[gdsmit1]

I've been running the stock Linux distro on my Dell Inspiron Mini 10v since I bought it. Well that's getting kind of old and since it isn't supported any longer, I figure it's time to install a new distro. I decided to give Linux Mint 13 a try. I booted it up on a 4 gig USB stick. It seemed to work pretty well. The screen sized fine and all applications I tried worked well.

However, the wireless isn't working. When I click on the network icon, it says firmware is missing. I know that wireless was one of the problems with older distros, but I figured that this would be supported out of the box.

So has anyone worked through getting their wireless working with Linux Mint 13 and a Dell Inspiron Mini 10?

[Dan_Shane]

Originally Posted by gdsmit1

I've been running the stock Linux distro on my Dell Inspiron Mini 10v since I bought it. Well that's getting kind of old and since it isn't supported any longer, I figure it's time to install a new distro. I decided to give Linux Mint 13 a try. I booted it up on a 4 gig USB stick. It seemed to work pretty well. The screen sized fine and all applications I tried worked well.

However, the wireless isn't working. When I click on the network icon, it says firmware is missing. I know that wireless was one of the problems with older distros, but I figured that this would be supported out of the box.

So has anyone worked through getting their wireless working with Linux Mint 13 and a Dell Inspiron Mini 10?

I'm running Mint 13 on my Latitude 2100, and I faced the same issue with the wireless adapter. The trick is to use a wired Ethernet connection to the Web, then allow the installation of 3rd-party drivers.

Go into System Tools / System Settings. The 2nd field down should be Hardware, and the 1st icon should be Additional Drivers. Click on that and Mint should do a search for proprietary drivers, resulting in the Broadcom STA Wireless Driver. Install that and you are good to go.

You are going to love Mint!

[gdsmit1]

I'm installing right now. I did briefly look through the menus, and I'm not finding System Tools anywhere. But that's probably because I'm installing the XCFE version. I'll dig more once it's installed.

Thanks

[gdsmit1]

I went back and installed the MATE version like I put in the subject. Your steps seem to have worked perfectly. Here's hoping that the MATE desktop isn't too much for this little netbook. If it is, I guess I can just install XFCE.

Thanks

[gdsmit1]

I was able to play around a little bit with it last night. It seems to take a bit longer to boot up, or maybe it's just that it seems to take longer since I sit there with a black screen until I have a log in screen.

The only issue I have so far is with GPodder. The newer version does not sync the same way with my MP3 player, but that's not really a big deal.

[Dan_Shane]

Originally Posted by gdsmit1

I was able to play around a little bit with it last night. It seems to take a bit longer to boot up, or maybe it's just that it seems to take longer since I sit there with a black screen until I have a log in screen.

The only issue I have so far is with GPodder. The newer version does not sync the same way with my MP3 player, but that's not really a big deal.

I agree the boot time seems more than one would expect, and first time running some apps also is not instantaneous. But I experienced similar times with Ubuntu and SUSE Linux, so it appears the Atom processor likes Windows a little better.

Still, after being logged into the GUI for a few minutes the performance seems to pick up.

I don't boot into Mint a lot, but I do enjoy having that option. There is a lot of peripheral development out there that relies on Linux, and Mint allows me to take advantage of that without sacrificing a GUI that is easy to navigate.

[gdsmit1]

I only boot into Linux. I had an old laptop that I dual booted with XP and Ubuntu. I found that ubuntu took 45 seconds to boot to a usable state. XP took just shy of 5 minutes to come up and bring up all the required security applications.