Acer Aspire V3-112 was Re: which netbook not to buy?
On Sun, Jul 12, 2015 at 02:39:50PM +, Peter J. Philipp wrote: Hi, I'm considering buying a new netbook (currently I have an October 2012 Acer Aspire One). If at all I'd like to stay with Acer but not necessarily. I'm worried about UEFI secure boot on these netbooks. Is there any Acer models that I definitely should not buy? Regards, -peter I ended up buying an Acer Aspire V3-112 from saturn.de. Gladly I found the Insyde BIOS and was able to turn off UEFI into legacy mode. I then proceeded to install OpenBSD 5.7 on the thing. It seems to work nicely and did not let me down. The screen is flickering a little at odd times, in console mode, not sure what to make of it. Dmesg follows after my signature. -peter OpenBSD 5.7 (RAMDISK_CD) #806: Sun Mar 8 11:08:49 MDT 2015 dera...@amd64.openbsd.org:/usr/src/sys/arch/amd64/compile/RAMDISK_CD RTC BIOS diagnostic error 80clock_battery real mem = 4158390272 (3965MB) avail mem = 4046000128 (3858MB) mainbus0 at root bios0 at mainbus0: SMBIOS rev. 2.7 @ 0xe6eb0 (22 entries) bios0: vendor Insyde Corp. version V1.10 date 08/20/2014 bios0: Acer Aspire V3-112P acpi0 at bios0: rev 2 acpi0: sleep states S0 S3 S4 S5 acpi0: tables DSDT FACP UEFI MSDM HPET APIC MCFG SSDT SSDT SSDT SSDT SSDT UEFI SSDT CSRT SSDT FPDT acpimadt0 at acpi0 addr 0xfee0: PC-AT compat cpu0 at mainbus0: apid 0 (boot processor) cpu0: Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU N2940 @ 1.83GHz, 1833.68 MHz cpu0: FPU,VME,DE,PSE,TSC,MSR,PAE,MCE,CX8,APIC,SEP,MTRR,PGE,MCA,CMOV,PAT,PSE36,CFLUSH,DS,ACPI,MMX,FXSR,SSE,SSE2,SS,HTT,TM,PBE,SSE3,PCLMUL,DTES64,MWAIT,DS-CPL,VMX,EST,TM2,SSSE3,CX16,xTPR,PDCM,SSE4.1,SSE4.2,MOVBE,POPCNT,DEADLINE,RDRAND,NXE,LONG,LAHF,3DNOWP,PERF,ITSC,SMEP,ERMS cpu0: 1MB 64b/line 16-way L2 cache cpu0: apic clock running at 83MHz cpu at mainbus0: not configured cpu at mainbus0: not configured cpu at mainbus0: not configured ioapic0 at mainbus0: apid 2 pa 0xfec0, version 20, 87 pins ioapic0: misconfigured as apic 1, remapped to apid 2 acpiprt0 at acpi0: bus 0 (PCI0) acpiprt1 at acpi0: bus 1 (RP01) acpiprt2 at acpi0: bus 2 (RP02) acpiprt3 at acpi0: bus 3 (RP03) acpiprt4 at acpi0: bus -1 (RP04) pci0 at mainbus0 bus 0 pchb0 at pci0 dev 0 function 0 Intel Bay Trail Host rev 0x0e vga1 at pci0 dev 2 function 0 Intel Bay Trail Video rev 0x0e vga1: aperture needed wsdisplay0 at vga1 mux 1: console (80x25, vt100 emulation) sdhc0 at pci0 dev 18 function 0 vendor Intel, unknown product 0x0f16 rev 0x0e: apic 2 int 18 sdmmc0 at sdhc0 ahci0 at pci0 dev 19 function 0 Intel Bay Trail AHCI rev 0x0e: msi, AHCI 1.3 scsibus0 at ahci0: 32 targets sd0 at scsibus0 targ 0 lun 0: ATA, ST500LT012-1DG14, 0001 SCSI3 0/direct fixed naa.5000c5008074443d sd0: 476940MB, 512 bytes/sector, 976773168 sectors xhci0 at pci0 dev 20 function 0 Intel Bay Trail xHCI rev 0x0e: msi usb0 at xhci0: USB revision 3.0 uhub0 at usb0 Intel xHCI root hub rev 3.00/1.00 addr 1 sdhc1 at pci0 dev 23 function 0 vendor Intel, unknown product 0x0f50 rev 0x0e: apic 2 int 23 sdhc1: base clock