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Abstract: I present my experiences with Linux on an Acer Aspire 1300XC Notebook. I describe the hardware and whether it is (or might be) supported under Linux and talk about problems that one might encounter during installation or operation. There are several machines that are very similar to the one discussed here, particularily the models of the Aspire 1300 series. Chances are that substantial portions of this text might also apply to the related 1302 and 1304 series. |
Everything in this text represents my personal experiences. This information might be inaccurate and/or incomplete. Use it at your own risk.
Latest news: I've switched to kubuntu 6.06. No problems during the installation and the hardware seems to be supported perfectly. Well, actually two old problems persist: Firstly, I'm still having troubles with my WLAN card. Secondly, the kernel regularly deadlocks during cold system boots, a problem that was seemingly introduced in the more recent kernels. Otherwise it appears that this page is now rather of historical interest.
Last update: Wed Nov 1 20:10:31 CET 2006
Revision 1.6a - switched to kubuntu - page obsolete?
Revision 1.6 - modem driver in stock kernel?
Revision 1.5a - one little mystery solved. see here
Revision 1.5 - augmented/corrected hardware description, minor corrections
Revision 1.4 - cardbus adaptor
Revision 1.3 -
kernel 2.6.7, XFree86 4.3.0, recovered page from an accidental
overwrite.
If you ever need to recover some homepage, the wayback machine and google
cache might help
Revision 1.2 - burnt some CD-Rs (without problems), started using USB
Revision 1.1 - CD-RW blanking works for me (again)
Revision 1.0 - major update: 2.6 kernel series
Revision 0.12 - updated my home page links
Revision 0.11 - fixed some links
Revision 0.10 - modem driver seems more stable now
Revision 0.9 - added Tcl/Tk variant of batstat script
Revision 0.8 - added some more details about the hardware (chipsets, etc.)
Revision 0.7 - PowerNow! support, launch keys, erasing CD-RWs, upgraded to kernel 2.4.20, added a long missing link
Revision 0.6 - modem
Revision 0.5 - mentioned 1302 series, document restructured, touchpad, parallel port, CD-RW, repasted batstat script
Revision 0.4 - usb
Revision 0.3 - major update: other models, unbootable harddisk,
softmodem, cd-writer, X-Server, ACPI battery status, sleep mode
Revision 0.2 - corrected page title
Revision 0.1 - initial release
Linux seems to run very well on this machine and as far as now I'm quite happy with it.
The models of the Aspire 1300 series seem to differ only in the following aspects: battery type, memory size, processor model, optical drive choice and display size. So chances are that these models will behave very similarly. The 1302 and 1304 series seem to bear some similarity with the 1300 series either.
In particular, I've got feedback concerning the following models: 1300LC, 1300XV, 1302XC, 1302XV, 1304XC.
Notice for novices: To get maximum support for your hardware, you might, in some cases, need to install and configure more current software than is included in your distribution. In particular, you might need to obtain, configure and install a very recent kernel. To get started, you might want to read this HOWTO.
assessment keys: not working (-), functional (!), working(+) unknown(?)
Works fine. CPU frequency scaling has finally become part of the stable kernel branch and it seems to support the PowerNow! features perfectly.
Preliminary support with kernel 2.6.1. Supports power configuration, button, fan, thermal zone and c-states. Suspend-to-ram and suspend-to-disk have improved, but still barely work for me, although NERvOus claims that suspend-to-disk works.
Solved issues:
It generally works fine for me with XFree86 4.3.0 (savage driver).
Concerning GLX support, NERvOus
pointed out the following:
[...] the Savage driver for XFree4.x doesn't support GLX!
The only way to have GLX working with a savage card is to use a
commercial X server, like xig's one (which is really expensive). The
development status of glx support for savage cards is being announced on
the following mailing-list:
http://www.probo.com/mailman/listinfo/savage40
Work.
Work.
CD reading OK, DVD reading OK, CD-R writing OK, CD-RW writing and blanking OK. I'm now using direct IDE access (scsi-ide is obsolete). cdrecord might require the -immed flag (thanks to Adrian Knoth for the tip!).
Works with the VIA-rhine driver.
Works. I'm using it with a Netgear WG511 wireless LAN adaptor.
Works with the ALSA driver.
This is a softmode. I don't use it and I'm not up to date concerning it's support. There exists a driver with non-free license. Do not forget to read the FAQ, in case you encounter problems. I also recommend you to read NERvOus' notes.
Update: Kernel 2.6.11.3 contains a driver named snd-via82xx-modem. I'm not sure, but this certainly looks like a driver for this modem. I didn't bother to test it, though.
Works. I'm using it to connect my Trust BT120 USB Bluetooth dongle. Additionally the following devices have been reported to work: Nikon digital camera.
Works with Iomega ZIP drive.
Works as PS/2 pointing device (GlidePointPS/2 protocol). In my configuration the middle double button is used as third pointer button, but the intended "Wheel" semantics is reportedly also available through a patch.
Works.
Work. Use hotkeys. As a starting point you could use this configuration aspire1300.def.
Repartitioning the harddisk during the Debian installation procedure might make that disk unbootable. In that case the BIOS refuses to boot from the disk (If I remember correctly, it does with a complaint about an invalid master boot record). Update: Ever since I've been partitioning hard disks on various machines, I've been wondering what that funky ``bootable'' flag might be good for, but I never found out. Now I know for sure, it's a mechanism that was specially devised to allow witty BIOS software to refuse to load some perfectly valid bootstrapping code! Just don't forget to mark your root partition as ``bootable'', and the BIOS will happily load the boot manager of your choice. I guess that it might even work, I you just mark any partition as bootable and install lilo in the mast boot record, but I've no incentive to check that assumption.
I worked around this problem as follows:
It seems that most "battery status monitors" around use APM. wmacpi is one suitable for ACPI and klaptop from KDE work too.
Feel free to use the following Tcl/Tk script as a rudimentary
monitor (now for kernel 2.6.1):
#!/bin/sh
# \
exec wish "$0" "$@"
proc refresh {} {
.l1 configure -text [exec cat /proc/acpi/battery/BAT0/state]
after 10000 refresh
}
. configure -background black
pack [label .l1 -font {-*-*-*-r-*-*-7-*-*-*-*-*-*-*} -justify left -background black -foreground white]
after 0 refresh
Thanks to all people who have sent in suggestions for this page.