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Toshiba Supports Linux 61

Posted by CmdrTaco from the isn't-that-helpful dept.
Matts Kallioniemi writes "Toshiba just now put up a Linux support page. Quite a change from two months ago when they refused to even think about Linux. Now if I could only get a Libretto ff 1100, but Toshiba Sweden are not importing the Libretto any more. :-( "
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Toshiba Supports Linux! More

Toshiba Supports Linux!

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  • I ahve a Sattelite and it rungs any flavor of Linux Great on it. No complaints here except for my generic pcmcia nic. I do say that when I called earlier this month about a small resolution difference under Linux they were not much of a help
    Like Linux what? Is that something MS just put out..





  • I'm seriously considering sending them documentation as well as configuration file for the Toshiba notebooks I've installed Linux on around the office. I'm writing this right now on a 740CDT, and I just bought a 2545XCDT for myself. The only thing I haven't been able to get working on either one is the internal modem, but at least on the 2545XCDT it appears to be a PCI modem. I suppose that means I'll have to read some web pages. *chuckle* The only problem I've had so far with the 2545XCDT is that the floppy drive's controller is apparently just a wee bit deviated from the norm, enough so to cause the occasional FDC reply error when you try to read files from disk. (If anyone knows about this, pipe up). I'm going to set up pages for both the 740CDT and the 2545XCDT shortly and add them to the Linux Laptop Page, but I'm giving Toshiba a crack at them as well (provided I can understand their reply emails. *chuckle*)
  • How many of you remember the early 80's, right after the original PCs came out, how bad the motherboard manuals were?

    I honestly thought that they were translated from Japanese into English by a Russian who couldn't read either language.

    Got to admit, though, that I do miss those manuals. They included specs for designing and implementing your own slots and ISA cards. I blasted many old PC motherboards because of the poor translations, but oh what fun it was!!

    "For taht which is interface will interfacing with motherboard at clock ticks of 4.77 MHz."

    How cool was that?!?
  • Yup. The best message to send about their English use would be new HTML for their pages. Use your Japanese reading skills to translate their other pages. Don't critize, just code.
  • It's better than MS-Windows because whether to reboot is your decision rather than being forced to reboot. You're also not going to have to reload the operating system because for unknown reasons it just won't run anymore...
  • I recieved e-mail from Toshiba in Japanese.

    Toshiba is overloaded by the e-mail response. They are trying to resond to all the e-mail but shorthanded. Thus they had no time to go through English ones but just started Japanese ones. So be patient.

    His e-mail response thanked all the people sending corrections on bad English.

    Also he said he peeked into /. but could not figure out how to leave message here.

    Looks like good start.

  • I take great offense to what you have said. I am tri-lingual, Russian, Estonian and English. I am not perfect in any of the three languages. But if need be I can at least have someone proofread my work. This poor example of English shows me that they do not care enough about what they are doing to even have a co-worker look over what they type. In context, the poor grammar and spelling are nothing like we see and post here on /., this came from a business site not an open forum. IMHO whoever wrote this page should have at least had someone else read it over.

    Your broad assumption that most of us are monolingual, is insulting. It only proves that you have no clue as to the population of /. and could be classified as FUD. So lets think about this logically, we have many international posters here on /. so I would guess that a lot of are multi-lingual. So take your FUD and crawl back into your your little safe place where you are better than other people.
  • Total access 65 counts ('99/7/1) (at 1:20 PM mountain Time)
    Wonder what it will be after the /. effect ;-)

  • Linux On Toshiba (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Its funny, I call Toshiba to find out if they had NT drivers for their laptops a few months back and the person on the phone Yelled at me. "You can't install NT on this PC. If you do you will void your Wty." I was like... chill...

    Now they are installing Linux.

    I wonder how well thats going to fly...

  • It says 195 hits now. Is it overflowing at 999 or something?
  • funny how the libretto still has "the other OS"'s logo on it :)
  • I wonder if they'll have specs for all their laptops. I have a Sat. Pro 490 CDT that I'd love to get Linux fully running on. I could get RH installed, but never had any luck with the PCMCIA stuff.

