Setup Kubuntu 8.04 KDE 4 Remix on Toshiba Satellite 2450 Series

KDE 4 is finally released officially in Kubuntu 8.04, so it's time for me to reinstall stuff in the laptop (Toshiba Satellit 2450). Recently it's been running kubuntu 7.10 with 3d card fail to configure and I have no patience/time left to fix it. It was working in previus kubuntu, so I have a good hope that things will be better this time plus I have been itching to test KDE 4 (I had been staying away from previous betas). So, here's the recap.

The installation went really smooth. There's nothing new with ubuntu/kubuntu here, it's been known to have trouble-free installation process (although it's been known to cause a little pain afterwards :) ). Restart then login shows a welcoming KDE 4 experience, quite slick.

Now, the fun begin. The network is not working and there's no graphical setting that I can use anywhere to set the ip and stuff. It's been quite well-done in KDE 3-based system-settings, so this is quite a major drawback. A little googling "inspire" me doing things manually below :

put this on /etc/network/interfaces

auto eth0
iface eth0 inet static
address ...
gateway ...
netmask ...
network ....0
broadcast ....255

and this in /etc/resolv.conf

nameserver ...
nameserver ...

and finally execute this manually (and put in /etc/init.d/rc.local for auto-execution in booting)

route add default gw ...

Once the network works, it then quite typical fix, upgrade, install, remove, etc.. .

The next surprising thing was Firefox looked really really ugly. I remember this is the same case with the early days of kubuntu, the gtk use default look and feel (which is very bad). Easy enough, there's gtk-engine-kde4 to the rescue. Installing and setting it through SystemSetting->Appearance fixed it.

The next worth mentioning is about nvidia proprietary driver installation. I am a bit skeptical due to previous experience. But again, another round of googling, "inspire" me again (since I am not exactly doing what's in it nor the situation exactly the same).

In my case, it actually much more simpler (no need for Envy). There's a proprietary driver ready to be enabled (downloaded and configured) in the system. It's on DriverManager accessible form the StartMenu. Just need a click in enable checkbox and it automatically download and configure it. However to get it working, it still need one line in "Screen" section in /etc/X11/xorg.conf :

Option "UseDisplayDevice" "DFP"

After video card acceleration working, the rest of the time is spent playing with desktop effects, which is quite interesting and fun.

Kubuntu 8.04 with KDE 4 sure is worth it, although I really think the Network Configuration matter is a very very major flaw. It put people who isntalling it in a very difficult situation to troubleshoot. In a system where it's not a problem (preconfigured successfully in certain system?) it could be fine, but not in many cases, I think. Besides with no network configuration GUI available to play with, there's so little hint on what to do next.