PixieLive

18 reactions

• 1 From adam - 11/04/2013, 23:49

  Just a quick one incase anyone else get's thrown this error.

  After burning the ISO to a USB disk for some reason I just get thrown the grub menu as if it is missing the config file, I tried reflashing it a few different ways but didn't fix it. Also tried to boot grub manually but it didnt work cleanly.

  To resolve I put the thumb drive back into a windows machine and opened cmd.exe, went to the thumb drive:\PixieLive\boot and ran "bootinst.bat", and away it went!

  Initial impressions are fantastic - wifi is working straight off the bat! :)

  It's fast and it's definitely given my crappy old inspiron 1010 a new life!

  I'll give it a good run over the next few days and let you know if I find any issues - looks great so far - well done! :)

• 2 From adam - 12/04/2013, 02:35

  It's running really good, the only suggestion I can think of right now is a desktop link to a "script that will install PixieLive on the hard disk".

  That might be easier said than done, but it would make it into a proper Live ISO.

  Failing that, maybe a quick set of instructions somewhere on how to get it copied onto a hard disk and the boot sector updated so you can install it from a thumb drive and get it up and running.

  Apart from that, it's awesome - you've done a really amazing job and I'll be donating next pay day! :)

  Thanks again!

• 3 From Christian Lorandi - 12/04/2013, 14:37

  @adam:

  about the boot error: 

  • how did you "burn" the iso to USB? "dd if=image.iso of=/dev/USBDRIVE" or extracted the content and copied?
  • did you rename the PixieLive3RC1 directory?

  as far as i know bootinst.bat (from linux) or bootinst.sh (from linux) are always necessary if you install on an USB drive, to install the bootloader

  about the autoinstall script:

  I will never provide an autoinstall script for several reasons:

  • if something goes wrong (and it may easily happen with an automatic tool, just think about linux installations of 10 years ago) people may loose their data. I don't want them to blame me :-D
  • writing that kind of tools take a lot (i.e. weeks or months) of time i don't have
  • a proper LiveISO is not necessarily installable, that is a non-live one

  I will write a guide about how to install it manually, so:

  1. people will know it's harmful and they could lose data
  2. people will do everything by themself
  3. people will learn something new about the system
  4. from point 1. and 2. derives: people cannot blame me for possible data loss

  what do you mean for "install PixieLive on the hard disk"?

  Installing "like a standard distribution" or kind of "Copying the live to the HDD and booting from it"?

  if the answer is the second one, there is already an old guide i wrote for PixieLive-1 or 2: How-to-install-it-on-you-HDD

  It's not updated but you need just to update files and directories names

  Thank you for your feedback

  Christian

• 4 From adam - 13/04/2013, 02:53

  With the boot error, tried dd & also from a windows machine to burn the ISO to a thumb drive using http://www.linuxliveusb.com/ which also did the same thing - maybe it's something funny with my particular thumb drive but once I ran the bootinst it fixed it

  I'll have a look at that "howto" later today - yes I meant having Pixie as the main distro on the machine (ie, installed on the hard disk and not booting from a thumb drive).

  The GMA500 support & general lightweight'ness of Pixie means the machine is usable again - it's better than any other OS I have tried before! Definitely gives the machine a new life! :)

• 5 From Alin - 19/04/2013, 14:28

  Hello Christian,

  Thanks a lot for these release, it works wonderful!

  I have one problem: my Vaio P21Z/Q shows only a reduced screen and I have not 1600x768 resolution (only 1366x768). The GC is GMA500.

  Do you have any idea?

  Thanks again for your big work! :-)

• 6 From Christian Lorandi - 20/04/2013, 14:40

  @Alin:

  did you try using the Xemgd=1600x768 cheatcode?

  In the bootloader page (the first blue screen with the PixieLive mode selection) press TAB and add the cheatcode Xemgd=1600x768 to the command line

  let me know if it works

  thank you, Christian

• 7 From goeran - 21/04/2013, 14:25

  Thank you for your nice work for my good old eeepc. Would it be possible to add the source files for the emgd kernel module?

  Greetings
  Göran

• 8 From Christian Lorandi - 21/04/2013, 15:24

  @goeran:

  you can download them from the intel website: http://www.intel.it/content/www/us/en/intelligent-systems/intel-embedded-media-and-graphics-driver/emgd-for-intel-atom-systems.html

  Christian

• 9 From joaquin - 07/05/2013, 23:46

  Im tryin to download by torrent but is really imposible, 2 days trying and any seeder. There is a direct download available? I would really apreciate.

• 10 From Christian Lorandi - 08/05/2013, 09:14

  @joaquin:

  actually, there is at least one seeder (me), but the tracker (linuxtracker) seems to be down...

  i will setup a direct download as soon as possible

• 11 From Haste - 20/06/2013, 08:29

  I'm unable to run pixie 3 RC1 on based Dell Inspiron Mini 1210 :(

  I had installed it on a thumb drive and it starts to boot, but however after completing the initial boot when transition to GUI happens, a flash of display corruption happens and the screen goes black and it stays like that forever. It seems to be some issue with display driver. Can you suggest anything which might be able to help. My detailed system specifications are below:

  1.33 GHz Intel Atom Z520 Processor
  1GB DDR2 RAM
  Intel GMA500 Graphics
  80GB PATA Hard Drive
  Broadcomm BCM4312 Wireless

  Linux Mint 14 runs on it without any issues, however its slow.

• 12 From Christian Lorandi - 24/06/2013, 14:51

  @Haste:

  as far as i know, the natural resolution of the Dell Inspiron Mini 1210 is 1280x800, did you try using the Xemgd=1280x800 cheatcode? You should press TAB in the bootloader screen and add it to the line which appears.

  Let me know if it works, thank you, Christian

• 13 From Haste - 25/06/2013, 17:09

  Thanks for replying me back Christian. However that option doesn't seem to help. Its still the same behavior.

• 14 From Christian Lorandi - 25/06/2013, 17:38

  @Haste:

  strange, i don't know how to fix it then, the only thing i can suggest at the moment is to use the noload=emgd cheatcode, but this will disable the emgd driver and use the gma500_gfx instead, obtaining the same effect you have on linux Mint probably

  anyway, give it a try if you can

  Christian

• 15 From Haste - 26/06/2013, 14:01

  Yes, I tried that already. But with similar result. Here, I see 4 4 red colored dots on top of my screen very close to the edge which move their position as i move my fingers across touchpad. Rest of the screen is black.

• 16 From skebb - 03/07/2013, 13:55

  I`ve got a Sony p11z and I have a problem with the screen. It only uses 80% of the Sonys screen. The remaining 20% at the right side are black.
  I try other resolutions and the mem=1900MB cheatcode, but that didn`t solve the problem. At least I tried noload=emgd. It did not solve the problem.

  Greetings
  skebb

• 17 From Christian Lorandi - 04/07/2013, 09:18

  @skebb:

  apparently we had a lot of graphical issues with this release.

  I will prepare a new one as soon as possible (also because libreoffice-4 was recently marked as stable), I hope the new release will solve these problems.

  Christian

• 18 From skebb - 04/07/2013, 09:57

  Thanks for the quick answer and for the good job with this distro.
  I hope, that the new release iscoming soon.

  Greetings
  skebb