[plug] Athlon64 notebooks

[Bernd Felsche]

"John Usher (Maptek)" <John.Usher at perth.maptek.com.au> writes:

>Was just wondering whether any PLUG people have Athlon 64 notebooks, and
>if so, then I would like to know:

>A) which distribution of Linux you are running;

SuSE 9.2 (now, initially 9.1) on an ASUS L5000D since September.

>B) How well Linux supports the notebooks devices (wireless cards,
>suspend/resume, IR, etc, etc).

It detects the infernal modem but can't talk to it in 64-bit mode.
The wireless is a bit of a loss as well because Broadcom haven't
released enough information to get a Linux driver developed; and
they don't themselves provide one.

I tried the suspend to disc, but there still appear to be some
problems in that regard. Haven't tried since the latest kernel
patch.

>C) Any advice on what you think might be missing features or annoyances
>or anything related to the laptop. Or on the flipside, any unexpected
>bonuses.

The powernow-8 module works a treat. CPU speed changes in response
to real loads are transparent to applications. The fans kick in as
necessary so you know if there's a lot of sustained load and the CPU
is in "top gear".

The profiles available with SuSE allow you to have pre-sets
depending on where you plug in, etc. Select a profile at boot time
(GRUB) and you're all set for the LAN insanity that may prevail at
your usual locations; or tell it no LAN at all for when you're
unplugged. Far nicer than waiting for DHCP to timeout during
startup.

9.2's X.org seems to work better than 9.1's XFree86. The text
consoles no longer have "venetian blind" effects after loading the
NVidia drivers. Use the online update to install the NVidia drivers
correctly. I followed the instructions supplied by NVidia and it
wouldn't load correctly due to some subtle config differences.

I could only order the machine locally with Windows TaXP. It had the
80GB drive partioned as two 40GB FAT32 which were easy to resize and
delete using SUSE's tools.

For general information: http://tuxmobil.org/cpu_64bit.html

Enjoy.

P.S. You should avoid loading the 3D games if you plan to get any
work done at all.
-- 
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