[SOLVED] How to upgrade from FireFox 20 in Ubuntu 10.04

Before I start off I have read many recent things telling people to upgrade because this version is out of date. So I will politely inform off the bat that I can not. This is a very old IBM T40 with a broken cdrom drive and if there are any incompatibilities with a newer version (via internet upgrade) there will be no way for me to downgrade back as, this computer doesn't support flash drive installs. If there were it would probably be beyond me to do it correctly.

With that out of the way it took me a few hours to figure out how to upgrade from FF V3.x with apt-get to get to 20 and it fixed most of the browsing problems I have been having but not all. I would like to get the most recent working stable version possible because I have to use this for a few months until I can afford to get a new computer (desktop broke.).

Any assistance would be much appreciated. Thank you for your time

TL;DR: Can't upgrade Ubuntu and need newer stable version of firefox.

I don't know how you installed but what you really need is a supported OS. I no longer use Ubuntu, use Debian instead. Ubuntu is based on Debian testing. When 10.04 was being developed that was Debian 5. Debian 6 is past its EOL now. You have some very serious security holes in your install that really need to be corrected to be safe to run on the internet at all.

There are a number of distros out there that will run on your box.

But as far as FF goes did you try the packages available on their site?

I think you may have some dependency problems.

If you run a search for your actual hardware (use the model and serial numbers from the bottom of the laptop) you should be able to find a replacement cdrom.

I have a very old Dell latitude (no wifi but does have a dsl port and an internal dial up modem) that runs Debian 7, the current stable. It would not boot a stick with the ISO on it. Has 2 usb ports though one is usb1 the other usb2. I found that it would actually boot a real install on a usb stick when it was in the usb2 port. Very, very slooooow. But with another installed (not live session, a real install of Wheezy) on another stick which was in the usb1 port I was able to copy that to the HDD using gparted in the installed session running from the usb2 port.

Pretty slow but it does work and run. Can't do much but one thing at a time on it but as far as browsing the web goes it is fine. Will run VLC fine if you don't mind the crappy sound that is such a trademark of Dell.

Weighs about 84 pounds. Very solid box.

But I am sure you could replace the cdrom pretty inexpensively and IBM probably has a manual on your box in pdf form.

I ran a quick search for cdrom drives. Found one. Lists a lot different T40s. Couldn't make much sense of it as it is from IBM France. But having no real info on your hardware I didn't waste more time looking further. The stuff is out there.

Running that unsupported OS really is dangerous. Your out of date browser is not the problem the rest of your systems by a long way.

If you mean Ubuntu 10.04 it was installed quite a while ago when the disc drive was still working. If you mean firefox 20 it was from an Apt get command.

As I said this computer wont allow installs from USB or external drives so that isn't an option. I've tested it many times in the past with various external drives, bootable usb sticks, etc....it doesn't work (even going through all the bios options).

I didn't try the file from firefoxes website because it said not to use it if it was installed with the distro. And I don't want to break anything.

As for the hardware, when we got it we replaced a few things, I know for sure 1 was the bluetooth adapter and maybe 1 or 2 other things to make sure they would work with this version of Ubuntu quite a while ago. Couldn't tell you what they were and cant take it apart again as the thing is hanging by a thread as it is.

And not about to spend anymore money on a cdrom for it. I can transfer files from it put it on a usb drive and play it on my roku.

I know it's not the safest set up, but it's what I am stuck with for now.

Thanks for you help, I'll just stick with it the way it is for a few months.

Originally Posted by scbbc81 With that out of the way it took me a few hours to figure out how to upgrade from FF V3.x with apt-get to get to 20 and it fixed most of the browsing problems I have been having but not all.

You can easily install the latest version of Firefox with the ubuntuzilla PPA.
(.deb ppa for the latest Seamonkey, Firefox, and Thunderbird)
You can add the ubuntuzilla repository to your /etc/apt/sources.list.
You can use the following command to add it to your sources.list from a terminal:

echo -e "\ndeb http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/ubuntuzilla/mozilla/apt all main" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list > /dev/null

Then add the package signing key to your keyring, by running the following command:

sudo apt-key adv --recv-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com C1289A29

Update your package database:

sudo apt-get update

Install your desired package, with one of the following commands:

sudo apt-get install firefox-mozilla-build

sudo apt-get install thunderbird-mozilla-build

sudo apt-get install seamonkey-mozilla-build

http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawik...itle=Main_Page

Originally Posted by scbbc81 Before I start off I have read many recent things telling people to upgrade because this version is out of date. So I will politely inform off the bat that I can not. This is a very old IBM T40 with a broken cdrom drive and if there are any incompatibilities with a newer version (via internet upgrade) there will be no way for me to downgrade back as, this computer doesn't support flash drive installs.

You are wrong that you "cannot" install a supported version of Ubuntu. There are at least two different ways to install with no CD or USB.

First, create a / (root) partition of about 13GB or so, for the new operating system.

You could use grml-rescueboot.
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopi...889589#p889397

Or you can use grub to load an .iso
Boot a Mint .iso from your hard drive using Grub2 - http://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/1849

NOTE: if your T40 does not have PAE support, you are limited to using Ubuntu 12.04 - Ubuntu 14.04 will not work (without forcepae)
To find out if you have PAE support, run the command:

grep --color=always -i PAE /proc/cpuinfo

If PAE is not listed, use Ubuntu 12.04

Thank you TxLonghorn for the very informative post, I will look into it later today. I had no idea you could boot iso's from grub2. Time to figure out my bluetooth adapter and the rest of the hardware. I like this option because it seems I can also keep an ISO of 10.04 incase something goes horribly wrong after I try it live.

