Falz at 15:17, 9 July 2014

2014-07-09T15:17:31Z

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	[[Category:~~Tech~~]]		[[Category:Unix]]
	Dell had another wacky special that they were selling a [http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3918Vostro 1500] for $499. Its base features were:		Dell had another wacky special that they were selling a [http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3918Vostro 1500] for $499. Its base features were:

Falz: Created page with "Category:Tech Dell had another wacky special that they were selling a [http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3918Vostro 1500] for $499. Its base features were:..."

2014-07-09T15:07:08Z

Created page with "Category:Tech Dell had another wacky special that they were selling a [http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3918Vostro 1500] for $499. Its base features were:..."

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[[Category:Tech]]
Dell had another wacky special that they were selling a [http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3918Vostro 1500] for $499. Its base features were:

* Intel Core 2 Duo T5270 CPU
* NVIDIA 8400M GS Video
* CD/DVD Burner
* 2GB Ram
* 80GB HDD

Seemed like a good deal so I decided to replace my previous laptop and get one, while upgrading the screen to [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WSXGA%2B WSXGA+](1680x1050) and upping the HDD to 120GB.

==Networking==
Wired and wireless networking are supported in FreeBSD 7. Wireless was [http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/books/handbook/network-wireless.html surprizingly easy to set up]. Per the man page for '''wpi''', these went in to '''/boot/loader.conf''':

if_wpi_load="YES"
wlan_load="YES"
wlan_amrr_load="YES"
firmware_load="YES"
wpifw_load="YES"
legal.intel_wpi.license_ack=1

'''/etc/wpa_supplicant.conf''':
network={
ssid="''something''"
proto=WPA
key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
pairwise=TKIP
group=TKIP
psk=''insecurekey''
priority=2
}

'''rc.conf''':
ifconfig_wpi0="WPA DHCP"

After this, one can just issue '''/etc/rc.d/netif restart''' or reboot.

==Audio==
Audio was a slight pain to get configured and took some messing around. This laptop uses the '''snd_hda''' driver which is an implimtation from Sigmantel. '''dmesg''' shows:

pcm0: [ITHREAD]
pcm0: <HDA Codec: Sigmatel (Unknown)>
pcm0: <HDA Driver Revision: 20071129_0050>

and `cat /dev/sndstat` shows:
FreeBSD Audio Driver (newpcm: 32bit 2007061600/i386)
Installed devices:
pcm0: <Intel 82801H High Definition Audio Controller> at memory 0xfebfc000 irq 21 \
kld snd_hda [20071129_0050] [MPSAFE] (1p:2v/1r:1v channels duplex default)

The fix, in my situation, was to add this to '''/boot/device.hints''':

hint.pcm.0.config="gpio0"

Audio is still not perfect, but it works.

==Xorg==
The binary Xorg packages with FreeBSD 7 worked great. It appears that since xorg 7.3, you don't even need an xorg conf to get it running as a test, so 'startx' simply brings you in to it. I'm a [http://kde.org KDE] user, so I installed those packages as well. '''pkg_add -r kde''' does the trick, even though its super bloated. You will want an xorg.conf however, and you can easily create one per the [http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/books/handbook/x-config.html instructions] with:

Xorg -config xorg.conf

===Video===
I installed the '''x11/nvidia-driver''', changed the '''driver''' to '''"nvidia"''' in '''xorg.conf''' and it worked the first time. You do need to add this to '''/boot/loader.conf''' to load the module:

nvidia_load="YES"

Nothing special was needed to make 1680x1050 work, as it worked at the correct resolution and apsect with my generated xorg.conf. You can probably trim it down a bit to only the color depth you want to make your config easier to read.

===Synaptics Touchpad===
While the touch pad will work with basic functionality, to enable features such as scrolling, a few things need to happen. Please this line in '''/boot/loader.conf''':

hw.psm.synaptics_support=1

Then install '''x11-drivers/synaptics''' and note its sample config once installed. It was necessary to add the '''AllowEmptyInput''' portion, and tweak your '''InputDevice''' to change speed, scrolling, area, etc like so:

Section "ServerLayout"
#''InputDevice "OldMouseLine" "CorePointer"''
InputDevice "Synaptics_Touchpad" "CorePointer"
EndSection

Section "ServerFlags"
Option "AllowEmptyInput"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Synaptics_Touchpad"
Driver "synaptics"
Option "Device" "/dev/psm0"
Option "Protocol" "psm"
EndSection

==ACPI==
This is the only thing I cannot get working properly. ACPI seems to be detected, but it will not properly trigger S3, which is suspend to ram. One can attempt to manually invoke this with:

acpiconf -s 3

but it fails. I attempted to enable debugging in '''acpi.ko''' per [http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/books/handbook/acpi-debug.html the ACPI docs] but all that did was make my system unbootable, even with ACPI disabled. To get things working again, I had to use the [http://frenzy.org.ua/eng/ Frenzy Rescue CD], which worked great.

FreeBSD 7 on Dell Vostro 1500 - Revision history

Falz at 15:17, 9 July 2014

Falz: Created page with "Category:Tech Dell had another wacky special that they were selling a [http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3918Vostro 1500] for $499. Its base features were:..."