posted on: 2012-09-23 12:36:22
What it takes to get this nice little laptop working with ubuntu 12.04.

>The dell Inspiron 13z is a ultrabook of sorts. It came with the latest Intel Ivy Bridge components, and the display and 3D drivers have been perfect out of the box. Of course this is a new computer and not everything works on linux on a new computer. So far there are two problems that I have address or are works in progress.

First: The ethernet connection doesn't work. This is very strange because the ethernet connection always works. Anyways the work around isn't too bad.

Get the improved driver from here

Second: I ditched unity and installed gnome-shell. Then I needed the right-click open terminal option. Just install nautilus-open-terminal. I also removed the software center, and update manager. Those piss me off. I replaced software center with synaptic. (which works great)

Third: The touchpad. This is a serious usability issue that is actively being worked on. It is an ALPS touchpad that doesn't get properly recognized at startup. Here is the bug for a different model of dell computer. In this list there is a kernel model for getting the touchpad recognized. As per comment 178 there is a driver at www.dahetral.com that can be built and installed.

I down loaded the driver, and built it using the suggested commands:

make -C /lib/modules/`uname -r`/build M=`pwd` psmouse.ko

Then I removed the old driver and started the new one.

sudo rmmod psmouse
sudo insmod ./psmouse.ko

Now I can change some settings. The scrolling doesn't work, but the tap to click stopped. Tap to click makes my life miserable.

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