- Contact: David Bell
- Brand: Vaio
- Make : Sony
- Model: VGN-FS8900
Website: http://esupport.sony.com/US/perl/model-home.pl?mdl=VGNFS8900
Current Issues
- 3D Acceleration status is unknown
- Although the nvidia drivers install correctly and work, and 3D acceleration is reported to be working, I am not sure it actually is working. glxgears runs slowly (where as on my PC's with nVidia graphics cards it is very very fast). Planet Penguin Racer / Tux Racer does however work (although it is a tiny bit sluggish). Games work within Windows on the same laptop. glxinfo reports that 3D acceleration works. DVD's work (they did not work in Breezy).
- Second monitor causes problems
- The laptop has an external monitor port. With the nvidia drivers the system starts normally and X loads normally, but after that things start to go wrong. X will restart correct if required, but switching to a virtual terminal leaves you at a blank screen and no way of returning to X. Upon asking the machine to shut down the machine switches to a blank screen. By chance I noticed that if you plug in an external monitor after the system has booted you can see the shutdown process as the system shuts down on the external monitor.
- When starting with an external monitor connected the laptop only works via the external monitor, and the external monitor is given the specifications of the LCD monitor and hence looks warped and not all of the desktop can be seen. When shutting down the colour becomes inverted for a few seconds, and then returns to normal.
- Sound Mixer has two devices, one of which does not work
- Two sound devices show up, only the "Realtek ALC260 (OSS mixer)" device, not the "HDA Intel (ALSA mixer)" works in controlling sound.
- GNOME Sound controls don't work
- The keyboard shortcuts in GNOME for muting and changing the volume do not actually change the sound volume coming from the speakers, whatever mixer I set in volume control.
- Power Manager shuts the system down when it should not
- In Dapper (unlike earlier releases) the Power Manager correct determines the battery charge percentage remaining, however it still guesses only "3 minutes" or "1 minute" left and determines the battery is critically low (when it is not). With the feature of shutting down when low turned on the system shuts down, when it does not need to.
Hardware details
|
in Dapper (current stable)? |
in Edgy (current development)? |
Installation works? |
Untested |
Untested |
Hardware Information |
|||
Screen & Monitors |
|||
Device |
Works? |
Bug # |
|
in Dapper (current stable)? |
in Edgy (current development)? |
||
Screen |
Works |
Untested |
|
Correct resolution? |
Yes, 1200x800 |
Untested |
|
Correct refresh rate? |
Yes |
Untested |
|
3D Acceleration |
Not known |
Untested |
|
External monitor works? |
Yes and No (see above) |
Untested |
|
External monitor - mirrors |
Untested |
Untested |
|
External monitor - extend desktop |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Power Management |
|||
Battery detected? |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Hibernates? |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Sleep |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Dim monitor on battery |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Blank monitor on inactivity |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Lid Close |
Untested |
Yes |
|
Cpu frequency scaling |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Sound |
|||
Sound works? |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Correct volume? |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Hardware volume switch |
No |
Untested |
|
Headphone jack |
Yes |
Untested |
|
Mic jack |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Networking |
|||
Wired NIC |
Works |
Untested |
|
Wireless NIC |
Works |
Untested |
|
PCMCIA NIC |
N/A |
Untested |
|
Firewire |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Bluetooth |
N/A |
Untested |
|
Modem |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Infrared |
N/A |
Untested |
|
Touchpad & Mice |
|||
Touchpad |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Touchpad - Doubletap = double click |
Works |
Untested |
|
Touchpad - Scroll down side |
Works |
Untested |
|
Touchpad - turned off while typing |
Untested |
Untested |
|
External mouse - USB |
Works |
Untested |
|
External mouse - Serial |
N.A |
Untested |
|
Docking Station/Port Replicator |
|||
AC through replicator |
Untested |
Untested |
|
USB |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Serial |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Parallel |
Untested |
Untested |
|
External Monitor - VGA |
Untested |
Untested |
|
External Monitor - DVI |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Modem |
Untested |
Untested |
|
NIC |
Untested |
Untested |
|
PS/2 |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Additional Hardware |
|||
Fingerprint reader |
Untested |
Untested |
|
CD/DVD drive |
Untested |
Untested |
|
PCMCIA cards |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Parallel Ports |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Card reader(s) |
Untested |
Untested |
|
Function and other keys |
|||||
Fn key |
Operation |
Keycode |
Works? |
Bug # |
|
in Dapper (current stable)? |
in Edgy (current development)? |
||||
+ Space |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ Esc |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ F1 |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ F2 |
Mute |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F3 |
Volume down |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F4 |
Volume up |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F5 |
Brightness down |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F6 |
Brightness up |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F7 |
External monitor mode |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F8 |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ F9 |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ F10 |
Zoom |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ F11 |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ F12 |
Hibernate |
|
Does not work |
Untested |
|
+ ArrowUp |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
|
+ PgUp |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
+ PgDown |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
Other special keys |
|||||
Key |
Operation |
Keycode |
Works? |
Bug # |
|
in Dapper (current stable)? |
in Edgy (current development)? |
||||
Key |
|
|
Untested |
Untested |
|
Notes
This is an FS8900 built to my desired specifications. Of note is that the graphics card is a GeForce 6400 Go TurboCache with 128MB of memory. lspci however does not recognize the type of nVidia card. Presumably because it is a "Go" card the 3D acceleration does not work and the card is not known. Indeed, the all-in-one Windows driver does not work either under Windows, only the Sony supplied driver does.