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Contents
- Links to basic knowledge
-
Frequently Asked Questions
- Why do you make another fork of Debian to adapt it to the Asus Eee PC?
- Do you provide a custom kernel specially adapted to the Eee PC hardware?
- Do I need a swap partition?
- What about hibernate if I have no swap?
- How much RAM do I need?
- How much disk space does the installation take?
- Do I need the EFI partition or is it safe to delete?
- Can I make a test install on removable media without changing the existing OS?
- Can I install *to* a USB harddrive in an external case?
- Can I put the *installer* on an external harddrive and start installation *from there*?
- Can I install from an external CDROM drive?
- Can I mount an SD card at boot time?
- My system takes too much space on the flash drive. How can I make it smaller?
- Suspend won't work. How do I fix it?
- Where can I get help?
- Where is the FAQ?
Links to basic knowledge
See ../HowTo/Install to learn how to install Debian on your Asus Eee PC.
See ../HowTo/Troubleshooting for answers to problems arising from the initial install & configuration of Debian on the Eee.
See ../HowTo/Upgrade after an upgrade.
See ../TipsAndTricks to have many questions answered, before you even ask them.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do you make another fork of Debian to adapt it to the Asus Eee PC?
We don't. DebianEeePC is pure Debian. It's a DebianPureBlends project to make Debian work optimally on the Eee. Our repository keeps just a few packages which cannot (yet) be in mainstream Debian for some reason.
Do you provide a custom kernel specially adapted to the Eee PC hardware?
- Maintaining a custom kernel for special hardware is much more work then just finding the right configuration and compiling kernels. Think of backporting all mainstream and Debian patches and all the related testing needed to really support such a kernel over some time. As we aim to fully support the Eee in Debian itself and not a fork of Debian, we cannot depend on a custom kernel. Such a kernel would never be a part of Debian.
Do I need a swap partition?
No, not really. The system works well without. The installer will try to convince you, that you do need one, but it's up to you to decide. Putting more RAM into your Eee is often a better choice than using swap.
What about hibernate if I have no swap?
Hibernate will not work without a swap space. However, it is sufficient to use a swap file created in the following way:
- dd if=/dev/zero of=/tmp/deletami bs=1024k count=512
- This command creates a 512 MB swap file that can be used to hibernate the system. (Note that you'll need a bigger swap file if you have more RAM).
How much RAM do I need?
- Try it out. You will be surprised how much you can do even with 512 MB. But then, RAM is cheap and does not drain too much battery power. So if you can upgrade to 1 G or 2 G it is certainly worth it.
How much disk space does the installation take?
The aim is to provide a simple basic installation and let the user decide what he wants to add. A test on 2008 April 10 with a base install, ?then package files cleaned and treated with localepurge needed 401 MB of disk space.
Do I need the EFI partition or is it safe to delete?
When Boot Booster is enabled in the BIOS data gets saved in the small EFI partition to speed up next boot process. (See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EFI_System_Partition). It’s safe to delete that, Debian won’t need it. Leave it in place if a short boot time is important to you.
Can I make a test install on removable media without changing the existing OS?
Yes. See ../HowTo/InstallOnSDcardOrUsbStick.
Can I install *to* a USB harddrive in an external case?
Yes. There are the same confusing device name changes as outlined in installing to USB flash media. You will have to fix the installation before booting as outlined there. Booting with grub, you can press 'e' and change the disk where the kernel is loaded from.
Can I put the *installer* on an external harddrive and start installation *from there*?
If you want to use your drive in “superflopp” mode (i.e. without partition table etc.) it should work. But who would like to? Press <Esc> on bootup and select your external drive to boot from, if you want to do it.
Can I install from an external CDROM drive?
Yes. Press <Esc> on bootup and select your cdrom drive.
Can I mount an SD card at boot time?
Yes. However, due to the order in which rc scripts are executed during the boot process, automatically mounting file systems on an SD card cannot be done as part of a mount -a invocation. You should add noauto to the options, and explicitly mount the file system later on in the boot process, e.g. from the /etc/rc.local file.
My system takes too much space on the flash drive. How can I make it smaller?
The Debian eeepc system leaves you all the freedom to install/uninstall the software packages you want. Use Aptitude or apt-get to do that. For suggestions of lightweight packages see ../Software. ../TipsAndTricks gives instructions how to make your system's footprint smaller, like deleting obsolete package files and localepurge.
Suspend won't work. How do I fix it?
- The eee will not suspend unless your user is not in the power group.
Where can I get help?
Your questions are welcome on our IRC channel #debian-eeepc at oftc (irc://irc.oftc.net/#debian-eeepc ) or the mailing list. Please do read the information given in our wiki pages first. Feel free to come back later and edit the wiki, if your question was not answered here.
Where is the FAQ?
This is the FAQ! Why didn't you read the FAQ before asking?