Side Projects and Small Updates

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Running stress tests on the x250 before repasting

Hello there again! Just thought I’d give a nearly-mid-month update on things.

While repairing the Thinkpad X250 I’ve been working on recently, I found that two separate replacement keyboards did not have ribbon cables long enough to fully plug in to the connector on the motherboard- this seems to mess with trackpoint functionality. Guess I’ll wait on testing other cable and board replacements on that before coming to a conclusion. Looks like the thermal paste on that core i5 4th gen may also need to be replaced, as it seems the processor hits a solid 99c after only a few seconds of being stress tested, whoa. I intend on giving this to a friend once fully repaired.

I also have a System76 Gazelle model gazp9 that I’m working on getting the body plastics and screen repaired for. Looks like the previous owner I received this from had a habit of punching their screen, so might need an entire display assembly to fix that. This’ll be the extra computer I keep in case a family member ever needs a computer, and are open to trying out Pop!OS. Once I get that guy into functioning order again, I’ll definitely see if I can get an Arch Linux rice as well as a Pop!_OS screenshot from it with inxi and neofetch information.

Looking forward to using my Framework Laptop and a future System76 mobile workstation as my daily drivers in the future. More cores on one machine means I can use one for Virtualization and application compiling for work, with the other being the modular thin and light for everything else. Here’s hoping the JingPad’s software matures as well, as that would be the perfect companion tablet that ran an Ubuntu-based distro. Keep an eye on those project and hardware tracker spreadsheets for when I update em- looking forward to testing some fun hardware soon, as well as next year.

That’s it for this week! I’ll throw some fun things I’ve been reading or watching below recently:

  • Foxes Afloat is a fun youtube channel with a couple who have lived on narrowboats in the UK Canals for a while. I especially like them because I can relate to Colin who is also on the Asperger’s Syndrome train

  • My coworker Nathan Dyer wrote a great blog post about his life hacks for better wrist support, and another one previously about how he’s improved his Bluetooth experience on Linux

  • Watched a fun video on why Tesla made their DOJO computer from a Tesla fan channel

  • Nick from The Linux Experiment channel gave an update on how his JingPad is performing, with updated software.

  • I have a PineTime and PinePower Desktop unit arriving from the fun folks at Pine64 soon, looking forward to seeing how the PineTime can replace my Pebble Time Round. Here’s their october update

  • Jeff Geerling recently reviewed a pre-production board of the Cutie Pi tablet. After running through my emails on my no-longer-used email account I used to have as a main account, it looks like I might be receiving one of those in upcoming months too!

Fedora 35 on my Framework + eGPU setup

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Hi there! Back again. Today I finally made the move to Fedora 35 on my Framework and started testing out GloriousEggroll’s Nobara Project additions to Fedora on my Pangolin pang10.

This time around I decided to use Gnome Software to upgrade.

The only anomaly I found after booting was that the newest kernel from the fsync community repository didn’t work, so I made sure to remove that and disable the repository until newer kernels were working:

sudo dnf remove kernel-core-5.14.16-302.fsync.fc35 && sudo dnf remove kernel-devel-5.14.16-302.fsync.fc35 
sudo dnf autoremove
sudo dnf copr disable sentry/kernel-fsync
sudo dnf distro-sync -y && sudo dnf update --refresh -y

After removing that, running updates to get the newest fedora kernel, and rebooting into that, I was right as rain.

