Ubuntu Wiki

• Contact: DomagojHarkHranjec

• Brand: TravelMate

• Make : Acer
• Model: 2492NWLMi

• Website: http://global.acer.com/products/notebook/tm2490.htm

• S/N: Only needed if you have a Canonical supplied laptop

Current Issues

System Info

bios-version:V3.01
system-manufacturer:Acer
system-product-name:TravelMate 2490
system-version:V3.01

Hardware details

Notes

*1) I recommend "alternate" install while "desktop" is excruciatingly slow. (Maybe because this model has only 256 MiB? *4) It had swap on the HDD and it did detect it but didn't activate it, for some reason. Try activating swap by hand, maybe that helps.) I found a weird workaround if you are stuck with "desktop" CD (like I was). Put in a desktop CD, wait until it boots. (Long wait.) Close the red error pop-up. Go from X to console 2, go into prompt and write "sudo vi /etc/X11/xorg.conf". Find the line 'Driver "i810"'. Comment it and add line 'Driver "vesa"'. Save and exit. Go to X and kill it. (Ctrl+Alt+Backspace) It will restart with VESA driver and it will be much faster. (Bizarre. It should be faster with native driver. Probably some conflict with LiveCD decompressing procedure?) Now you can start the installation procedure. When you, at last, boot into Ubuntu, bring back "i810" line into xorg.conf and restart X. Now it will work good and fast.

*2) Read "https://help.ubuntu.com/community/i915Driver". At "Software Sources" add "universe". Do "sudo apg-get install 915resolution". Log-out and do "Ctrl+Alt+Backspace". Voilà! (1280x800)

*3) Read "https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/Driver/bcm43xx/Edgy". Add "universe". (If not already.) Do "sudo apt-get install bcm43xx-fwcutter". Do "sudo /usr/share/bcm43xx-fwcutter/install_bcm43xx_firmware.sh". Reboot. I guess only these files are needed (in /lib/firmware/kernel): "bcm43xx_microcode5.fw bcm43xx_pcm5.fw bcm43xx_initval05.fw bcm43xx_initval06.fw". It seems to work, I managed to communicate with nearby access point. Didn't make full connection (assigning of IP address), though.

*4) RAM is definitely an issue. I upgraded the laptop to 1280 MiB and run desktop CD. Now it boots faster, without red error pop-up and GUI is naturally responsive.

*5) I've made upgrade to Feisty Fawn. The dist-upgrade went almost flawlessly. Some issues:

• a) I've had US English language set but I've wanted to use Croatian server. I've needed to change language to Croatian to access Croatian repository. (During login to X you can change language to English so it's OK.) b) I've had boot partition of cca. 25MiB. It wasn't enough! Upgrade needs more than 50MiB on boot partition (Which is insane! Boot partitions are supposed to be small! If I've knew about Ubuntu strategies I would partition my HDD differently but unfortunately, now it's too late...) so I've must move boot data to root partition and boot from there. I've turned my old boot partition to swap space. c) After that, upgrade went successfully except bcm43xx-fwcutter package, which couldn't download firmware. Just don't let it try to download and everything will be OK.

*6) i915resolution was already installed.

*7) Comparing to Edgy where compiz was additional package but worked horribly, on Feisty was pretty integrated and worked great. I've activated wobbly windows and cube. For cube I've needed to add some virtual desktop (4) and then I could rotate them. Both cube and wobbly work with no speed penalty to OS and looks great.

*8) Read "https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WifiDocs/Driver/bcm43xx/Feisty". bcm43xx-fwcutter can't download firmware automatically (wrong URL) so do it by hand and cut it to /lib/firmware. Reload bcm43xx module. GNOME now has wireless support integrated by default so search for nearby WiFi in upper left corner.

*9) Here's the idea for fixin' it up. On console: "setkeycodes 0e33 89; setkeycodes 0e34 90". In X terminal "xmodmap -e 'keycode 128 = dollar'; xmodmap -e 'keycode 211 = EuroSign'". You can also fix the console with "dumpkeys >dk.txt; vi dk.txt; (change to: keycode 89 = currency\n keycode 90 = dollar\n); loadkeys dk.txt". It could be automatized by putting this in adequate scripts/config files.

*10) This is LinModem's scanModem (http://linmodems.technion.ac.il/packages/scanModem.gz) output:

CLASS=0403 NAME="Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801G " PCIDEV=8086:27d8 SUBSYS=1025:0090 IRQ=21 HDA=8086:27d8 SOFT=8086:27d8.HDA CodecDiagnosed= slamrTest= HDAchipVendorID=14f1 CHIP=0x14f12bfa CodecClass=14f1 IDENT=hsfmodem SLMODEMD_DEVICE= OPTS= Driver=hsfmodem-drivers DRIVER=hsfmodem_drivers

So, it's Conexant HSF modem over Intel's HDA audio device. You can get the driver from Linuxant. You need to get two drivers.

1) alsa-driver with support for Conexant chipset http://www.linuxant.com/alsa-driver/archive/alsa-driver-linuxant-1.0.20.3/alsa-driver-linuxant_1.0.20.3_all.deb.zip

2) hsfmodem driver http://www.linuxant.com/drivers/hsf/full/archive/hsfmodem-7.80.02.04full/hsfmodem_7.80.02.04full_i386.deb.zip

You'll probably need to satisfy some .deb dependencies (libc-dev and such). After installation of second driver, run 'sudo hsfconfig'. Answer the questions and that's it. FREE version is limited to 14.4 kbps.

CategoryLaptop