Debian Linux on an Acer TravelMate C112 Ti
This report is listed at TuxMobil - Linux on laptops, notebooks, PDAs and mobile phones
This machine is a replacement for my joyous Acer TravelMate C100, which I have successfully wrecked through 18 months of continous use... and then palmed it off onto my Dad. The C112 Ti is an "up-rated" version of the C110, although the badge on it still says "TravelMate C110". The C112 Ti uses a 1.1Ghz Pentium(R) M Processor: lkcl@highfield:~$ cat /proc/cpuinfo processor : 0 vendor_id : GenuineIntel cpu family : 6 model : 13 model name : Intel(R) Pentium(R) M processor 1.10GHz stepping : 6 cpu MHz : 1100.014 cache size : 2048 KB fdiv_bug : no hlt_bug : no f00f_bug : no coma_bug : no fpu : yes fpu_exception : yes cpuid level : 2 wp : yes flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss tm pbe est tm2 bogomips : 2179.07 At the time that the Acer TravelMate C100 was purchased, its hardware was not fully or properly supported, and the C112 is no different. Ironically, after nearly two years, the C100's hardware is now FULLY supported by Linux - including the ACPI after a hack - just as i get rid of the damn thing. Damn, damn, there's even an Acer Hotkeys Gentoo package. Installation of Debian was carried out over a PXE Boot due to the difficulties I experienced with the C100 (the IDE controller for the CDROM is at a non-standard port...), and due to the fact that the C112 comes with an external FireWire DVD+RW, I just... didn't want the hassle or to even find OUT if I would encounter any hassle. I originally installed a PXE boot environment on my Sony Z600 HEK some three nearly four years ago, and have performed network-based root-nfs-managed copies of the hard drive from laptop to laptop three times now. I don't even bother actually doing an install: I simply compile a kernel with NFS Root FS support, I have a miniature (manually copied! kids! don't do this at home: use debootstrap instead!) Root Filesystem into which I have manually installed various commands like grub, ssh, rsync, install-mbr etc. over time, and I just... PXE-boot from that, then of course I have direct access to the drive, set up the partitions, then rsync the contents of the old laptop over ssh to the new one, chroot to it, mount /proc, cd /dev, run MAKEDEV, run install-mbr, run grub-install and then reboot to see if it worked. Usually, it doesn't, so I reboot using PXE again and fix whatever I found... :) There's a much more reasonable description of my ramblings, above, at the Gentoo Wiki on the C100. For more "sane" people, however, I recommend that you investigate Hands Free Debian for installation over PXE/Netboot, USB-Dongle/Netboot, CD/Netboot because phil has set up an "unattented" Debian Install infrastructure, and it's really cool and Going Places. The usual boring joyous lspci: 00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Host Bridge (rev 02) 00:00.1 System peripheral: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 3584 (rev 02) 00:00.3 System peripheral: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 3585 (rev 02) 00:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 3581 (rev 02) 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Device (rev 02) 00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Device (rev 02) 00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB (Hub #1) (rev 03) 00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB (Hub #2) (rev 03) 00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB (Hub #3) (rev 03) 00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB2 (rev 03) 00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BAM/CAM PCI Bridge (rev 83) 00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801DBM LPC Interface Controller (rev 03) 00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801DBM Ultra ATA Storage Controller (rev 03) 00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corp. 82801DB/DBM SMBus Controller (rev 03) 00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 03) 00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corp. 82801DB AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 03) 02:01.0 CardBus bridge: Ricoh Co Ltd RL5c475 (rev b8) 02:01.1 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C551 IEEE 1394 Controller 02:05.0 Network controller: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 4220 (rev 05) 02:08.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corp. 82801BD PRO/100 VE (MOB) Ethernet Controller (rev 83) The Network Controller is my favourite: it's a COMBINED 802.11g plus Bluetooth (yes, bluetooth!) built-in PCI device, and is it supported? Is it buggery. The USB and Firewire controllers? No problem. The Wacom Touchscreen? Setup here because it's an i2c SMbus device, supported by wacom-tools and the wacom driver: thanks to Danny Kukawa he knows about these Wacom devices and how to detect and configure them. ACPI, unlike the C100, works absolutely fine with the standard Debian 2.6.11 kernel. CPUfreq packages, KDE "power management", blah blah, all absolutely fine, boring boring. Known Working components: Screen, Keyboard, Mouse, Ethernet, Firewire, USB, ATA IDE, AC97 Audio, CardBus. Untested components: AC97 Modem Controller (who cares! this is the C21st!) Not working components (yet... give it a year or so...): Combined 802.11g+Bluetooth device. In other words, for £1200 inc VAT, you get a really nice small machine which weighs 1.5kg and Does The Job. oh - and you get an external FireWire DVD+RW thrown in, too. As for the missing hardware, I retrieved my Linksys WPC11 802.11b PCMCIA card from the person I'd lent it to, plugged it in, worked straight-off. I've yet to find a need to plug in my TDK USB Bluetooth dongle (roll on the Bluetooth ALSA driver, come on guys!) but, being a USB device, I expect it to work, but when I do actually bother to plug it in, will update this page accordingly. p.s. the 1024x768 screen on the C112 is a lot sharper and brighter than that of the C100, but still nowhere near as good as the Sony Z600HEK.