Graphics: Device-1: Intel TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics] driver: i915 v: kernel
Device-2: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Navi 23 [Radeon RX 6600/6600 XT/6600M] driver: amdgpu v: kernel
Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.11 driver: loaded: amdgpu,modesetting resolution: 2560x1440
OpenGL: renderer: AMD DIMGREY_CAVEFISH (LLVM 13.0.0 DRM 3.42 5.14.16-301.fc35.x86_64) v: 4.6 Mesa 22.0.0-devel
.',;::::;,'. s31bz@framework
.';:cccccccccccc:;,. ---------------
.;cccccccccccccccccccccc;. OS: Fedora Linux 35 (Workstation Edition) x86_64
.:cccccccccccccccccccccccccc:. Host: Laptop A8
.;ccccccccccccc;.:dddl:.;ccccccc;. Kernel: 5.14.16-301.fc35.x86_64
.:ccccccccccccc;OWMKOOXMWd;ccccccc:. Uptime: 1 hour, 35 mins
.:ccccccccccccc;KMMc;cc;xMMc:ccccccc:. Packages: 2578 (rpm), 17 (flatpak)
,cccccccccccccc;MMM.;cc;;WW::cccccccc, Shell: zsh 5.8
:cccccccccccccc;MMM.;cccccccccccccccc: Resolution: 2560x1440
:ccccccc;oxOOOo;MMM0OOk.;cccccccccccc: DE: GNOME 41.1
cccccc:0MMKxdd:;MMMkddc.;cccccccccccc; WM: Mutter
ccccc:XM0';cccc;MMM.;cccccccccccccccc' WM Theme: Sweet-Dark
ccccc;MMo;ccccc;MMW.;ccccccccccccccc; Theme: Adwaita-dark [GTK2/3]
ccccc;0MNc.ccc.xMMd:ccccccccccccccc; Icons: Nebula [GTK2/3]
cccccc;dNMWXXXWM0::cccccccccccccc:, Terminal: gnome-terminal
cccccccc;.:odl:.;cccccccccccccc:,. CPU: 11th Gen Intel i7-1185G7 (8) @ 4.800GHz
:cccccccccccccccccccccccccccc:'. GPU: AMD ATI Radeon RX 6600/6600 XT/6600M
.:cccccccccccccccccccccc:;,.. GPU: Intel TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics]
'::cccccccccccccc::;,. Memory: 5744MiB / 31880MiB

Good to see that No Man’s Sky is functioning well on the newest mesa, fedora kernel and proton as well now. Multiplayer is nice to see.

As it’s only been about 9-10 hours since I’ve upgraded to Fedora 35, I’ll have to see how well this plays with other games and whether or not some things may need patching. That said, this seems like yet another bulletproof released and I look forward to enjoying it!

Here are some fun things I’ve read or watched recently:

Framework Laptop + eGPU on Fedora Linux

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Hi there! I’ve recently taken to moving to a more portable setup, which should allow me to travel more while getting more done.

Still working on finding a decent portable monitor setup that allows the Pangolin pang10 (HDMI-out only) and my Framework Laptop (USB-C out, plus various port expansions) to have a secondary display while traveling. I’ve also been gaming on an eGPU-based setup for the past month and some change with the Framework Laptop.

The External GPU enclosure I’m utilizing is the awesome CoolerMaster EG200 eGPU. This thing includes a 2.5” drive bay on the front, a separate-from-thunderbolt USB hub on the back, and a clean setup for the GPU. Wires are pre-ran from the built-in standard desktop power supply and all the parts are clealy marked, should you need replacements.

The Framework Laptop is still running Fedora Linux. I might try Arch or openSUSE around the beginning of 2022, but we’ll see. I decided to go with an AMD GPU this time around, as I’ve mostly used Intel and NVIDIA products most of my life. Starting with an older RX590 I found on eBay, I tested the GPU for 2-3 weeks and it was running most of my games fine, held back only by the performance of that older card.

Then, all of a sudden, I sprung upon a combo deal on Newegg. Get an AM4 motherboard at MSRP and get an RX6600XT at MSRP as well, as part of the bundle deal! I could likely use that motherboard in a small server build in the future, so I’m keeping that in storage for now, as I use the RX6600XT in the eGPU. Games are running great on the external monitor! While Risk of Rain 2 destroys framerates like it always does, games like Factorio, No Man’s Sky, Audiosurf 2 and Last Epoch are running perfectly fine from 50-140fps!

After receiving the RX6600XT, I used the egpu-switcher app from github to make sure the proper symlinks were setup to offload graphics to that, and grabbed newer mesa drivers via GloriousEggroll’s mesa-aco COPR, and I was good to go! I’ve heard mentions that kernel 5.14.x will allow AMD hotplug support, but it seems that isn’t ready yet, from my testing. Framework has promised a firmware update to their Framework Laptop soon too, that will fix the power delivery anomaly I was seeing. I’d need the eGPU hooked up along with a secondary power supply if I wanted to game for longer than four hours at a time. Once that update comes in, I’ll be able to take that port I’m sacrificing to a power adapter and switch out Expansion Cards to put an Ethernet port in and enjoy faster networking.

