Gentoo Forums
Gentoo Forums
Gentoo Forums
Quick Search: in
Gentoo Acer 803LCi support thread (discussion section)
View unanswered posts
View posts from last 24 hours

Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 28, 29, 30  
Reply to topic    Gentoo Forums Forum Index Kernel & Hardware
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
tuxlover
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 297
Location: weltweit

PostPosted: Sat Feb 18, 2006 1:17 pm    Post subject: vga quality? Reply with quote

Hi,

on my tm 800 (3 years old almost) I've always had the problem that the external vga signal is very bad. If I connect a decent crt screen it looks pretty fuzzy. It's really too bad to work with (it's ok for a beamer or very low resolution).

What I'm asking is, if anyone here has had a port replicator connected to this computer and tried the vga connector on the port replicator, is how is the replicator's vga signal? Is it any better? (Does the port replicator actually have a vga connector?)

I would like to connect an external screen, and I'm thinking that maybe the bad vga quality is caused by the wiring or so, which could be different on the replicator.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
thepi
Guru
Guru


Joined: 06 Jan 2004
Posts: 352
Location: Tokyo, Japan

PostPosted: Sun Feb 19, 2006 11:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

IIRC the bad signal was caused by a flaw in the original series' mainboard design. Acer would exchange the board when you sent it in since it was covered by warranty, but it's too late for you to work that way :? I'm not sure - didn't the replicator contain its own vga chip? It would propably be hard to get to work on linux, then. If you're lucky, it's done similar to the Samsung X series replicator, where the signal is routed through the port. OTOH, this most likely means that you're still stuck with the bad signal quality.

So basically, sorry for not being able to help :?
_________________
Violence is the last resort of the incompetent --Isaac Asimov
Gentoo on Acer TM800 | Help! | Vote! | Get FF!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
tuxlover
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 297
Location: weltweit

PostPosted: Sun Feb 19, 2006 9:46 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks.
Actually Acer changed my motherboard (and wlan card, and touchpad... without me complaining about them) when I sent it in a while ago because of a bad audio jack. I haven't tried vga since (because it looked so horrible before), maybe I should try it again now, who knows?
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
stefandoesinger
n00b
n00b


Joined: 07 Mar 2005
Posts: 23
Location: Österreich

PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 9:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

A port replicator won't change anything. It just consists of a few wires. But it's no problem to work with it from Linux.

I had the mainboard replaced a few months ago, and my CRT signal isn't really good too. It's enought to work with it, but it's a pitty for a 19 inch TFT sceen :(

Time for me to get a new computer with an DVI output
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
ToeiRei
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 03 Jan 2005
Posts: 1191
Location: Austria

PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 9:34 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The Acer tm 800 might be old, but it is a great laptop. - So I tried to upgrade it. Here's what I did:

RAM Upgrade
As it isn't covered by warranty any more I took it apart for cleaning out the dust and noticed that there is a 2nd RAM Chip under the keyboard which was easy to exchange. So I did an upgrade to 1 GB RAM and it works like a charm.

HDD
Exchanging the HDD is an easy task as you do not need to take out the keyboard. So I inserted a 100 GB disc. Bios knows it. So I just booted from a LiveCD and used rsync for a disc copy.

The upgrade wasn't that expensive (207.80 EUR), but the speed gain is great.

Rei
_________________
Please stand by - The mailer daemon is busy burning your messages in hell...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
tuxlover
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 297
Location: weltweit

PostPosted: Tue Feb 28, 2006 9:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

As I mentioned Acer replaced my mainboard as well. I connected a 17" tft a couple of days ago, and the image quality looked almost perfect! Actually, I'm waiting for my new 19" tft right now, it should come with the mail today :)
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
ToeiRei
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 03 Jan 2005
Posts: 1191
Location: Austria

PostPosted: Mon Apr 10, 2006 11:35 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

What about updating / rewriting this howto? I think it's kind of outdated somehow...
If you want me to, I would do it.

Rei
_________________
Please stand by - The mailer daemon is busy burning your messages in hell...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
thepi
Guru
Guru


Joined: 06 Jan 2004
Posts: 352
Location: Tokyo, Japan

PostPosted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 4:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Actually some of it was already started (like outsourcing the Framebuffer, qingy,... parts), but... well, obviously help is still needed :)

pi~
_________________
Violence is the last resort of the incompetent --Isaac Asimov
Gentoo on Acer TM800 | Help! | Vote! | Get FF!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
ToeiRei
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 03 Jan 2005
Posts: 1191
Location: Austria

PostPosted: Tue Apr 18, 2006 8:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Are there any other parts to be splitted off?
As soon as I know what has to be reworked, I'll do it.

