I bought an Acer Aspire One ZG5 netbook a few weeks ago. This model has the 120GB hard disk, 1GB RAM and runs Linpus Lite Linux, a Fedora-based Linux distro. Reading around various forums, it seemed a number of people were having problems installing software on their Aspire One running Linpus so I thought I’d install a Ubuntu distro as I already have an old desktop PC happily running Ubuntu 8.10. I had seen a blog post by Knightwise some weeks ago on his favourable experiences installing Easy Peasy Linux on his Acer Aspire One so I thought I’d have a go with this too. Easy Peasy is the new name for the UbuntuEEE distribution. It’s a Ubuntu Network Remix (UNR) of the standard Ubuntu release to enable it to work better on devices with small screens such as netbooks. It installs Firefox with Flash and Java, Skype, Google Picasa, Songbird etc. out of the box and Knightwise had no problems with the installation on his netbook and seemed quite pleased with it.
I’m going to go through the steps I took to install Easy Peasy, aimed at the new Linux user, like myself. I believe quite a few inexperienced users will be ’sold’ this netbook/Linpus combination because of its price (somewhat cheaper that the Windows XP version) and the straightforward user interface and then may well run into problems when they try to install software. So here goes. It might look a bit daunting but it’s quite straightforward when you work through it.
Before you start, you will need two USB sticks or thumb drives and access to a desktop PC with a DVD optical drive because the Acer Aspire One doesn’t come with an optical drive. The USB sticks must be configured to use the FAT32 file system. If necessary, to change the file system of the USB drive, you just need to right-click on the drive icon in the My Computer screen and select Format, then choose FAT32 for the file system. Of course, reformatting your drive means nuking any data on it, so save whatever you need first. You’ll need a 2GB USB drive for the Linpus recovery drive and another 2GB drive for the Easy Peasy install. Once you are happy with the new Easy Peasy install, you can overwrite the USB stick with the Linpus install. You can always recreate it again from the DVD if required.
So first, we have to create the Linpus recovery USB stick should we run into problems with the new Easy Peasy install. You may have already done this when you bought your Aspire One, if so skip to the next section.
Creating the Linpus recovery USB drive
Your Acer Aspire One should have come with a Recovery DVD. Put this in your PC’s DVD drive and plug in the first USB stick. Reboot the PC. Your PC should boot from the DVD (if it doesn’t, you’ll have to change the boot order in the BIOS so that the PC boots from the DVD first). To enter the BIOS, you’ll need to press the Delete or F1 key (depending on your PC) while the PC is booting.
Once the PC has booted off the Linpus recovery DVD, choose the option Create USB recovery drive. Follow the on-screen prompts to select the USB drive. Takes about 3 minutes to create the Linpus recovery USB drive. Then remove the DVD and press Exit. Leave the USB drive plugged in. The PC then reboots back into Windows.
Check the boot order on your Aspire One
To check the boot order so you can boot your netbook off this USB stick, plug the Linpus recovery USB drive into one of the USB ports on your Aspire One. As the netbook is booting, press the F2 key for the BIOS setup. You’ll see the prompt on screen as the netbook boots. Go to the Boot menu, select your USB drive and use the F5 key to move it up to position 1. Press F12 to save this set-up and exit.
The netbook will now boot off the USB drive and you can reinstall Linpus Linux onto the netbook hard drive from here should anything go wrong. If your USB drive is unplugged, your system will boot off the hard drive.
Creating the Easy Peasy USB drive
Now we’re ready to create our Easy Peasy install on the second USB drive but first we have to download the Easy Peasy iso file. Boot your Aspire One with no USB drive attached, open your browser and go to the Easy Peasy website. Download the iso file to your Downloads folder. It’s about 860MB so may take a couple of hours to download depending on the speed of your internet connection.
To install a bootable copy of this iso file on your USB stick you will need a bootloader program. I’ve used UNetbootin and you can download it here. Make sure to download the Linux version. Again, download to your Downloads folder. You’ll need to make UNetbootin executable. In the File Manager, highlight the file and go to Properties, Permissions tab and check the box against Allow file to be run as a program.
Now, when I double clicked UNetbootin, I got the message: UNetbootin must be run as root. Use:
sudo /mnt/home/Downloads/Unetbootin-linux-319
But when I tried this command in the Terminal, I was advised I needed to install the programs mtools and p7zip.
To add these programs, I first enabled right click desktop menus by clicking on the desktop, selecting the Behavior tab and under menus, checked Show desktop menus on right click. Then right clicking on the desktop, I chose System and then Add/remove programs. This runs pirut which needs your admin password. I searched for the software I needed to install: mtools and installed it, then p7zip and installed it. I found I also had to install p7zip plugins before UNetbootin would run.
So back to the terminal window and type:
sudo /mnt/home/Downloads/Unetbootin-linux-319
Click Disk Image, keep ISO in the drop down box and browse to the Easy Peasy iso file in the Downloads folder. Select your USB drive from the drop down box then click OK. Easy Peasy Linux will now be installed on your USB drive. Once installed, close all windows and restart the netbook with the Easy Peasy USB drive in place.