The last grep command to check for PAE returned no results. I looked into it and it looks like 12.04 and 12.04.5 both require PAE? I may have gotten lucky though. It seems like there is a work around for my computer since it has a Pentium M, it says I can force PAE during the isos boot up. I'll have to read more into to see if I would have to do that every time it boots up once installed though and to make sure that option won't damage any hardware.

I'm gonna look more into this tonight or tomorrow. Until then Firefox is working perfect.

Thanks for all the great information!

For what it's worth I use Debian and, for my own reasons, want to run Firefox and not Debians's version, Iceweasel.
I run the Firefox Nightly builds and to install just unzipped them into /opt/ and changed ownership to root (which is the way I prefer things but is not necessarily the best) then put a soft link in /usr/bin. The same could be done with any of the Firefox Linux builds from their site without affecting Ubuntu (much) but you would have to manually add things like menu entries.
The above said I think the best bet is to upgrade as outlined rather than use an older Ubuntu version.

Just one last question and the problem is solved once I read more about how to make isos boot with grub2.

I now remember why I never upgraded to 12.04 when my disc drive was working I didn't like the way it worked in videos and I didn't bother because I mostly used Opensuse on my desktop. Sadly the desktop is no longer.

Point is Ubuntu 14.04 looks much better but I'm getting mixed minimum requirements for it. This has 1.25gb of ram and the minimum requirements I'm reading are ranging from 512mb-1.5gb. So how is support for Xubuntu 14.04? If I'm going to upgrade I easily meet their requirements.

First I must apollogize for not mentioning booting ISOs from grub. One of those things that I, stupidly, supposed everyone knew. This a really silly assumption to make as it is not a thing people commonly do.

Ubuntu was the first distro to use grub2 but not the first to have their ISOs boot with grub. There are a couple of "hooks" that need to be in the ISO. Once they added those, however, and it pains me to give them any credit, their ISOs boot extremely reliably.

This also holds true of distros based on Ubuntu.

As an Xfce user I find Xubuntu really pretty lame. It is harder to configure than straight up Xfce because it uses Nautilus for managing the desktop so many of the fine tools in the Xfce Settings Manager do not work or, at least, work correctly.

One easy solution would be to check out the Linux Mint distro. Directly based on Ubuntu but offering the Mate desktop which is a fork of Gnome 2 that I assume you are currently using.

My wife uses it on her laptop with Debian Wheezy. As an old Gnome 2 user I think it is much better than the last days of Gnome 2 by far. It is very nice. They also forked all parts of Gnome 2 so Mate is a DE under constant development and improvement with great support.

I would not recommend Cinnamon as it is an in house Linux Mint fork of Gnome Shell which is not going to run on your hardware well if at all.

Mate is actually supported by LM now. The lead guy at LM that runs the Linux Mint Debian Edition is very active in that support. So on both LM and LMDE you have excellent integration of both those Gnome based DEs.

Mate will run as well as your current Gnome DE does and will be up to date.
http://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=2713

Only thing I see that would be a concern would be;
Booting with non-PAE CPUs

Listed with known issues on that page. As you have already found the stuff to add to the menu entry (made permenant by adding to /etc/default/grub and running "update-grub") this should not be a problem.

Grab the ISO and see if it boots and runs as a live session.

Cool thanks! I have to run to work. I'll do some research when I get home from work. For now much more than the original information that has been asked for has been answered. I will mark it as solved. Thanks everyone for being helpful!

I have an old Dell Inspiron 700m with the Pentium M, which does not support PAE. (1.2 GB ram)
I tried various operating systems, and settled on Linux Mint 13 (based on Ubuntu 12.04) xfce. I love it. It turned an old clunker notebook into a "screaming" machine. My ram usage at startup is less than 300 MB.
I tried Linux Mint 17 xfce (based on Ubuntu 14.04) with the forcepae option. That worked, but not as well as Mint 13. I also tried Mint 13 Mate (my first choice), but xfce worked a bit better, I think.

Note: if you have trouble with the installation program complaining about mounted partitions ("Can't write new partition table") - put the .iso file on a USB drive and boot it with the hard drive's grub2.

Originally Posted by TxLonghorn I have an old Dell Inspiron 700m with the Pentium M, which does not support PAE. (1.2 GB ram) I tried various operating systems, and settled on Linux Mint 13 (based on Ubuntu 12.04) xfce. I love it. It turned an old clunker notebook into a "screaming" machine. My ram usage at startup is less than 300 MB. I tried Linux Mint 17 xfce (based on Ubuntu 14.04) with the forcepae option. That worked, but not as well as Mint 13. I also tried Mint 13 Mate (my first choice), but xfce worked a bit better, I think. Note: if you have trouble with the installation program complaining about mounted partitions ("Can't write new partition table") - put the .iso file on a USB drive and boot it with the hard drive's grub2.

That last is a great idea. I didn't have that option at all.

My old Dell was actually in a community recycling center; people leave stuff that works rather than fill our dump, and had Vista on it. That was pretty slow too. But I couldn't boot the ISO from there.