Rei
_________________
Please stand by - The mailer daemon is busy burning your messages in hell...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
tuxlover
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 297
Location: weltweit

PostPosted: Thu Jun 22, 2006 6:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

ToeiRei wrote:
RAM Upgrade
...

I bought a 1GB RAM module a couple of days ago, but Linux only seems to recognize around 900MB, which is bad because I also wanted to continue using one of the old 256MB module which came with my travelmate. I tried both sockets (on the bottom and underneath the keyboard), but it doesn't seem to matter if I put in 1GB or 1.3GB of RAM, Linux only shows 900MB in top and meminfo:
Code:
cat /proc/meminfo
MemTotal:       906748 kB
MemFree:        360460 kB
...
HighTotal:           0 kB
HighFree:            0 kB
LowTotal:       906748 kB
...

In BIOS and Windows all of the available 1.3GB are recognized.

Has anybody come across this problem? What can I do about it?

[edit]
I appended "mem=1280M" to the kernel boot line in grub's menu.lst, it doesn't help.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
ToeiRei
Veteran
Veteran


Joined: 03 Jan 2005
Posts: 1191
Location: Austria

PostPosted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 9:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

already tried a bios upgrade?

Rei

P.S.: Sorry for the late reply - didn't got notifications that it was 'updated'
_________________
Please stand by - The mailer daemon is busy burning your messages in hell...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjv
Guru
Guru


Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 353
Location: Belgium

PostPosted: Mon Aug 14, 2006 12:16 pm    Post subject: smartcard reader works Reply with quote

Hello, it's quite hard to pickup where we left, but I didn't think anyone had yet been able to really use the smartcard reader. I managed to read out my Belgian eID card succesfully with it today. It works like a charm now. Very cool indeed 8). I'll try to put more info on the wiki (shall i delete the old CardMan4000 stuff?). The only problem is that I can't help you with applications (for non-Belgians).

Btw is anyone still really using this laptop (aka. how many have broken down already?)? I might get around to buying a new laptop soon, but it seems quite hard to find laptops that really outperform this one by far (as to Pentium-M's for instance). It would also mean giving up on the curved keyboard which I really always have enjoyed, the nice formfactor, and also the non-CrystalBright lcd (those new lcd's reflect too much in my opinion).

I'm also interested in some new CFLAGS for use with march=Pentium-M for the new gcc-3.4.

Greetz
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
tuxlover
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 21 Oct 2003
Posts: 297
Location: weltweit

PostPosted: Tue Aug 15, 2006 10:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

After 3.5 years and a recent hdd upgrade (the original one broke) and some additional RAM (1.3GB, now also recognized by my kernel) my tm 800 (1.3GHz) is still working perfectly.
You're right, the new laptop screens are just terrible. How can you work with those? It's amazing to see how very much technology industry follows fads.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjv
Guru
Guru


Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 353
Location: Belgium

PostPosted: Wed Aug 16, 2006 6:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Glad your still enjoying it as much as I do, tuxlover!

No much luck with the green security smartcards yet. I also found these articles on the internet btw:
http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=cryptography&m=101736011511274&w=2
http://archive.cert.uni-stuttgart.de/archive/bugtraq/2003/04/msg00260.html
http://archive.cert.uni-stuttgart.de/archive/bugtraq/2005/09/msg00268.html
Seems that it is all very insecure, only there to make you believe it's secure. You might as well have put a big sticker on your laptop saying it is burglar proof or something, as a deterrent. Now I'm just happy I never used it (except for a tryout once, I think I even might have screwed the cards because you can initialize them only once, the installation seemed very restrictive), I have it all disabled I think. Just imagine that you loose the cards and can't boot your system anymore.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
federico
Advocate
Advocate


Joined: 18 Feb 2003
Posts: 3272
Location: Italy, Milano

PostPosted: Sat Aug 26, 2006 10:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I am still using my tm291lmi that's similar to the 803. I am buying now a new battery and I need a new dvdwriter as I have recently broken mine (the notebook has fallen down). What sort of dvdwriter use the 803?
_________________
Sideralis www.sideralis.org
Pic http://blackman.amicofigo.com/gallery
Arduino http://www.arduino.cc
Chi aveva potuto aveva spaccato
2000 pezzi buttati là
Molti saluti,qualche domanda
Semplice come musica punk
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
corey_s
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 29 Jun 2003
Posts: 264

PostPosted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 2:45 am    Post subject: built-in bluetooth for the TM 800? Reply with quote

Greetings!

Been a long time since I've been to thread!

ANyhow, I've got a TravelMate 800, and for the first time I'm looking into getting bluetooth working on this thing ( I want to get a headset working for use w/ kphone ).

