Another Vista horror story (and Fedora Crash story) - Page 2

Thetargos · #16 19th September 2007, 07:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by disjointed

Great

And what hardware exactly you have on your laptop? Interesting what was the origin of the problem.

Yeah, not so great, though... We've been having no end of problems with this thing...

Here's the hardware:

(lspci -vv output too long for [code] tags)

http://pastebin.com/f73903a30

Thetargos · #17 21st September 2007, 10:26 PM

The problems with the wireless as well as wired connection with computer are driving me nuts!! Currently in the process of testing with F82 Live CD and Linux Mint LiveCD, hopefully I'll be able to get at least one connection working before I lose all my hair.

kizwan · #18 26th September 2007, 10:57 AM

There is another person, that have same model, having same problem like you:-
Acer Aspire 5050
http://forums.fedoraforum.org/showthread.php?t=167503

As your wireless card, please check at the bottom of your laptop to find out the exact model. If it is AR5BXB63 (AR5007EG), no driver that support this card yet (madwifi.org). However you may use ndiswrapper for temporary solution.

As your ethernet card, Realtek RTL-8139, I can't find driver for linux with kernel 2.6.X. The only driver I found is for linux with kernel 2.4.X. I guess it should already supported by latest linux distro. Try find any package with "rtl8139" using yum (EDIT: since you don't have any connectivity, you need to download manually the package (if it exist) at another computer/notebook.

).

kizwan · #19 26th September 2007, 11:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by disjointed

Great

And what hardware exactly you have on your laptop? Interesting what was the origin of the problem.

I think because of the ATI chipset.

Thetargos · #20 26th September 2007, 11:44 AM

Interestingly enough I got the RTL8139 card to work, I had to also pass the arguments to the kernel noapic and nolapic. The WLAN is confirmed to NOT work without ACPI as it boots up "shut down" and is "brought up" through ACPI

There's hope, though, it might involve a either a kernel recompile or a custom kernel build, but that's not an issue (the problem will be finding the sweet spot for ACPI to actually work) and install acer_acpi, however that seems to be for 64-bit systems, alas, there seems to be a Fedora repository, and as such I may not need to recompile the kernel

I'm learning as I go, and will keep you posted on how this turns out to be.

PhillyFloyd · #21 27th September 2007, 01:35 PM

Quote:

t seems to be harder and harder to get non-M$ friendly hardware, particularly in Latin America. Europe and the US and Asia all have the option that some retailers will even ship OEM machines with Linux preloaded (Dell, HP, Lenovo, even freaking Acer!)

You know, the bad thing about this, go to Dell's site and"

[1] Try and find the pre-configured Ubuntu computers --- they are hidden under page upon page of filler and the link to them is completely hidden and small

[2] Look at the hardware specs on a preconfigured Ubuntu and a MS box --- you can't get any mid to top end hardware on the linux boxes --- so it almost is setup for failure already

This annoyed me because a lot of people in the community are lauding Dell and other vendors for providing such an "option" but they are still subscribing to the MS philosophy of "give them the options we think they want" and not give them all the options available....

Thetargos · #22 27th September 2007, 04:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhillyFloyd

You know, the bad thing about this, go to Dell's site and"

[1] Try and find the pre-configured Ubuntu computers --- they are hidden under page upon page of filler and the link to them is completely hidden and small

[2] Look at the hardware specs on a preconfigured Ubuntu and a MS box --- you can't get any mid to top end hardware on the linux boxes --- so it almost is setup for failure already

This annoyed me because a lot of people in the community are lauding Dell and other vendors for providing such an "option" but they are still subscribing to the MS philosophy of "give them the options we think they want" and not give them all the options available....

Been there, but in the end I was at least able to find the machines listing

Apparently the UK site of Dell is more friendly, as they even setup a separate page for their Linux offerings (something in the order of www.dell.co.uk/linux or some such). Same goes with HP and Lenovo. What I really hate is that to us (people on tight budget) are the ones who end up having to pay M$'s Tax if you want a new systems. And until things change, is not like you can "build" your own laptop as you can your Desktop, so to all intents and purposes, no freaking way to avoid the f*****g MS Tax.

PhillyFloyd · #23 29th September 2007, 05:24 PM

Here's an amusing story:

My friend had about 600 photos in jpeg format on a Vista laptop, fairly new laptop and mid to almost upper level hardware ... anyway ... we could copy the images to a flash drive, external harddrive, or other external media because they would become corrupted, plus it would randomly decide to take 60 minutes one time, 8 minutes the next try etc ... he thought he lost all his pictures, so I booted into Knoppix, mounted the harddrive, and bam .. was able to copy the images just fine without corruption to a flash drive , i bring this up because I spent the rest of the day installing Fedora on his laptop --- slowly but surely, Vista is the best thing to happen to Linux

Thetargos · #24 29th September 2007, 08:27 PM

There is a known issue with Vista and how does it move/copy things around... Needless to say, it is an utter mess, inconsistent, SSSLLLOOOWWW and ultimately (yeah, pun intended!) useless. No wonder Microsoft officially authorized "Vista Downgrades", hehe.

angryfirelord · #25 3rd October 2007, 02:47 AM

Did you try using the LiveCD by any chance? I had some issues with the DVD (no kernel issues though), but using the LiveCD worked fine.

kevmif · #26 3rd October 2007, 03:40 AM

I have the same or a very similar model... its the default kernel of F7 that it hates. Once I was able to eventually get it booted an update the kernel I had no issues.

Thetargos · #27 3rd October 2007, 05:38 AM

I had to manually rebuild the kernel and do some rather nasty ACPI hacking to get it working without issues, so I don't think it is the same model. I'm not sure if the LiveCD includes a kernel patched with a more tolerant ACPI system in the kernel (which is what I had to ultimately do) and I still get some problems, and I'm still working on them.

Tijgertim · #28 11th October 2007, 08:44 AM

I had trouble installing (and booting) an HP dc5700. Fedora sees a Compaq Laptop motherboard but then freezes.
The solution is the addition of the kernel option pci=nommconf in the boot sequence.
When installing Fedora 8 you have 60 seconds to chose options and change the boot command.
If you add pci=nommconf at this point, maybe your machine will boot; this option is added to the operating boot options.

Hope this is of some use.

defcon3 · #29 11th October 2007, 11:38 AM

Changing your BIOS settings for SATA from AHCI into Compatibility should solve most of booting/installation problems

shafted · #30 11th October 2007, 06:25 PM

man... just forget vista and wait for F8 to come out... in my gateway there is an option though in the bios that has a DOS/Other mode for the disk... Iunno if acer's have that... but check that out... I couldn't install it last time because of that... try to LiveCD it first before you install anything...