I bought my KTX 1000 laptop early in 1998 and because we do quite a lot of work with Linux I decided to set it up on my laptop. All in all this was pretty straightforward, with just a few little problems getting things going. Since then I've reinstalled Linux on here a few times as new versions came out, or as I have upgraded the laptop (I got a new 6.4GB drive for it). The main areas where I have experienced a problem at some time are:
The KTX 1000 comes in several flavours. The particular laptop I bought was a P233MMX with 128MB of RAM, 3.2GB hard drive and a 13.3" TFT screen (1024x768 pxels by 65536 colours). My father also bought one more recently at the other end of the scale: P200MMX, 64MB RAM, 1.2GB hard drive and a smaller 800x600 screen. Looking at the two models side by side there is a significant difference in the case shape. The screen seems to be the biggest difference in specification and, indeed, is probably the main reason for the difference in case shape as well.
I use Debian GNU/Linux almost exclusively. I have only tried Debian on the laptop, but I have installed Slackware, RedHat, SUSE, Caldera and other distributions on other hardware. We use Debian for our servers in the office, and for clients. This means that if you have a problem with RedHat or something I may be unable to help. On the other hand the only real differences between distributions of Linux are the setup programs, and the locations of files: the actual programs are pretty much the same.
Have a read of my essay on Linux distributions if you want to get my full views of the differences between them.
Using the 2.0.X series kernels (I haven't tried anything earlier than 2.0.33) there seems to be a problem with the screen resetting. When compiled for APM, the screen blanking can turn the display off and it is not possible to reset it without using SVGATextMode (see below).
Using the later 2.1.X kernels it is possible to compile frame buffer (and VESA console) support into the kernel. This seems to work a lot better at resetting the screen, as well as letting you set the console to use a graphics resolution giving a 128x44 display.
I have moved completely to the 2.2.X series kernels now (currently 2.2.3) and am finding that this works well.
VGATextMode also does a great job of allowing large console screens (128x44), without compromising the readability using a compressed font, by switching the console into a graphics mode similar to the way the later 2.1.X and 2.2.X kernels can with frame-buffer support.
This seems to work best with later kernels, and it is a good idead to ensure that it is compiled as a module.
Works well, but don't turn on "Use APM for screen blanking" with the 2.0.X kernels!
I find these options work best for me:
| Use APM for screen blanking | No |
| Allow multiple suspend/resume | No |
I guess most people won't have to worry about this one too much. When I got the laptop I got a fancy docking station for it that can take a CD-ROM drive, hard drive and PCI card, as well as having a couple of extra PCMCIA slots. The docking station was a bad decision.
For the docking station to work with Windows I have to make sure that "Plug and Play OS" is turned on in the BIOS. I also had to make sure the BIOS was upgraded to a more recent version, and that various drivers were installed before ever the laptop was plugged into the docking station. So if it was that arcane for Windows, what was it going to be like for Linux?
Well, Linux initially had fewer problems with the docking station than Windows did. When I first started using Linux I had no problems at all with the docking station: it would see the hard drive in there as /dev/hde and it found the network card (an ne2k-pci) and used it without any trouble.
Along about kernel 2.1.124 I noticed a new option to support the CMD646, so I turned it on. This gave panics and all sorts of bad-karma on boot if combined with "Use DMA when available", so make sure you don't compile your kernel with CMD646 support. I sent an e-mail to the CMD646 maintainers but haven't got a response as yet.
Recently we also upgraded our network to 100MBit and I have changed my network card to a DEC Tulip (21140-based) PCI network card. This also gives bizarre results, and so I have to use my PCMCIA network card for now. Fortunately PCMCIA is working again now (kernel 2.2.3, pcmcia 3.0.9) , so I can!