I'm wondering how the heck to start... apparently I don't need a dongle 'cuz the 800 has built-in bluetooth, right? There's a couple buttons on the front, below the mouse pad - I know one is for wifi, and so the other must be for bluetooth. I've followed the Acer 803 howto for bluetooth, and the gentoo bluetooth HOWTO, but I'm left completely unable to determine what to do next.... the bluetooth button on the laptop never causes the led to light up, and I can't seem to find any device regarding bluetooth - via lspci, hcitool,hciconfig, etc... I think I'm missing some basic conceptual detail somewhere along the lines. ( note that I don't yet have an actual bluetooth device - I'm just first trying to make sure the built in bluetooth device is working on the laptop )

I installed the bluez stuff ( libs and utils ). I have the bluetooth kernel module running. I started /etc/init.d/bluetooth. etc. etc.

scanner ~ # /etc/init.d/bluetooth start
* Starting Bluetooth ...
* Starting hcid ... [ ok ]
* Starting sdpd ... [ ok ]
* Starting rfcomm ...

scanner ~ # dmesg | tail
Bluetooth: Core ver 2.8
NET: Registered protocol family 31
Bluetooth: HCI device and connection manager initialized
Bluetooth: HCI socket layer initialized
Bluetooth: L2CAP ver 2.8
Bluetooth: L2CAP socket layer initialized
Bluetooth: RFCOMM socket layer initialized
Bluetooth: RFCOMM TTY layer initialized
Bluetooth: RFCOMM ver 1.6


What am I missing? I simply want to determine that the built-in bluetooth on my laptop is ready to communicate with some bluetooth device, such as a headset, that I"m yet to purchase.


Thanks!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjv
Guru
Guru


Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 353
Location: Belgium

PostPosted: Fri Oct 20, 2006 8:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

What headset?

I recently bought a Jabra BT620S stereo bluetooth headset.

First setup and start everything. I already did this years ago so I'm not sure any more if the wiki is correct. I can look into my config if you want. Then press the bluetooth button! Don't forget that please (also make sure you didn't disable bt in the bios or in the Windows Acer Notebook Manager). You should really see the blue light since I believe this is only a hardware thing. Next, you should see something in dmesg (and a small burst of HD reads).

Then on for the audio part, you will need bluetooth-alsa (at sourceforge). Btsco will only give you mono. If you have a stereo headset you will need a2dp. This works but not 100%. It's only a first quick hack, so it's very premature and unstable unfortunately, and also a hell to set-up something useful with it (I'm still trying to figure this out though I have it working in a bareable but limited way).

I think you can find most of these things on the net yourself. For specific, detailed problems and pitfalls ask me...
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
corey_s
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 29 Jun 2003
Posts: 264

PostPosted: Sat Oct 21, 2006 6:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

pjv wrote:
What headset?


Haven't decided yet... waiting to actually buy one _after_ I've verified that the built-in bluetooth adapter in my TM 800 is functioning properly - which I've yet to actually have accomplished yet...

I went through both the gentoo on TM803 wiki/manual, and also through the gentoo bluetooth howto, and everything seems to be fine - I can start the bluetooth modules and run the bluetooth init script... I guess the TM800 uses the "blutonium" driver via the bcm203x kernel module??

Code:

scanner ~ # dmesg | grep Bluetooth
Bluetooth: Broadcom Blutonium firmware driver ver 1.0
Bluetooth: Core ver 2.8
Bluetooth: HCI device and connection manager initialized
Bluetooth: HCI socket layer initialized
Bluetooth: L2CAP ver 2.8
Bluetooth: L2CAP socket layer initialized
Bluetooth: RFCOMM socket layer initialized
Bluetooth: RFCOMM TTY layer initialized
Bluetooth: RFCOMM ver 1.6



The thing that has me feeling unconvinced that everything's working right, though, is the fact that the bluetooth LED on my laptop doesn't light up, and pressing the button does not appear to have any effect whatsoever ( the led never goes on, and nothing ever shows up in dmesg - unlike what goes on with the wifi led and button ). Does that light only go on when an actual bluetooth _device_ ( such as headset or mouse or phone or whatever ) is attached? Or is it supposed to light up soon as the actual built-in _adapter_ ( blutonium ) is functioning?

I don't want to go off and spend 60+ bucks on a headset, just to get it home and find that the built-in adapter in my 800 isn't working.

I appreciate any help/advice/feedback offered!

Cheers,

Corey
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
corey_s
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 29 Jun 2003
Posts: 264

PostPosted: Sat Oct 21, 2006 7:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

corey_s wrote:
... I guess the TM800 uses the "blutonium" driver via the bcm203x kernel module??

Code:

scanner ~ # dmesg | grep Bluetooth
Bluetooth: Broadcom Blutonium firmware driver ver 1.0
<snip>




Another question: would the bcm203xx ( blutonium ) driver/module still somehow load successfully, even if there were no such adapter actually installed in my laptop? ( I know this wouldn't be the case with most/all other forms of hardware, but since I'm completely new to bluetooth, and since things don't _appear_ to be working quite right, I can't help but wonder whether there is some sort of exception occuring in this specific circumstance ).

