Acer Extensa 5200

Introduction

Basic informations about that laptop. Some parameters may be diffrent

Hardware

Processor: Intel Celeron M 440 @ 1.86

Video: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)

Audio: Intel Corporation 82801G (ICH7 Family) High Definition Audio Controller (rev 02)

Wired NIC: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX Ethernet (rev 02)

Wireless NIC: Broadcom Corporation Dell Wireless 1390 Wlan Mini-PCI Card (ref 01)

Kernel

On default kernel everything seems to be ok, but if you want to hibernate you need kernel23-suspend2

Networking

Ethernet works fine

Wireless

For my Broadcom i use Ndiswrapper. Drivers are [here].

In the fact, you need only two files, bcmwl5.inf and bcmwl5.sys. You can download it [here] , that's LESS THEN ONE MEGABYTE!!

Just install ndiswrapper

[root@host]# pacman -S ndiswrapper ndiswrapper-utils

Remove module from your existing kernel

[root@host]# rmmod bcm43xx

download and extract drivers and install them

[root@host]# wget http://cave0.tl.krakow.pl/~ert16/bcmwl5.tar.bz2
[root@host]# tar -jxf bcmwl5.tar.bz2
[root@host]# cd bcmwl5
[root@host]# ndiswrapper -i bcmwl5.inf

you can test driver by using

[root@host]# iwlist  wlan0 scan
wlan0     No scan results

Power Management

ACPI

Just install acpid and acpitool

#pacman -S acpid acpitool

and add it to daemons in /etc/rc.conf

DAEMONS=( acpid )

now everything should work fine. After reboot you can check it by

$ acpitool 
 Battery #1     : charged, 100.0%
 AC adapter     : on-line
 Thermal zone 1 : ok, 46 C
 Thermal zone 2 : ok, 46 C

CPU frequency scaling

Works by default width KDE manager, but I preffer cpufreqd install cpufreqd and cpufrqutils.

#pacman -S cpufrequtils cpufreqd 

If you are using XFCE you may want plugin that shows your courrent cpu frequency.

#pacman -S xfce4-cpufreq-plugin

Now, load your kernel-module that will manage your cpu, for me this will be p4_clockmod

#modprobe p4_clockmod

check if it runs correctly

#cpufreq-info
cpufrequtils 002: cpufreq-info (C) Dominik Brodowski 2004-2006
Report errors and bugs to linux@brodo.de, please.
analyzing CPU 0:
  driver: p4-clockmod
  CPUs which need to switch frequency at the same time: 0
  hardware limits: 233 MHz - 1.87 GHz
  available frequency steps: 233 MHz, 467 MHz, 700 MHz, 933 MHz, 1.17 GHz, 1.40 GHz, 1.63 GHz, 1.87 GHz
  available cpufreq governors: ondemand, conservative, performance
  current policy: frequency should be within 1.87 GHz and 1.87 GHz.
                  The governor "performance" may decide which speed to use
                  within this range.
  current CPU frequency is 1.87 GHz.

now, configure cpufreqd, that will change your cpufreq governor and other settings when you plug out your AC, or your battery will be low. Edit /etc/cpufreqd.conf and uncomment lines

[acpi]
acpid_socket=/var/run/acpid.socket
[/acpi]

And make it quiet

verbosity=0

If you want to change settings by cpufreqd-set, uncomment lines

enable_remote=1
remote_group=root

Now, you can lunch daemon up and check if it is working correctly

#/etc/rc.d/cpufreqd start

If everything works change your system settings. Edit /etc/rc.conf, and add module p4_clockmod to the list of preloaded modules

MODULES=( p4_clockmod )

and make daemons active

DAEMONS=( acpid cpufreqd  )

On XFCE right-click on you panel and add monitor to see informations about your current CPU speed.

Hibernate

Follow the manual about Suspend to Disk

After configuration uncomment

Runi915resolution yes

Xorg

install 915resolution by

pacman -S 915resolution

edit /etc/conf.d/915resolution and insert lines

MODE="38"
RESOLUTION="1280 800"

Add 915resolution to startup scripts in /etc/rc.conf

External Resources

• This report has been listed in the Linux Laptop and Notebook Installation Guides Survey: Acer.