frequency out of range: 8 MHz sdhc1 at 0x10: can't initialize host Intel Bay Trail TXE rev 0x0e at pci0 dev 26 function 0 not configured Intel Bay Trail HD Audio rev 0x0e at pci0 dev 27 function 0 not configured ppb0 at pci0 dev 28 function 0 Intel Bay Trail PCIE rev 0x0e: msi pci1 at ppb0 bus 1 ppb1 at pci0 dev 28 function 1 Intel Bay Trail PCIE rev 0x0e: msi pci2 at ppb1 bus 2 Atheros AR9565 rev 0x01 at pci2 dev 0 function 0 not configured ppb2 at pci0 dev 28 function 2 Intel Bay Trail PCIE rev 0x0e: msi pci3 at ppb2 bus 3 re0 at pci3 dev 0 function 0 Realtek 8168 rev 0x0c: RTL8168G/8111G (0x4c00), msi, address 2c:60:0c:69:03:5f rgephy0 at re0 phy 7: RTL8251 PHY, rev. 0 ehci0 at pci0 dev 29 function 0 vendor Intel, unknown product 0x0f34 rev 0x0e: apic 2 int 23 ehci0: timed out waiting for BIOS usb1 at ehci0: USB revision 2.0 uhub1 at usb1 Intel EHCI root hub rev 2.00/1.00 addr 1 Intel Bay Trail LPC rev 0x0e at pci0 dev 31 function 0 not configured Intel Bay Trail SMBus rev 0x0e at pci0 dev 31 function 3 not configured isa0 at mainbus0 com0 at isa0 port 0x3f8/8 irq 4: ns16550a, 16 byte fifo pckbc0 at isa0 port 0x60/5 pckbd0 at pckbc0 (kbd slot) pckbc0: using irq 1 for kbd slot wskbd0 at pckbd0: console keyboard, using wsdisplay0 uhub2 at uhub1 port 1 vendor 0x8087 product 0x07e6 rev 2.00/0.14 addr 2 uhub3 at uhub2 port 2 vendor 0x05e3 USB2.0 Hub rev 2.00/85.37 addr 3 vendor 0x0489 product 0xe078 rev 1.10/0.01 addr 4 at uhub3 port 1 not configured umass0 at uhub3 port 2 configuration 1 interface 0 Sony DRX-820UL rev 2.00/4.63 addr 5 umass0: using ATAPI over Bulk-Only scsibus1 at umass0: 2 targets, initiator 0 cd0 at scsibus1 targ 1 lun 0: SONY, DVD RW DRU-820A, 2.0c ATAPI 5/cdrom removable serial.054c02910UL_MP005EBA uhidev0 at uhub2 port 3 configuration 1 interface 0 ELAN Touchscreen rev 2.00/10.11 addr 6 uhidev0: iclass 3/0, 68 report ids uhid at uhidev0 reportid 1 not configured uhid at uhidev0 reportid 2 not configured uhid at
Re: Acer Aspire V3-112 was Re: which netbook not to buy?
On 07/15/15 18:28, li...@wrant.com wrote: I'm considering buying a new netbook... So you asked what not to buy. You got some good and solid advice from knowledgeable people here regarding what works great including OpenBSD coverage. I'm really happy with my old netbook though. Guess what everything worked on it except wifi. So I put trust into the same brand, and it has bitten me. X won't work, the intel drm driver doesn't work. I hacked a little in the kernel to see if a simple fix would fix it, it didn't. However the bright news is that I bought this netbook for a purpose of a personal project. Those features that I needed work. So I'm somewhat disappointed but it's not the end of the world. BTW by the time someone said don't buy brand I already bought it. It came shipped to me here this morning. I did not chose to get a Lenovo because I felt they were pricy over the 350 euros that I paid. Maybe my own fault then, but I wanted to be adventurous. Cheers, -peter
Re: Acer Aspire V3-112 was Re: which netbook not to buy?
