New #linuxaudio laptop

It is done. 😝 My new Linux based music production companion for on-the-go work, a beautiful ThinkPad Z16 with 4k OLED touchscreen from Lenovo, is (after 3 days of setting everything up) ready to go. 🥳🤓

Since I keep a changelog for each of my computers, I thought I'd make a blog post from the first couple of log entries for this new, amazing (!) laptop.

The ThinkPad Z series is Lenovo's relatively new all AMD offering. My particular model sports an AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 6650H 12 core CPU running at 3.300GHz, an AMD ATI Radeon 680M GPU, 16 GB of memory and a truly stunning 16" 4k OLED touchscreen! Also, a decent webcam, a very good trackpad and an aluminum body which feels deicate but at the same time just lovely. I am super happy and very grateful to have this amazing machine with me as my new #computerfriend wherever I go. 😇

Changelog

  • download latest UEFI BIOS 1.22(N3GET42W) from https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/products/laptops-and-netbooks/thinkpad-z-series-laptops/thinkpad-z16-type-21d4-21d5/downloads/ds557748-bios-update-utility-bootable-cd-for-microsoft-windows-11-10-thinkpad-z13-gen-1-z16-gen-1?category=BIOS%2FUEFI
  • download geteltorito from https://userpages.uni-koblenz.de/~krienke/ftp/noarch/geteltorito/
  • extract bootable media from the ISO file via ./geteltorito -o ~/Downloads/n3gur08w.img ~/Downloads/n3gur08w.iso
  • flash the IMG to USB stick via sudo dd if=n3gur08w.img of=/dev/sda
  • boot from the USB stick and flashed the UEFI BIOS
  • download the latest Manjaro GNOME boot image torrent from https://manjaro.org/download/
  • flash Manjaro boot image to USB stick with dd
  • boot from the USB stick and run Manjaro installer
    • partition the disk with LUKS and Swap (with Hibernate)
  • perform a system update via pamac update
  • install Kernel 6.1.1-1 via Manjaro Settings app
  • exchange gnome-terminal with gnome-console via pamac remove gnome-terminal
  • disable all GNOME shell extensions via Extensions app
  • remove Manjaro custom branding via pamac remove manjaro-gdm-branding manjaro-gnome-backgrounds manjaro-hello manjaro-base-skel manjaro-gnome-settings web-installer-url-handler
  • install Oh My Zsh via sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/master/tools/install.sh)"
  • pamac install flatpak
  • install all third party apps I intend to use with flatpak install com.bitwarden.desktop io.github.quodlibet.QuodLibet app.drey.EarTag com.axosoft.GitKraken com.belmoussaoui.Decoder com.bitwig.BitwigStudio com.github.finefindus.eyedropper com.github.geigi.cozy com.github.huluti.Curtail com.github.liferooter.textpieces com.github.phase1geo.minder com.github.tchx84.Flatseal com.gitlab.newsflash com.mattjakeman.ExtensionManager com.obsproject.Studio com.usebottles.bottles de.haeckerfelix.Fragments de.haeckerfelix.Shortwave net.sonobus.SonoBus org.ardour.Ardour org.audacityteam.Audacity org.darktable.Darktable org.gabmus.swatch org.gimp.GIMP flatpak org.gnome.gitlab.somas.Apostrophe org.inkscape.Inkscape org.mixxx.Mixxx org.mozilla.Thunderbird org.mozilla.firefox org.signal.Signal org.telegram.desktop org.zrythm.Zrythm com.bitwarden.desktop org.gnome.design.Palette org.gnome.meld org.filezillaproject.Filezilla org.pipewire.Helvum org.soundconverter.SoundConverter org.libreoffice.LibreOffice org.gnome.World.PikaBackup org.gnome.Lollypop com.github.neithern.g4music
  • install all GNOME and and Manjaro apps I intend to use with pamac install gnome-layout-switcher gnome-text-editor gnome-boxes gnome-characters gnome-connections gnome-contacts dconf-editor gnome-font-viewer gnome-firmware gnome-menus gnome-remote-desktop gnome-shell-extension-legacy-theme-auto-switcher gnome-shell-extension-nighttime-switcher eog gnome-maps gnome-podcasts gnome-soundrecorder gnome-tour gnome-clocks gnome-usage bootsplash-systemd bootsplash-theme-manjaro bind nmap neofetch hunspell-de hyphen-de hyphen-en pavucontrol libgda6 gst-libav gst-plugins-ugly pipewire-alsa pipewire-pulse pipewire-jack php php-gd
  • remove some unneeded packages with pamac remove gedit qgnomeplatform-qt5 qgnomeplatform-qt6 firefox lollypop
  • disable xorg access for Firefox and Thunderbird via Flatseal directive in order to enforce Wayland utilization
  • copy personal audio library to ~/Music/Audio\ Library/
  • install Pano shell extension via Extension Manager app
  • setup Manjaro bootsplash
    • add "bootsplash-manjaro" to "HOOKS" in /etc/mkinitcpio.conf
    • remove "quiet" from "GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT" from /etc/default/grub
    • add "bootsplash.bootfile=bootsplash-themes/manjaro/bootsplash" to the end of "GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT" in /etc/default/grub
    • sudo mkinitcpio -p linux61
    • sudo update-grub
  • setup email, CalDAV, CardDAV and Matrix in Thunderbird
  • remove signature separator in Thunderbird via Config editor and mail.identity.default.suppress_signature_separator true
  • set mailnews.wraplength to 0 in Thunderbird Config editor
  • setup Birthday Calendar extension in Thunderbird
  • copy personal music library to ~/Music/Music/
  • copy music projects to ~/Music/Bitwig\ Studio/
  • setup personal wallpaper with Dynamic Wallpaper app
  • setup Feedbin account in NewsFlash
  • setup personal template in OBS Studio
  • copy personal shell scripts to ~/Scripts/
  • copy personal templates for LibreOffice to ~/Templates/
  • setup custom copy-path, add-date and cleanup scripts for Nautilus
  • setup music library in QuodLibet
  • download, install, authenticate and verify audio plugin binaries according to Synthesizer and FX lists from https://amadeuspaulussen.com/info/gear
  • disable weird (to me) touch/tab/drag setting in GNOME via gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.peripherals.touchpad tap-and-drag false
  • setup Night Light from Sunset to Sunrise in Settings app
  • clone personal git repositories
  • setup git identity via git config --global user.name "Amadeus Paulussen" && git config --global user.email "amadeus@paulussen.id"
  • add git credentials permamently via git config --global credential.helper store
  • setup SSH
  • enable PHP GD extension in order to allow for quick local Grav development by uncommenting extension=gd in /etc/php/php.ini
  • setup personal website in Builder app
  • download and install Sononym and create sononym.desktop launcher file in ~/.local/share/applications as well as copy custom made launcher icon to ~/.sononym/sononym.png (feel free to download and use both, the custom icon and .desktop launcher file for Sononym)
  • setup Pika and Timeshift backups to external USB drive

Bitwig Studio & Sononym

Bitwig Studio and Sononym running on my new music production laptop

Among many of the (to me, truly fascinating!) applications I will be using, Bitwig Studio and Sononym will be the ones running most often on this new laptop - music making, awyeah! 😜

There's more

Other interesting bits and bytes on the subject of Linux and music production from my blog:

#musicproduction, #linux, #opensource
2023-01-01 (amadeus)