Debian Linux On A Dell Smart Step 200N

I recently installed Debian sarge with a 2.6 kernel on a Dell Smart-Step 200N.

Word of warning. This laptop sucks. The cooling system sucks. It overheats and dies, especially if used for long periods of time plugged into AC and doing something processor intensive.

Why bother?

The sarge net-inst installer worked reasonably great. Most stuff worked, except, notably, the wireless card (the Linksys WPC11 is a pain in the arse for 2.4) and USB filesystems. The touchpad as well was finicky, jumping whenever you lift your finger. Also, there was a marked lack of ACPI support and CPU throttling; the former for standby/suspend, and the latter for doing something about the heat.

Helpful Resources

John Weber has an excellent, sufficiently detailed, page on Linux on the Dell SmartStep 200N/250N. All that's needed are a few tweaks on top of what he's suggested...

More later.