    I wait with baited breath...
  • ...is for Compaq to do the same!

    HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my, that's funny......

  • well look at that. very cool. thanks!

    --

  • It's legit. There's a link to tce.co.jp on the Toshiba site (http://www.toshiba.co.jp/group/index_j.htm)

  • OK, the person who wrote this page is a poor English speaker. But the irony is that most of those of you that are laughing at him are completely monolingual, and can't speak or write any non-English language as well as this person wrote English (and no, your knowledge of computer languages, in which all the keywords are English words, isn't an argument against this point).

    If anything, the poor English is a good sign that the people putting this site up are technical and have the information we need. If it were marketing people, their English would be perfect but they wouldn't know anything.

    The Slashdot community could react to this effort to reach out with a wave of ridicule, or we could say "thanks ... here's what we need." You decide.

  • Think it's likeone of those automatic translators, not someone with poor english skills. ;-) Least thier trying, Better open policy with a low budjet (won't hurt linux too much), than a bad policy with a big budget.

    My guess is this project _just bearly_ has full corporate approval, so the budjet is tiny until they see some success.

  • Toshiba spec sheets are here. [toshiba.com]
    Select your model then look at the spec sheet. Chip types and other useful information.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I feel very much like this page is not by the company we usually refer to as Toshiba, but another another Company. Did you notice they never use the Toshiba logo? Were you surprised Toshiba would use a 14.4 for their developers connection? Did anyone bother to compare the Kanjis of both companies?

    I couldnt loooooooooaaad the frontpage of their server, and I couldnt do a traceroute - it looped
    at a061.pageweb.ne.jp. Doesnt sound like a big companys official connection to me...
  • Posted by FascDot Killed My Previous Use:

    First, their hit counter must be rolling because it was at 24 when I got there.

    Also, here's the unedited text of the "for developers" page:

    We hoping, we want to be good connecting adviser between group for developing Toshiba PC's driver, utility and Toshiba Co. Therefore we complete request from developer groups and we will offer information back which you need information from Toshiba Co. or Therefore we complete request from developer groups and we will offer information back instead of Toshiba Co.

    Notice: These information are available with conditions. (Not all free give away). Please request clearly, what you want to do? what kind of information you need, so on. Please understand we are just started to approach in this free field. That's why we will cope case by case, in case of the content need time for answer it or can not give information back.

    Please give this matter's inquiry here in.
    ---
    Put Hemos through English 101!
  • Linux is actually a very useful thing to have on a laptop. Not only a useful desktop but a good network analysis tool, out of the box with standard stuff.
    NT is horrible for laptops. The pcmcia support blows. Nothing lke booting linux and having it detect your card automagically.

    Actually I think linux is th best thing to put on a laptop.
  • First off read my post, I am not making fun of people that don't speak proper English. I in fact am not Russian, I just didn't order the languages I speak in order. Secondly my point was that if you are going to post something to that is supposed to promote anything for a company you should get it proof read, not that you have to speak proper English. As for you, since you got personal, try getting a login and not being a coward.

  • Some more information (Score:3)

    by Chilli ( 5230 ) on Thursday July 01, 1999 @07:27PM (#1822715) Homepage
    I assume, not too many are clicking on the "Japanese page is here" link. Which is a pity, as it is common on bilingual Web-pages in Japan that the Japanese pages have more information than the English ones (that's not to protect the information, but because it is an awful lot of work for the average Japanese to write English).

    So, here some more information for the Japanese-impaired ;-)

    • In Japan, they offer pre-installation service for laptops and desktops if you order more than 10 machines; interestingly, not only for Linux, but also for FreeBSD (not too surprising, as FreeBSD is quite popular in Japan). IMHO this means that they really have some people with technical expertise working on that project.
    • If I understand correctly, they also plan to develop machines that have Linux pre-installed for normal sales.
    • Furthermore, they plan to develop utilities (not further specified) and drivers of their own.
    • They also want to offer free and commercial user support and plan to create a training centre.
    • There is already information on the DynaBookSS PORTEGE 3300CT PAP330xx and LibrettoSS 1010CT PAL101xx available. Are they sold outside Japan?
    Seems to be a pretty honest attempt to cooperate, which IMO should be acknowledged by supporting them.