The netbook will boot off the USB drive and you can now install Easy Peasy Linux. On the partitioning screen I chose Guided – Use entire disk as I didn’t want to retain the old Linpus install on a partition.
I’ve been running Easy Peasy for a couple of days now with no problems. Connected to my wireless network without problems and straightaway I could share files with my Windows PC over the wireless network. YouTube videos play without problems and Skype is loaded ready to go.
And that’s about it. Hope this guide is clear enough to get you through the install. If you found problems following it, let me know and I’ll update it. Although I’ve used an Acer Aspire One, the procedure should work to install this Ubuntu distro on any netbook. If you found it useful, please Digg, Stumble, tweet or bookmark on Delicious using the links below.
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March 9th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
[...] posted here: Installing Easy Peasy Linux on my Acer Aspire One netbook | Tech … Category : Acer Aspire One / [...]
March 18th, 2009 at 3:44 pm
1MB of ram? Are you kidding? I think it’s 1GB of ram, not 1MB.
March 19th, 2009 at 1:18 am
Thanks for spotting that. Have corrected it.
March 29th, 2009 at 8:43 am
Thanks for that. I’ve just put ubuntu netbook remix on my aspire one (8Gb SSD) aand it’s nice but no wireless. I’ve found a couple of articles on fixing that but they involve half a book of terminal instructions.
You are saying easypeasy works straight away? What is the difference between easypeasy and the standard ubuntu netbook remix?
Cheers Tad
March 29th, 2009 at 10:04 am
Easy Peasy was formerly known as Ubuntu Eee and uses the Netbook Remix interface.
Yes I had no problems getting Easy Peasy to work. Wireless was real simple to set up. No terminal work at all! It detected my network card no problems and all I had to do was key in my WPA passphrase. Only problem so far is that it won’t load Skype.
March 30th, 2009 at 2:43 am
OK thanks. I may try the terminal stuff and if unsuccessful try easy peasy.
I have read somewhere though that there may be an issue with easy peasy on a machine with SSD (like mine) -something about it writing to the disk a lot and wearing it out(?)
March 30th, 2009 at 2:52 am
Thanks for a comprehensive how-to-guide! Bought the AA1 over the weekend so planning to install the Easy Peasy soon. Two questions: I went to the UNetbootin website and they have many different versions, Which one should I download? Fedora 7, Fedora 8 or some other one? Also, could you please outline the steps for installing mtools and p7zip? Sorry for all the questions – I’m a Linux n00b
March 30th, 2009 at 3:01 am
Please ignore my first question – looked at the UNetbooting website and saw that there are only two options. But if you could explain how to install mtools and p7zip I would really appreciate it.
March 30th, 2009 at 5:24 am
Yarik,
I’m a complete Linux n00b too! Problem is I only used Linpus for a short while before installing Easy Peasy so I can’t go back and check what I did in detail. I did take some notes during the install and used those to make this post. Try following my instructions in the post for enabling right click on the desktop, going to add/remove programs and searching for mtools and p7zip. Do each one separately and install it after the search has found it. I do remember it was important to install p7zip plugins too. It will show up in the p7zip search. Hope this helps.
March 30th, 2009 at 7:25 am
Thanks!
Will give it a try this coming weekend – I can already see that I’m not going to be happy with Linux linpus, even though I managed to download Skype and VLC
March 30th, 2009 at 11:34 pm
Hi there,
Sorry, you have a lot of newbies around! Here’s another one. I’m running Easy Peasy from the USB just to try it out before installing. It works and looks great except for the webcam and the microphone. Have you had problems with them as well? Would they work if I install it properly on the HD?
Thanks for your help
March 31st, 2009 at 3:16 am
Another thanks. I installed easyp and the wireless works.
I put it on at work where I only had access to windows xp os (now I’ve upset everyone) -it was even more straightforward than the above.
1) Formatted a 2Gb usm pen with FAT32 (My computer/rclick device/format)
2)Downloaded easyp .iso from the site you gave to desktop
3)downloaded the UNetbootin from the site you gave (but the Windows version)
4)Used UNetbootin to load easyp onto the pen.
5)started the acer with pen in (tapping F12 to select boot priority)-and that was it -had wireless which I straightaway used as there were about 300 updates.
At no point was I asked to load any additional software.
EasyPeasy is like ubuntu netbook remix but with the logo. I’ll have to investigate that thing about it’s suitability for SSD’s.
Sorry camacho I havn’t tried the functions you are worried about.
March 31st, 2009 at 8:00 am
tad, Yea it’s probably easier to install the iso on the USB stick using a Windows PC, especially if you’re more familiar with Windows than Linux, but I was aiming the post at new users who only had a netbook+Linpus and had to use that to put the iso on the stick.
camacho, I can’t get Skype to run yet so I’m not sure about the webcam and mic myself. I’ve searched on the net and found that the default configurations in Skype can give errors. May just need a bit of tweaking.
April 4th, 2009 at 5:01 am
I was pointed in the direction of this site from which I fixed most of the bugs. I think you can get Skype working from there too.
http://www.ubuntu-eee.com/wiki/index.php5?title=User_Guides
April 4th, 2009 at 3:37 pm
This seems quite helpful, but I have a 160GB ZG5 with XP and am wondering if anyone knows if I can revert to factory settings if I do not like Easy Peasy?
