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Dell Inspiron 15R
Author(s)
H4ppyClown
Sidicas
Introduction
Dell Inspiron 15R Purchased February 2011. Experience below is based on Debian 6.0.
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Specifications
| Name | Dell Inspiron 15R |
| Processor | Intel® Pentium® Processor P6100 (3M Cache, 2.00 GHz) |
| Screen | 15.6in High Definition (1366×768) WLED |
| RAM | 3072MB 1333MHz Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM [1×1024 + 1×2048] |
| HDD | 320GB (5,400rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive |
| Optical Drive | DVD +/- RW Drive (read/write CD & DVD) |
| Graphics | Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator HD |
| Network | Standard Dell Wireless 1501 802.11 g/n |
Linux Compatibility
| Device | Compatibility | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Processor | Yes | Installed i386 architecture. Have not tested IA64 architecture but in theory is compatible |
| Screen | Yes | Xorg booted into 1366×768 resolution with no tweaking of config required |
| HDD | Yes | |
| Optical Drive | Yes | |
| Graphics | Yes | Could not enable 3D functions (e.g. Compiz) but then its not a 3D accelerating chip. |
| Sound | Yes | ALSA gives different sliders for headphones & onboard speakers, which is useful. |
| Ethernet | Yes | |
| Wireless | Yes | Needed to install package “firmware-brcm80211” to enable wireless. |
| Bluetooth | Not Tested | Looks like its enabled but no other device to test with. |
| USB | Yes | 3 USD ports available |
| Card Reader | Not Tested | |
| ExpressCard Slot | Not Tested | |
| Camera | Yes | Onboard Webcam works fine |
| HDMI | Not Tested | |
| VGA | Not Tested |
Multimedia Keys
Testing using Debian Wheezy and KDE 4.8.4
| Key | Compatibility | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Screen Toggle | No | Key is incorrectly interpreted as “p” |
| Wifi Toggle | Yes | |
| Touchpad Disable | Yes | Requires special work, see below |
| Brightness Down | Yes | |
| Brightness Up | Yes | |
| Previous Track | Yes | |
| Play / Stop | Yes | |
| Next Track | Yes | |
| Volume Down | Yes | |
| Volume Up | Yes | |
| Volume Mute | Yes | |
| Config | Yes | Generates a Meta-X keyboard press |
| Equalizer | No | Generates no X or ACPI events. e02a & e02c doesn't make it through to X. “Unknown key” |
| Bookmark Page | No | Generates no X or ACPI events. e024 doesn't make it through to X. “Unknown key” |
Touchpad Disable
FN+F3
The touchpad can be disabled easily with xinput or kde-config-touchpad.
The touchpad LED /sys/class/leds/dell-laptop::touchpad/brightness needs to be set to “1” when the touchpad is disabled and this is not done by default.
The touchpad LED can be fixed as follows:
1. Make a copy of /etc/acpi/asus-touchpad.sh and call it /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh
2. Edit the file and replace this line:
ledf=/sys/class/leds/asus::touchpad/brightness
with this line:
ledf=/sys/class/leds/dell-laptop::touchpad/brightness
3. Executing sudo /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh will now enable/disable the touchpad and toggle the LED correctly.
To avoid being prompted for a password:
1. Make /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh read-only:
sudo chmod -w /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh
2. Edit sudoers to allow sudoers to execute without password prompt.
myusername ALL = (root) NOPASSWD: /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh
Finally, bind the exectuion of /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh to the XF86TouchpadToggle keyboard event using xbindkeys.
~/.xbindkeysrc
#Disable Touchpad "sudo /etc/acpi/dell-touchpad.sh" m:0x0 + c:199 XF86TouchpadToggle
Then make sure you add xbindkeys to ~/.xinitrc to make sure xbindkeys starts with your desktop environment.
Notes
Was a pain-free install of Debian. No issues. Use a fixed ethernet connection to install so you can grab updates & enable wireless via “apt-get install firmware-brcm80211”. I haven't tested connecting an external monitor via VGA or HDMI so not sure how Xorg will respond to this.
Summary
Would recommend this laptop for Linux. Second time I've used a Dell laptop and both have been great.
Discussion
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For the WIFI i have to install: firmware-iwlwifi because my card was a Intel and it work, but only in a Kernel 3 o superior.