I quickly needed a new laptop to continue working and I found a Toshiba Satellite L670-10K. It’s a nice entry-level laptop with a dual core processor (I didn’t know Intel was still doing Pentium-branded processors) and a 17″ screen (read the specs for other details). I downloaded the latest Fedora Linux (version 13, 64 bits ; and version 14 is coming soon) and installed it from the LiveCD. Nearly everything was recognized out-of-the-box: screen resolution, graphical card (Intel, with 3D effects), wired network, webcam, card reader, sound card, etc.

The only thing that was not recognized was the wireless network card: a Realtek RTL8191SE. Here is how to install it. On the Toshiba website for (Windows) wireless drivers, it is always associated with the RTL8192SE model. So don’t be surprised if the driver downloaded from the Realtek website is a file with RTL8192 in its name although you clicked on the link for the RTL8191SE-VA2 model. Unpack this file. The LiveCD doesn’t come with some packges so you have to install them (via the System menu, Administration, Add/Remove software). These packages are: kernel-devel, gcc and make. Once it’s done, do a simple “make;make install” as root and reboot the laptop. Your wireless connection is now up and running!

If you want to have Flash on your 64-bits Linux, Adobe released version 10.1 of their Flash player with native 64 bits support. Download Flash player “Square”, unpack the archive and copy the (only) file “libflashplayer.so” in directory /home/yourusername/.mozilla/plugin, restart Firefox. You have now a Flash-enabled browser!

Finally, I must have done something wrong, somewhere but I kept having the first configuration screen after installation, even after subsequent reboots. After a quick search, I didn’t find anyone with the same issue. YMMV. In order to skip this screen (after you went through them a first time), just add the line “RUN_FIRSTBOOT=NO” in the file /etc/sysconfig/firstboot and voilà!

In conclusion, I’m very pleased with this laptop and Fedora. My Linux desktop was ready in just a few minutes. Let’s work, now! 🙂