent workstation. The
power supply from Toshiba is expensive but not as much as two of them :)

	In closing, a nice machine but lacking the solid feel of a Thinkpad I
apparently like so much. It's big and heavy but that's not really a
drawback. It's being used as a portable desktop around the house. I
finally found a case for it that's less than $50, another drawback but
not a big one.

Best Regards,
-- 
Peter Bart <peter at petertheplumber.net>
http://petertheplumber.net