April 5th, 2009 at 3:18 am
Once you’ve installed Easy Peasy on the netbook you can’t click a button to restore to factory settings. In the first part of the post I described how to create a Linpus recovery USB drive. This is the way back to your original Linpus setup. Just use this to reinstall Linpus but be sure to back up any data you have created on the netbook first.
April 9th, 2009 at 3:50 am
Very informational. Especially since I was not aware that you can change the operating system on a netbook with such ease.
April 13th, 2009 at 4:48 am
Thanks for the post, I installed it on my aspireone 8gb SSD and it works great, except for the sound (either none, or very very low) and the multi card reader won’t recognize any cards. Anyone have any luck with these?
April 16th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
Go to my last comment (#14) and use that link to show how to set up sound
June 9th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
hey,
great instructions! I am currently running easypeasy from my jump drive, but the wireless won’t work. I hated Linpus[skin disease???;)], so I installed UNR 9.04 thinking the wireless would still work. I am having the exact same issue in easypeasy-I put my WPA2 passcode in, and it finds the network, but it won’t connect. Also, in Network Config, it changes the password to gibberish. I have tried almost everything in UNR to no avail.
Just to recap,
i am running easy peasy 1.1
I have an acer aspire one ZG5
My wireless router is a new d-link
and my security is WPA2-Personal
If anyone knows how to fix this, please let me know.
Regards,
Jim
July 17th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
hey, I read your comment jim Says:
…………….
(June 9th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
hey,
great instructions! I am currently running easypeasy from my jump drive, but the wireless won’t work. I hated Linpus[skin disease???;)], so I installed UNR 9.04 thinking the wireless would still work. I am having the exact same issue in easypeasy-I put my WPA2 passcode in, and it finds the network, but it won’t connect. Also, in Network Config, it changes the password to gibberish. I have tried almost everything in UNR to no avail.
Just to recap,
i am running easy peasy 1.1
I have an acer aspire one ZG5
My wireless router is a new d-link
and my security is WPA2-Personal
If anyone knows how to fix this, please let me know.
Regards,
Jim)
………………………
and i have the same problem so i found out this “Well the only thing I can suggest is that you are using the wrong type of encryption. When the data (including the password) is sent to the router it is encrypted. That means it doesn’t send your password it sends your password encrypted, which may look like gibberish to you. There are different types of encryption. The two main types are WEP and WPA. First find out what type your router uses. It should say in network manager. Then somewhere look for where you can slect the type. Both WEP and WPA have different types like preshared or passphrase. You need to try them all untill you get the right one.
”
Hope this helps!
August 2nd, 2009 at 10:24 am
Hi,
I love your step by step guide to install easy peasy. I’m a complete novice at linux and want to change over to easy peasy on my AA1. I followed all your steps but I don’t see the partitioning screen you talk about. I don’t want to retain the linux OS but it seems that I don’t have an option to partition my drive. Right now I have ubuntu running off my USB drive and when I restart after removing the drive, it goes back to the old linux OS. I love ubuntu and I want it to be my sole OS. Please help!
August 4th, 2009 at 12:14 am
you can reviews & buy netbook at Reviews Netbook
August 14th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
I’d like to see an answer to Chad’s question above since I’m in the same situation having XP. Can I partition my 160G Hard drive and install there?…”This seems quite helpful, but I have a 160GB ZG5 with XP and am wondering if anyone knows if I can revert to factory settings if I do not like Easy Peasy?”
August 16th, 2009 at 6:54 am
Randy, I can’t help with dual booting Easy Peasy and XP or reverting to factory settings. My AA1 came with Linpus and I just wanted to replace it with Easy Peasy.
I’ve come across a few sites which might help guide you through the dual boot process:
http://www.linuxhaxor.net/2009/04/28/nixies-linux-haxor-quickie-learn-how-to-install-ubuntu-linux-in-5-minutes/
http://linnewbies.com/howtos/dualboot.php
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?pid=623344
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?id=71675
Obviously, the key thing is not to use the entire disk when installing Easy Peasy. Set up a new partition, either in Windows before you install Easy Peasy or during the Easy Peasy install.
Hope this helps. If anyone has practical experience with dual booting here or resetting an AA1 with XP back to factory settings, please drop a comment. Thanks.
November 18th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Hi,
Thanks for the tutorial, seems very thorough. I’ve just brought as Aspire 1 today and am in the process of downloading Easy Peasy now – I have certain ‘allergies’ to Windows.
Anyway, I’m fairly good with Linux but installing it on a machine without a cd drive had me stumped.
Think I’ll be ok from now on in – if I have any problems or find any fixes to the problems about I’ll let ya know.
Cheers!
November 18th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Akhila – When you boot up from the USB it loads the OS but does not install it. To install you need to click on the Desktop tab on the right and then double clikc on the install icon – this will start the installer and bring up the partitioner.
You should be able to dual boot by resizing the windows partition from within the installer – no idea about restoring to default though. If I need to do this I’ll post instructions.