Friday, May 15, 2009

Ubuntu 9.04 on Dell Optiplex 760

The issue was reported as Bug #348694.

I experienced the same problems reported there. When installing from liveCD, during the first stage you have to push the power switch to generate interruptions until the keyboard is on. Then you can start to strike a key. When the mouse is on, you can move mouse to keep the system awake. I am not sure if there is way to keep the mouse always busy in that way you will save time for installation.

The next day morning, you will find installation is finished, and you need to restart. Then you need to set the kernel options when the grub screen is on.
  • hpet=disable helps, but does not solve the problem.
  • acpi=off solve the problem, but you will lose a CPU.
  • acpi_skip_timer_override is the best solution.
Update: Dell has released a bios fix available here http://ftp.us.dell.com/bios/O760-A03.EXE
You need to have windows system installed to fix though.