Author Topic: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)  (Read 11540 times)

Rich442

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Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« on: December 18, 2016, 05:17:58 pm »
The 15" Dell Inspiron 5000-series works very well as a basic workstation with ecomstation 2.2 beta version 2. Bluetooth wireless compatibility (RFCOMM Protocol TDI) was a problem for me. JFS worked well for me as a filesystem and ALSA was fair for multimedia/sound. I used the Panorama graphics driver. AiR-BOOT was flawless as a boot loader. This device (in the AMD configuration) retails for about $499 USD (add $100.00 for an intel i7) at the manufacturer's website and even less at some reseller vendors (i.e. Wallsmart, Fry's and etc).

I would like to use this space to list my experience with installing eCS 2.2 beta on the Dell 15" Inspiron 5755 from late 2015.I am listing my specs for the AMD A8 version here:

Quote
Dell's base model AMD
System/Logic Board:   AMD A8-7410 APU with AMD Radeon R5 Graphics
Clock Speed   2.2Ghz
L2 Cache Size   2048
RAM: 8GB DDR3L
BIOS version: Dell A08 (comes with UEFI Secure boot and Legacy boot)
Network adapters:
Adaptor   Realtek PCIe FE Family Controller
Adaptor   Bluetooth Device (RFCOMM Protocol TDI)

Storage: 1 TB

Type   Description
DVD/CD-ROM Drives   
PLDS DVD+-RW DU-8A5LH

Display Adapters   
AMD Radeon(TM) R5 Graphics
IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers   
Standard SATA AHCI Controller

Sound Devices: AMD High Definition Audio Device, Realtek High Definition Audio
USB Controllers: AMD USB 3.0 eXtensible Host Controller - 1.0 (Microsoft)

SysInfo/2 (SystemInformation/2) 0.8.26 gave these results:
Quote
SysInfo/2 build 0.8.26 (C) 1999-2004, 2007, Alexey Smirnov, Yuri Prokushev. EMail:prokushev@freemail.ru
System CPU:   4 x  AMD Radeon R5 Graphics
Quantity:             4
Vendor:               AMD
Family:               F (Pentium 4)
Model:                0
Stepping:             1
Description:           AMD Radeon R5 Graphics
Speed:                2195.0MHz
Name from Vendor:     AMD A8-7410 APU with AMD Radeon R5 Graphics
Cache L1(Data):          32Kb
Associativity:            16-way set associative
Lines per Tag:            1
Cache Line size:          64bit
Cache L1(Instructions):  32Kb
Associativity:            2-way set associative
Lines per Tag:            1
Cache Line size:          64bit
Cache L2:                2048Kb
Associativity:            16-way set associative
Lines per Tag:            1
Cache Line size:          64bit
Future Flags:            178BFBFF
[...]


This model (5755) of the Inspiron 5000 looks for the the AHCI SATA driver by default. Alternately, the Dell BIOS will load an ATA disk driver in legacy mode. Unfortunately, the BIOS still did not detect the ATA driver from the 2.1 installer.  So I went back to using the 2.2 installer.

Doing an error check and JFS format on the installation volume C: took a little over an hour. Installation of the base system and  default applications took another 40 minutes and then the installer rebooted into the installed system.


Sysbench 0.9.5c gave these results for CPU performance:
Quote
CPU&FPU Benchmark ver. 1.01.01 04/03/2003

4 x  AMD Radeon R5 Graphics   
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
CPU Name                        DHRYSTONE(rns/sec)    HANOI(rns/sec) FLOPS(MFLOPS) FFT(rns/sec)
Intel Pentium 166MMX       79121.5                       26.9                 19715.3            36287.3
Intel Celeron 466              358907.3                     101.0                49457.4            102324.5
AMD Athlon 900                818519.1                     380.8               114431.3          163836.3
This computer                   2193917.3                   835.3               211941.3          523373.0

« Last Edit: December 20, 2016, 04:24:14 am by Richard Crowley »

Martin Iturbide

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #1 on: December 18, 2016, 10:30:50 pm »
Thanks for sharing. I will also include your information on the OS2World wiki in the next couple days.

Regards
Martin Iturbide
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ivan

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #2 on: December 18, 2016, 10:55:06 pm »
Very nice to know as I have a friend looking for a notebook that we can install OS/2 on.

One question.  What is the screen resolution of your unit?

An observation.  We have 18 desktop workstations with 1TB drives that we installed OS/2 on by using DFSee to make the partitions first with a small (3GB boot partition and splitting the remainder into equal partitions for programs and data respectively.  Our remaining workstations all have one or more disks larger than 1TB but the same size boot partition.