For the heck of it, I’ll include recent inxi/neofetch outputs from my docked Framework laptop and Pangolin pang10 laptop below.

## This info was taken from the inxi and neofetch programs on Oct 3 2021 from my Framework.

-----------------------------------------------

Graphics: Device-1: Intel TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics] driver: i915 v: kernel
Device-2: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Navi 23 [Radeon RX 6600/6600 XT/6600M] driver: amdgpu v: kernel
Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.11 driver: loaded: amdgpu,modesetting resolution: 2560x1440
OpenGL: renderer: AMD DIMGREY_CAVEFISH (DRM 3.42.0 5.14.9-200.fc34.x86_64 LLVM 12.0.1) v: 4.6 Mesa 21.3.0-devel

/:-------------:\
:-------------------:: ---------------
:-----------/shhOHbmp---:\ OS: Fedora 34 (Workstation Edition) x86_64
/-----------omMMMNNNMMD ---: Host: Laptop A8
:-----------sMMMMNMNMP. ---: Kernel: 5.14.9-200.fc34.x86_64
:-----------:MMMdP------- ---\ Uptime: 4 mins
,------------:MMMd-------- ---: Packages: 2334 (rpm), 17 (flatpak)
:------------:MMMd------- .---: Shell: zsh 5.8
:---- oNMMMMMMMMMNho .----: Resolution: 2560x1440
:-- .+shhhMMMmhhy++ .------/ DE: GNOME 40.4
:- -------:MMMd--------------: WM: Mutter
:- --------/MMMd-------------; WM Theme: Sweet-Dark
:- ------/hMMMy------------: Theme: Sweet-Dark [GTK2/3]
:-- :dMNdhhdNMMNo------------; Icons: Nebula [GTK2/3]
:---:sdNMMMMNds:------------: Terminal: gnome-terminal
:------:://:-------------:: CPU: 11th Gen Intel i7-1185G7 (8) @ 4.800GHz
:---------------------:// GPU: AMD ATI Radeon RX 6600/6600 XT/6600M
GPU: Intel TigerLake-LP GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics]
Memory: 3188MiB / 31880MiB

Outside of working on getting that eGPU setup running fine with the Framework, I’ve also been dabbling in Arch ARM recently and might try installing Parabola, Arch ARM and Ubuntu 21.04 on my Pi 400 recently. We’re also testing out how to “popify” the Ubuntu experience on a Pi 4/400 recently, so stay tuned for that!

My Framework Laptop

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Hello again! Long time no see. I recently received the i7-1185g7 variant of the Framework Laptop and have been loving it! Apparently I was one of those lucky ones in the First Batch that shipped.

Anyway, I’ve been quite surprised to find out that the fingerprint reader works perfectly fine, out of the box, in Fedora 34. See below for a snapshot of the Fedora setup I’m running on this lovely piece of modular tech:

Sweet-Dark theme Fedora on the Framework laptop

I’ve also already plastered the Framework with stickers, as I did my prior Thinkpad P51.

Framework Rear with all my stickers

The Thinkpad P51 this is replacing, also stickered

Now that I have Fedora 34, my comfy Linux distro so to speak, loaded up on the Framework, I’ll give a bit of an overview of owning it for two weeks or so.

The entire device is modular, as I’m sure many saw on the recent LTT video. It also has a functioning fingerprint reader in the top right that can be used for running anything that requires sudo access, logging in, signing keys etc.

One thing I’ve enjoyed the most after getting this device is sinking up with the community over at the Framework Community Page and on their Reddit. Going to try some eGPU setups soon with the RX 590 8GB I have laying around to see if I can game on this in the future as well. Currently, I believe we’re awaiting a firmware update,, as I’ve seen in my testing with an Akitio Node at work, but I have hope for the future.

I’ve also recently seen a really cool discussion around a possible battery pack expansion like what was on the Thinkpad X220 here and a fantastic thread about using Elementary OS by co-founder Cassidy on the Framework here.

Jumping into the Framework community and using this modular thin and light is not only quite the departure from my Thicc Boi Thinkpad P51, but also my first time using touchpads in many years. I believe the last time I used a touchpad was on a Powerbook.