That would explain why everything all seems to be working from a software perspective, but yet the hardware led indicator and button seem to fail to have any activity.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjv
Guru
Guru


Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 353
Location: Belgium

PostPosted: Sun Oct 22, 2006 9:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ok, let's start at the beginning.

The led really should light up. I'm pretty sure this is related only to hardware. In my country the "B" in the model name Acer Travelmate 803LCiB indicates that the model is equipped with bluetooth (not all 803 models are). The led blinks (like every second) when the device is just on, and blinks faster or remains on when a connection has been established. You really can't miss it. You really need to get this to work in my opinion before you look into the software. Can you check if it still works in Windows?

The only piece of linux software that I have seen that can influence the led is the acerhk (or related) drivers for the extra keyboard buttons. They give you control to turn the led off or on. Make sure you never fiddled with these things or put something in your system to always turn the led off.

So first, make sure you have the hardware support and see that it still works fine plz.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjv
Guru
Guru


Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 353
Location: Belgium

PostPosted: Sun Oct 22, 2006 9:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Update:

I just went to the bios to check if what I said was correct. I was wrong in (at least) two things: There is no option to disable bt in the bios, i was confusing this with the option for the infrared port. Secondly, an interesting thing: The led already is on at the POST-selfcheck and also when in the bios, and during grub. Then, when linux is booting, it goes out for some time, until the drivers are loaded, and it goes back on. So the drivers do have some effect apparently.

My advice to you is thus still to first wonder if you have the right hardware, and next to try to get the led to blink during early boot-up or while in the bios...

Good luck!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
corey_s
Apprentice
Apprentice


Joined: 29 Jun 2003
Posts: 264

PostPosted: Sun Oct 22, 2006 10:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well I finally figured it out late last night... even though my 800 does in fact have a bluetooth led and button sitting right next to the functioning wifi led/button.... the darned thing doesnt actually _have_ a built-in bluetooth adapter....

And even though there was no actual physical bluetooth hardware on the laptop, all the software ( deamons, modules, drivers ) were nonetheless able to successfully load with no warnings or complaints - which only exasperated my confusion: "well, there's an obvious bluetooth button here.... and everything I've read on the web says that the 800 has bluetooth built-in.... and the modules and drivers load without any issues.... so why is the stupid thing not working!?" (c8=

I was finally able to determine this with certainty using lsusb, which was what I was looking for: something that would indicate which adapter ( if any ) I had in my laptop.

At one point I had tried that, but thought that lsusb would only show results for attached external bluetooth devices, rather than for the adapter itself.

The output of lsusb does not display any results concerning a bluetooth adapter, so the bluetooth led and button present on my TM800 is unattached to any hardware and thus non-functioning.

Looks like I'll be buying myself a bluetooth usb adapter...

Thanks for your advice and input, pjv!

Cheers,

Corey
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
pjv
Guru
Guru


Joined: 02 Jul 2003
Posts: 353
Location: Belgium

PostPosted: Mon Oct 23, 2006 7:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ok, that's solved then.

However my bt device doesn't show up either when it is disabled, so one shouldn't take the output of lsusb for granted:
Code:
lsusb
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 0a12:0001 Cambridge Silicon Radio, Ltd Bluetooth Dongle (HCI mode)
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000


Code:
lsusb
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
thepi
Guru
Guru


Joined: 06 Jan 2004
Posts: 352
Location: Tokyo, Japan

PostPosted: Sat Nov 04, 2006 4:51 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The thing with the TM800 is, the very early models didn't have a Bluetooth adapter. Only the 800LCiB and later models did include the adapter, although the button was on all models. When I bought my TM800, I considered buying the B model, but it wasn't worth the 100,- EUR difference. I'd still like to have one, but so far I could do without as well.

About your earlier question, I'm also still using my TM800 happily after 3.3 years. It even survived me recently moving to Japan to be a research student. I only had to have the display repaired last year (backlight trouble), covered by guarantee. It was a bit of a pain since I had to send it in 4 times until they found it, but still. I also added some more memory (768mb now), a new HDD (80Gig Samsung MP0804H, fast & silent!) and a DVD-Writer (Toshiba SD-R6472). I see no reason to buy a new one soon, although it's sometimes rather tempting. :)
_________________
Violence is the last resort of the incompetent --Isaac Asimov
Gentoo on Acer TM800 | Help! | Vote! | Get FF!
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Reply to topic    Gentoo Forums Forum Index Kernel & Hardware All times are GMT
Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3 ... 28, 29, 30
Page 30 of 30

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum