Gentoo Linux on Acer Aspire 5003WLCi Laptop
Acer Aspire 5003WLCi
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| Drivers/Notes: | ||
| · 1.80Ghz AMD Turion64 ML-32 Socket 754 CPU | Works | Nothing | ||
| · 15.4" LCD Display | Works | Nothing | ||
| · 512MB PC2700 Samsung DDR RAM | Works | Nothing | ||
| · 60GB 5400RPM Western Digital IDE HDD | Works | Make sure to enable the 'sis5513' module in the kernel to allow for proper DMA support | ||
| · DVD CD+RW drive | Works | Nothing | ||
| · SiS M760GX Integrated Graphics Controller | Semi-works | The 'sis' driver in Xorg works however there is no DRI support. Simply put: no 3D acceleration :( However the machine itself is fast enough that playing movie files or even light OpenGL works just fine | ||
| · SiS AC'97 Sound Controller | Works | Use the 'intel8x0' driver for sound with ALSA | ||
| · SiS AC'97 Modem Controller | Untested | Haven't tested it, so I can't say for sure | ||
| · Integrated SiS900 10/100 Ethernet | Works | 'sis900' LAN supported in the kernel | ||
| · Broadcom 4318 Wireless LAN | Ugh... | There is a native Linux driver in the kernel now (bcm43xx) however the driver is still very flaky and the 4318 only works at 11Mb/s. However it DOES work. I have heard that ndiswrapper works with this, although it can be a pain even with ndiswrapper as well | ||
| · Texas Instruments PCI1510 PC card Cardbus Controller | Works | Use the 'CardBus yenta-compatible bridge support' module in the kernel |
lspci:
For good measures, here is my output of 'lspci' (keep in mind I have already changed the wireless card and added a Creative Labs PCMCIA sound card):
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00:00.0 Host bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 760/M760 Host (rev 03) 00:01.0 PCI bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SG86C202 00:02.0 ISA bridge: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS963 [MuTIOL Media IO] (rev 25) 00:02.5 IDE interface: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 5513 [IDE] 00:02.6 Modem: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] AC'97 Modem Controller (rev a0) 00:02.7 Multimedia audio controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] AC'97 Sound Controller (rev a0) 00:03.0 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f) 00:03.1 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 1.0 Controller (rev 0f) 00:03.2 USB Controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] USB 2.0 Controller 00:04.0 Ethernet controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] SiS900 PCI Fast Ethernet (rev 91) 00:06.0 CardBus bridge: Texas Instruments PCI1510 PC card Cardbus Controller 00:0b.0 Network controller: RaLink RT2500 802.11g Cardbus/mini-PCI (rev 01) 00:18.0 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration 00:18.1 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map 00:18.2 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller 00:18.3 Host bridge: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control 01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: Silicon Integrated Systems [SiS] 661/741/760/761 PCI/AGP VGA Display Adapter 02:00.0 Multimedia audio controller: Creative Labs SB0400 Audigy2 Value |
General Installation:
Not really much to it. Everything pretty much works right out of the box. Just have to make sure to enable all of the proper modules (or build them in) to the kernel that were mentioned in the table above. From there it is as easy as it is to install Gentoo, or whatever flavor of Linux you prefer.
For Gentoo, check out the Gentoo x86 quick install guide if you're very impatient like me and want to get it done real quick. It is a rather straight forward procedure.
Things to watch out for:
·Broadcom 4318 Wireless chip - It was a real hassle to get everything here to work right. While there are native drivers for it in the kernel, they are still very new and aren't all working yet. Sometimes after rebooting, it wouldn't find any wireless Access Points, and I would have to go under Windows and manually connect and then reboot back into Linux. For most people, it would be a lot easier to replace it with a mini-pci wireless card that has Linux support such as the NovaTech NV-922W wireless pci-mini card with an RaLink rt2560f chipset. RaLink takes pride in the fact that they make Linux drivers as well. Go RaLink!
·SiS M760GX Graphics Controller - Again, while this works, it doesn't have DRI support, so any 3D acceleration you planned on doing is not going to happen. Light OpenGL or playing movie files works due to it being a fast machine, but anything that requires a lot won't be so hot. I average around 300fps on glxgears to give you an idea.
Final thoughts:
This is a great little laptop, especially for the price. It was 64bit which is what attracted me. Admittedly the graphics chip could have been a LOT better, but it's not the end of the world. At this point since AMD has purchased ATI, all of the new Acer's are coming with much better ATI IGPs. My roommate just bought a new Acer with one, and I must say that I am pretty jealous. All together however, this is a great little machine, especially if you don't plan on doing any high end gaming.