I'm really happy with my old netbook though. Guess what everything worked on it except wifi. So I put trust into the same brand, and it has bitten me. X won't work, the intel drm driver doesn't work. I got more luck since I checked the technical specs before purchase. Everything worked on my netbook bar the wired network which get a driver soon after. Even the card reader, can you imagine. The recommendation is to upgrade RAM to the size that the thing can hold. Not being able to run X though is quite lacking in a device that is all screen and wobbly keys, this is a major problem. Which shows to find that on the low end of the market there is no such thing as consistency between products of the same brand, but only hardware matters. You may even be surprised how different specs may be within the life cycle of the same model. Sticking to a brand is not wise. To prepare for this one checks fully the specification of the hardware as actual devices rather than shopping leaflet / marketing material. The important part is that you get a dmesg in the shop from a flash thumb-drive or ask somebody who has the same model for it. This may trick you with revisions or sub-specification variety. So I'm somewhat disappointed but it's not the end of the world. In case of disappointment, one can return it or do a quick re-sale, if the advice was missed beforehand. BTW by the time someone said don't buy brand I already bought it. It came shipped to me here this morning. Yeah, I still regret not getting a refurbished / pre-owned Thinkpad, mostly for the CPU, screen pixels and keyboard.
Re: Acer Aspire V3-112 was Re: which netbook not to buy?
FWIW, about 5 years ago, my wife bought me a Toshiba NB305 that came with Windows 7 Starter, which I tried to use. I'm okay with Windows when I need to use it, but Starter edition might as well be a Windows kernel with IE and almost no customization available. I do need Windows to program my ham radios, and at the time, I needed a proprietary Windows-only VPN client for work. Worried about hardware support, I tossed Ubuntu on it. It was usable, but none of the hot keys (volume, brightness, wifi toggle etc) worked, neither did the webcam. It was also more sluggish than Win7 Starter. After a month or so of that, I used the factory restore image, resized the Windows partition, then followed the excellent instructions for multi-booting Windows and OpenBSD 4.8 through the Microsoft bootloader and bcdedit. I've used OpenBSD as my primary OS on that machine ever since and despite its age, it still feels light and nimble with daily use. I have a bunch of other Toshiba laptops (most newer), and it feels like I got *REALLY* lucky with this NB305, because on all the other Toshibas, OpenBSD has something that doesn't quite work right, often picky azalia (sound) or wifi. This is why you do the research before you spend the cash instead of just assuming a brand itself is golden. At any rate, I am exceedingly thankful that several devs and users have come forward with suggestions on what *TO* buy and what else works well with OpenBSD. I am absolutely listening. This little Toshiba isn't going to last forever, and I prefer ultrabook/netbook form-factor because I'm frequently on-the-go, and don't require tons of computrons for the SSH, email and basic web browsing I do on a daily basis. On Wed, Jul 15, 2015 at 11:53 AM, Peter J. Philipp p...@centroid.eu wrote: On 07/15/15 18:28, li...@wrant.com wrote: I'm considering buying a new netbook... So you asked what not to buy. You got some good and solid advice from knowledgeable people here regarding what works great including OpenBSD coverage. I'm really happy with my old netbook though. Guess what everything worked on it except wifi. So I put trust into the same brand, and it has bitten me. X won't work, the intel drm driver doesn't work. I hacked a little in the kernel to see if a simple fix would fix it, it didn't. However the bright news is that I bought this netbook for a purpose of a personal project. Those features that I needed work. So I'm somewhat disappointed but it's not the end of the world. BTW by the time someone said don't buy brand I already bought it. It came shipped to me here this morning. I did not chose to get a Lenovo because I felt they were pricy over the 350 euros that I paid. Maybe my own fault then, but I wanted to be adventurous. Cheers, -peter
Re: Acer Aspire V3-112 was Re: which netbook not to buy?
I'm considering buying a new netbook... So you asked what not to buy. You got some good and solid advice from knowledgeable people here regarding what works great including OpenBSD coverage. Then you informed us all you disregarded that completely for your own choice and this more and more looks like an advertisement campaign for your pre-selected brand. This may play a bad trick on other readers in the future. So the correct and reliable solution for novice users looking for a laptop to run their favourite or future beloved OpenBSD, is to follow the advice of the developers. At least you want to get the same joy they got when using OpenBSD on their equipment. I wish this was made popular recommendation when I was shopping for a netbook so I would chase this further instead of picking the available low end systems. Sadly here they were not selling those locally and I ended up buying a netbook that is not that joyful to use. Honestly, I did not care the least about your personal choice. I much appreciate the valuable information coming from the OpenBSD devs and definitely going to help myself with the Thinkpad better series in the future. Until your selected advertisers start making real hardware that does not look like plastic toys but computers again. Ironically the thread was not named what to buy. Please don't try to make other people in the future follow bad marketing advice.
