Being a fan on Ubuntu, I always keep an eye on its progress and development from time to time. Having bough a new Eee PC 901, an Intel Atom-based notebook with RAM 1 GB, 20 GB SSD, and a cute small display of 9 inch, I am curious of installing the new version of Ubuntu called as 9.04. I’ve got the previous Ubuntu class, 8.10 installed into my notebook soon after I bought this Asus-branded notebook. Ubuntu 9.04 seems to be exciting to have instead my existing old version of it.

Ubuntu 9.04 has been released since April 23, 2009, a Cannonical’s tenth, designed by Jaunty Jacklope. New features of Ubuntu 9.04 include faster booting time, integration of web services and application into the desktop interface. Its new usplash screen and login screen supports the Eee PC 901. These features are factors that drove me impatient to make it installed into my current notebook.

Installing a customized Linux kernel to support the wireless networking, Ethernet, and any additional utilities is necessary. Everything inside Ubuntu 9.04 is presented in a default option except some keys on the keyboard. This new release had a better response level than the previous Ubuntu 8.10. Booting process of Ubuntu 9.04 simply takes 20 seconds, 15 seconds faster than 8.10. The approximate duration of live battery is about 4.5 hours. It’s interesting enough for such cute Eee PC 901 of mine surely.

The installation of Ubuntu 9.04 into Eee PC 901 is really easy. Here you the steps

Step 1: If an external CD Drive is not available, you have to run the Ubuntu installer from a USB drive of SD card. Ubuntu’s USB Startup Disk Creator tool helps easily create a live USB system. The existence of Ubuntu system is a must and thereby the tool cannot work as expected without it. Yet, UNetbootin is another option to go for.

Step 2: Bootin a USB drive into the notebook. Press Escape after starting your Eee PC 901 to open the booting menu. Afterwards, choose the USB option available and press enter. Booting will begin soon after this step.

Step 3: Though we have found that Ubuntu’s installer can run normally be done, we need to pay attention to the partitions process. There are two types of solid state drives of Eee PC 901; first, a faster 4 GB drive, second, a bit slower 16 GB drive. Soon after you select manual option, put the root (/) on the smaller drive and home (/home) on the larger one. Ext4 files system is helpful in this case to create better performance from the SSDs. Usually we will get a warning if we haven’t created a swap partition. However, I had better recommend you no to use the swap partition to keep your SSDs work much longer.

Step 4: It is time to boot your newly installed system, Ubuntu 9.04. If there is a problem that makes your Ubuntu new system doesn’t work, look at the Bluetooth radio or webcam to make sure that they enabled and not otherwise. Install Cheese for a better webcam advantage. Add the CPU scaling applet to your GNOME panel on purpose of individual interest in controlling CPU scaling like the default of Xandros distribution.

The installation of Ubuntu 9.04 is already done now. Further information on tweaking Ubuntu for SSD drives can be accessed in my site where I explore this topic. Prove it by yourself if this tweaking applies well to your responsive system of Ubuntu 9.04. Have a nice try!

[via tombuntu.com]