    Chilli

    PS: I am sorry for any inaccuracies, but I am neither a native speaker of English nor Japanese.

  • It's not funny. It's sad and extremely bad English. It's not just a small grammatical mistakes. I would not say these guys did not get full corporate support but defiantly these guys never asked their US subsidiary person for proofreading. If this bad English is due to automatic translation, I should say this is a good translation. I remember using one and chucking it 1 hour later. That stupid translation software cost over $1000, phewwwww.
    Anyway, be kind, gentleman. It's a good start. And praise their intention or use their intention on our behalf. Positive thinking !
    If you really hate this bad English, instead of poking fun here, send them an e-mail telling the true story. --- Dammed it, I did.
    --- Sigh in Japanese ---
  • You have to check out the developers section. Its pretty funny.
  • Do you really mean outsold? Not the estimated user base, the actual boxed sales?

    If so I'm impressed.
  • I'd believe the server was /.ed, but I got to the page (after a loooong) wait and saw it had only 371 hits. Anybody know of a US mirror?

  • It works for me , but it's ssslllllloooooowwwwwww....
  • i've got one. it's good. :)

    --

  • And apparently Toshiba put theirs on a 14.4 ;)
  • As some people seem to be interested in it - if you have issue 3/99 [linux-magazin.de] of German Linux Magazin, there is a detailed description of the installation process. It's a pretty long report of one user's experience. Unfortunately, the article is not available online, the link just leads to the table of contents ;-( Maybe some German readers still have a copy, or you could ask Linux Magazin editors to make available an online version...
  • When I was searching around for setup information for my Toshiba laptop I remember seeing some postings that the hardware people at Toshiba were not opposed to sharing info with free software developers, but the fact was almost all of their hardware documentation was in Japanese.

    BTW, Except for setting up X, installing Redhat6 on my Toshiba Satellite was absolutely painless.
  • believe it or not Linux out sold NT server on Dec of '98 in Japan.
    And PowerLinux is made by hitachi(Japanese company)
    Also, from what I know quiet a few Sys Adm. Use linux in Japan too

  • Regional habbits (Score:3)

    by Oestergaard ( 3005 ) on Thursday July 01, 1999 @09:44AM (#1822732) Homepage
    Seems the US is the most Microsoft using region. Then Europe, then asia (dunno 'bout africa and others).
    Asia is far away from the states where Microsoft lives, both in miles and culture. No surprise that the irrational choice to just use microsoft stuff like everyone else is less widespread there.

    Denmark where I live, used to be a very IBM loyal country. Banks used OS/2 when IBM was pushing that, and apple computers have never really been widely used.
    Sweden (right next to us), has always had a lot of apple machines.
    It seems that Denmark now is a Microsoft loyal country. The RIPE region has something like 50% of all web servers running Linux, and around 15% on windows. In denmark (which is a part of RIPE) those numbers are reversed. (What _is_ it with us and large firms?)

    A friend I have went to Russia to tell some university people how they could solve their computing problems by buying PCs and putting Linux on them (that was a solution they could afford). But they weren't really interested in Linux, they wanted windows because that's what we use in the west. They smoke Marlboro there too :)

    It's really fun to watch how culture and regional differences influence people's decisions.
    Meanwhile I'll just be an illoyal dane running the OS that works.
  • hope this means they'll be putting out a linux driver for the libretto's pcmcia floppy drive...


    also, if you do have a libretto, i highly recommend debian as by far the easiest distribution to install, given the floppy disk limitation.

    --

  • I'd be interested in knowing a little about that prestige project at DTU, since I'm actually studying there...

