[Gllug] Kubuntu live CD requires mains power?

Christopher Currie ccurrie at usa.net
Wed Oct 11 13:15:17 UTC 2006


On my T22 IBM Thinkpad I have been testing a Kubuntu 6.06.1-desktop-i386 live 
CD (burnt from the iso) as part of trying to get my Belkin F5D7010 PCMCIA 
wireless card to work, so far unsuccessfully.

(I don't have a wireless network at home but want to use a laptop when 
travelling, attending computer clubs full of sneering Windows users, etc). 

When the laptop was connected to the mains at home, the CD booted OK, bringing 
up the KDE interface, and I was able to test the Wireless Assistant utility 
on the barely-existent local wireless networks. It found the one closed Sky 
network in the area correctly, but of course couldn't connect to it.

So I took the laptop to the nearest Starbucks to see if I could connect to 
their tmobile hotspot.

This time (on battery power only), the CD booted, displaying all messages as 
far as the point just before the KDE splash screen comes up (i.e. perhaps 
when loading X11?) then went blank and hung. 

It did this with the wireless card in each of two PCMCIA slots, and without 
the wireless card altogether.

The battery was almost fully charged, and the laptop would boot the installed 
Suse 10.1 or Windows 98 from the hard disk, even when the juice had gone down 
to half.

When I got it home, plugged it into the mains, booted the Kubuntu CD again, it 
came up fine...

(So it looks as if my thoughts of solving the wireless problems by replacing 
the SuSE with Kubuntu need to be abandoned.)

Has anyone hit this problem of live CDs requiring mains power to run a graphic 
display?

Christopher Currie
ccurrie at usa.net


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