Dell Inspiron 1501
Created by: Bill Giannikos,Last modification on Thu 29 of Nov, 2007 [04:42 UTC]by Anonymous
This guide is intended to provide you details on how well this laptop works with Linux and which drivers you need to configure. For details on how to actually install and configure the required drivers have a look at our guides section for distribution specific instructions.
Introduction
This is a guide to running Linux with the Dell Inspiron 1501 laptop. This Inspiron 1501 is one of only a few laptops with an AMD Turion64 X2 processor. Unfortunately, due to the Dell 1390 Wireless card, this laptop can be a little tricky to configure under Linux.Editing This Page
View our Editing GuidelinesSpecifications
| Name | Dell Inspiron 1501 | |
| Processor | AMD Turion64 X2 TL-50 | |
| Screen | 15.4" WXGA | |
| RAM | 1GB | |
| HDD | 60GB | |
| Optical Drive | DVD+-RW | |
| Graphics | ATI Radeon Xpress 1150 | |
| Network | 10/100 Ethernet, Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Wireless | |
| Other | 4 x USB2.0 | |
Linux Compatibility
| Device | Compatibility | Comments |
| Processor | Yes | |
| Screen | Yes | |
| HDD | Partial | Yes, if kernel version greater than 2.6.20 |
| Optical Drive | Yes | |
| Graphics | Yes | |
| Sound | Yes | Use the snd-hda-intel driver |
| Ethernet | Yes | |
| Wireless | Partial | |
| 56K Modem | Yes | use driers at http://www.linuxant.com/drivers/ |
| USB | Yes | |
Notes
For the hard drive in the Inspiron 1501 to be detected while installing Linux, you will likely need to use the boot parameter 'all-generic-ide'. However this will cause a performance penalty. This issue has been fixed since kernel version 2.6.20.In some distributions, such as Ubuntu, you will need to add pci=nomsi to your boot options for the system to boot properly.
The ATI Radeon Xpress 1150 in this laptop is supported by both the open source radeon driver and ATI's proprietary fglrx driver. You may like to view our Configuring an ATI graphics chip guide for installation instructions.
This Dell 1390 wireless controller in the Inspiron 1501 doesn't have any native drivers for Linux so using the ndiswrapper driver is necessary. You can review our Configuring the ndiswrapper driver for information on how to use this driver. The windows driver is available from Dell's website. There is also at set of native drivers which are available here, but these have note been tested yet. Using the BIOS configuration page, turning off the Wireless Hotkey (Fn-F2 control) seems to help the card work better with ndiswrapper and the Windows driver. (Without turning off the Wireless Hotkey control, the card may get detected, but not find any networks with "iwlist scan", and the little green WiFi light may not come on.)
Some versions of the Inspiron include the Dell 1490. This works with the bcm43xx driver.
Related Resources
Preparing your laptop for LinuxConfiguring an ATI graphics chip
Configuring the ndiswrapper driver for wireless controllers without native Linux drivers
Increasing battery life
Summary
The Dell Inspiron 1501 does require some intermediate level configuration work for it to work well under Linux. Unfortunately this can be quite tricky for new Linux users.Have you installed Linux on this laptop? If so how about leaving a comment about your success in the comments section below.
Comments
Inspiron 1501
It's been a help for me at times.
ati radeon xpress r200 and linux conflict
i can use only in text mode. during installation system can not diplay anything!
so i install in text mode,
then enter INIT 5 command in text mode but xserver did not start and says something wrong.!
arman_reybod@yahoo.com
hard drive use
Does this mean you don't need the boot parameter, or does it mean you don't have the performance penalty after user the boot parameter or does it mean you don't need the boot parameter but still have the performance penalty?
hard drive use
Wireless
Re: Wireless