Thinkpad 600 - The good and the bad and the ugly

[Michael A. Peters]

I don't know how long the USPS has been offering "click-n-ship" via
java, but they do - and it works in Linux - so I no longer have any need
to have windows (which I was using for PayPal shipping labels)

So I did an http install of rawhide on my IBM Thinkpad 600.
This is a 700 MHz PIII with 256 MB of ram (unfortunately in two 128
chips - so to max it out, I need to buy two new chips :( )

boot.iso, graphical install using my local rawhide mirror, it went
flawlessly. The fonts looked a little weird, but I actually expected
that. The "time remaining" is whacked, imho it should be removed - it
never has been accurate on any machine I have ever installed on.

I was impressed - since it was docked, my USB keyboard and mouse (Apple
Pro keyboard - best USB keyboard I've ever owned) were completely usable
during the install, they weren't for the initial boot prompt, but that's
expected. A certain other operating system does not make them available
until after I have logged in once and it detects the new hardware (and
then it works for login).

First boot went flawlessly, this seems to have been the least
troublesome test install I have done so far.

-=-

Post install - it didn't know what my monitor was.
So 800x600 is the best I could get. A thinkpad 600 isn't exactly
bleeding edge hardware. I was able to reconfigure it manually choosing
generic lcd 1024x, and that seems to work.

I could not find a way to shut down the box w/o opening a terminal
window. There is no shutdown option from menu or gdm.

virtual consoles are completely broken - I believe I've seen that
reported already though. I will check to see if there is a bug open for
my chipset (I think there is).

Playing test sound failed, but that I'm filing under the category of I
personally don't really give a damn.