    Hell, there might even be an english translation of the press release or whatever it is so it can be /.'ed properly.
  • Maybe it's overflowing at 9,999 , and the /. effect is just overwheming. :)
  • Um, that's been out for a long time. Check here:

    http://hyper.stanford.edu/~dhinds/pcmcia/pcmcia. html

    And look under supported cards, way at the bottom. The drive is not in the standard pcmcia distribution due to its small user base, but its on the pcmcia-cs ftp site with detailed instructions.

    It works too!
  • At this moment they give very primitive information only. No installation information. Not much of help but a good start.

    I bet they did not even tried it. For example, if you want to make multiple partition and try to install their back up CD to HDD, it will zap your partition with no option. I found no information on alternative installtion floppy.

    It took me a while to figure it out. I have one of the ultra-slim PC Dynabook SS3300CT (Japanese Windoze98) running Mandrake 6.0. If you reboot (with init 3) just as installed, it will freeze your console keyboard. Topic 97 PCMCIA driver seems to have some problem with keyboard / mouse system. You have to run gpm before pcmcia in Sys-V init. Go check my page for details of installation.


    http://home.pacbell.net/aoki



    FYI: I have not seen these ultra thin PC in Fry's (American store) but T-zone (Japanese store for Japanese business here) can get them for you in Silicon valley by calling them locally.
  • Yes I never quite understood how so many Danish companies jumped on the NT wagon, even when their existing technology were ok, thus just causing pains and money.

    Many even announce "prestige projects" (e.g. the Danish Technical University), dependent upon Win2000. A completely unfinished, not to mention unproven OS, that should not be used for anything important till' it has been proven for a few years at least (if ever, following the NT4 example).

    Is it that important to be trendy? Is it due to lack of education in the IT business? Is the lack of tech people causing a degration in quality of the average IT person in charge of business decisions?

    Maybe also company CEO's, etc. interfering with the IT department business, under the influence of Micros~1 hype. Buy them a good dinner and you can trick them into anything.
    - Denmark is a small country, only a few dinners are needed.
  • Another major computer mannufacturer is "supporting" Linux. Its good news. I'm glad. But, I'm going to reserve judgement for a while. There's really not enough on the site just yet to make me smile fully. In fact some of the comments on the site at the moment don't make me smile at all.

    The only page with any useful information on is the "Developers" page. Of course this is good, as thats what we want, to be able to support the tosh range. TEC say:

    "We at Toshiba would like to offer good comunication channel between people developing device drivers and system utility programs for Toshiba PCs and Toshiba. "

    Well this sounds great! But the next paragraph is:

    "These information are available with conditions. (Not all free give away). Please request clearly, what you want to do? what kind of information you need, so on. Please understand we are just started to approach in this free field. That's why we will cope case by case, in case of the content need time for answer it or can not give information back. "

    Ok maybe I'm not taking it in the right spirit, and I agree they are definitely making the right noises, but I want to see more from them. Ultimately it will help their business, because us geeks won't just want to buy their systems, chances are we will.

    I'm looking forward to seeing how it all develops, and seeing more "support" for Linux in the computing world.

    Now all I have to do is make my company see the light. Could be a long time coming though, they've just replaced all their Sun Servers with NT Servers. I couldn't even convince them to use PostgreSQL or MySQL on a linux box instead of buying SQL Server and 300 user licenses.
    --

    "I was either onto something, or on something!"

  • Heh. Reminds me of Dave Barry's "Read This First" column.

    Instructions: For results that can be the finest, it is our advising that: Never to hold these buttons two times!! Except the battery.

    I love it. The full text can be found in "Dave Barry's Greatest Hits" or the sci.electronics FAQ under humour. ( www.repairfaq.org [repairfaq.org]).
  • Does this mean that they'll do pre-installs of Linux on their machines? Anybody know what distribution they're using?
  • 14.4 try 2400 baud
  • I think this is one of Keiretsu subsidiary -- KOGAISHA.

    TOSHIBA word phrase in this company's Japanese name uses the same 2 Kanjis. (Or should I spell this in singular form Kanji???)

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