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MSI Wind U120
Introduction
This is a guide to running Linux on the MSI Wind U120 laptop. The U120 is a netbook, with a 10” wide screen that runs at a maximum resolution of 1024×600. My U120 came preinstalled with Microsoft Windows XP and I initially installed Kubuntu 8.10 on a 16GB pen drive that I would boot off of periodically. After installing and configuring the Realtek wireless drivers on the pen drive, I installed Xubuntu using Wubi on the XP partition. This test was less than satisfactory and I still have issues to try to work out in terms of getting the system to boot fully. This should not be an issue with a standard hard disk installation as proven by the ability to boot from a pen drive.
This page is just for discussing using Linux on the MSI Wind U120. For a general discussion about this laptop you can visit the MSI Wind U120 page on LapWik.
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Specifications
For full specifications see the MSI Wind U120 specifications page.
| Name | MSI Wind U120 |
| Processor | Intel® Atom™ N270 1.6GHz Processor |
| Screen | 10” WSVGA Widescreen |
| RAM | 1GB |
| HDD | 80GB to 160GB |
| Optical Drive | None |
| Graphics | Intel GMA 950 |
| Network | 10/100 Ethernet Realtek RTL8187 802.11b/g WLAN Card |
Linux Compatibility
| Device | Compatibility | Comments |
|---|---|---|
| Processor | Yes | |
| Screen | Yes | |
| HDD | Yes | |
| Graphics | Yes | direct rendering works |
| Sound | Yes | |
| Ethernet | Yes | |
| Wireless | Yes | Requires installation of rtl8187se_linux-04.tar.bz2 drivers. See instructions at: http://code.google.com/p/msi-wind-linux/ |
| Bluetooth | Not Tested | |
| Modem | Not Tested | |
| USB | Yes | |
| Card Reader | Not Tested | |
| Webcam | Yes | you have to mess around with the webcam fn key a little before it works |
Notes
The Realtek driver installation comes with an executable installer that will automatically compile using your kernel sources. It is very convenient and should be easy for a novice to install.
Summary
You can enter a summary of how well the MSI Wind U120 works with Linux here.
Discussion
Installed Arch from a usb drive (they have convenient usb images that work really well). Everything is working fine and is quite responsive with the openbox desktop. I wanted to add webcam does work, you just have to play with the fn button a little. Also, the sound works great.