Neil Waldhauer

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #3 on: December 19, 2016, 02:31:04 am »
Some computer have trouble recognizing all of their memory. What does the mem command say for the Inspiron?
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Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #4 on: December 19, 2016, 05:09:49 pm »
Quote
[C:\] mem 
2505 megabytes


(This Laptop actually has 8GB of DDR3L). I should have noted that this is a 64-bit PC so I really wanted to try it out anyway.

Another issue is with the four processors. In the boot sequence, the OS initializes all 4 of them but then gives
Quote
WARNING: Some devices could not be assigned an interrupt (out of range).


I did not install/try wireless drivers for the Bluetooth Device RFCOMM Protocol TDI because it is a protocol used specifically for the Windows 10 OS
but then the boot continues as normal. The ACPI driver (eCS 3.22) loads very nicely
Later, I get an error that
 
Quote
r8161$ driver was not loaded
See the lantran.log for more information
and

Quote
SYS1201: The device driver C:\IBMCOM\MACS\R8169.OS2 specified in the DEVICE statement
on line 42 of the CONFIG.SYS file was not installed. Line 42 is ignored

The lantran.log reads

Quote
IBM OS/2 LANMSGOD [5/21/04] 6.00 is loaded and operational
IBM OS/2 TCPBEUI 6.00.0 Using a 32-bit data segment.
Installink NTWKSTA.200 Version 6.0. IBM LAN Redirector ( May 25, 2005)

IBM OS/2 NETBIOS 4.0
Adapter 0  123 NCBs, 96 sessions, and 6 names available to NETBIOS applications.
NETBIOS is loaded and operational.
R8169 NDIS device driver @#D Azarewicz:0.3.2#@##1## 11Nov 2013 11:41:21 DAZAR1
Driver
IR8169 No supported hardware was found.
IBM LANDVD is loaded and operational.
IBM OS/2 LAN Netbind
PR00025: An error occurred when the program tried to bind TCPIP_NIF to R8169_NIF.
TCPBEUI: Logical adapter 0 is trying to  bind to TCP/IP interface lan0.
LT00141: Errors occurred while attempting to initialize TCPBEUI.

Line 42 in my CONFIG.SYS reads

Quote
DEVICE=C:\IBMCOM\MACS\R8169.OS2
« Last Edit: December 19, 2016, 05:15:50 pm by Richard Crowley »

Pete

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #5 on: December 19, 2016, 06:16:33 pm »
Hi Richard

With regard to the nic driver: I have a Realtek R8169 nic that worked fine with the driver in eCS2.2beta2 but seem to recall it was a bit of fannying around to actually get it working. I think the problems may have been caused by the eCS Adapters and Protocols setup not working correctly.

What I remember doing was using \IBMCOM\MPTS_IBM.EXE to Change to No Adapter followed by a reboot then used \IBMCOM\MPTS_IBM.EXE to Change to the Realtek driver followed by another reboot.

If that works for you then change the config.sys ACPI line to this
     PSD=ACPI.PSD /VW
to get rid of the "... interrupt (out of range message)".


If the nic still does not work then you probably have hardware not compatible with the version of the nic driver in use. In which case I think you will need to purchase the Arca Noae driver pack subscription which contains later Realtek drivers and other driver updates including ACPI support - /VW switch shown above not required. See https://www.arcanoae.com/shop/os2-ecs-drivers-software-subscription-personal/


Regards

Pete

Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #6 on: December 19, 2016, 06:43:36 pm »
Thank you.  :) Dell calls it the "Realtek PCIe FE Family Controller"
I went with the default driver which was the Realtek r8169 mentioned in the error messages. At first, I want to try to evaluate this controller with only the stock eCS and Beta Zone drivers provided by XEU and Mensys. Hopefully that might even help folks who are still using Warp Convenience Pack 4.52 or Warp Server for eBusiness or even eCS 1.x

I will try your idea and post my results as soon as I can. :)

« Last Edit: December 19, 2016, 07:52:31 pm by Richard Crowley »

Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #7 on: December 19, 2016, 08:06:17 pm »
Quote
Very nice to know as I have a friend looking for a notebook that we can install OS/2 on.
Bluetooth wireless adapter does not work as yet and the battery life seems a bit low.
Quote
One question.  What is the screen resolution of your unit?

I am using a 1660X900 screen resolution and 16M colors using the stock Panorama video driver. 1660x900 is also the resolution recommended by Dell and is the default resolution when this laptop is using Windows 10 Professional.

The video Driver Wizard allows using the SNAP, GRADD or VGA drivers as well. So, I'd say that Windows and eCS are even in terms of screen (non-Touch, of course)

Here are the complete Graphics benchmark results from SysBench 0.9.5c (I hope it helps):
Quote
Graphics
   BitBlt S->S copy      :      487.147    Million pixels/second
   BitBlt M->S copy      :      318.609    Million pixels/second
   Filled Rectangle      :      686.133    Million pixels/second
   Pattern Fill          :      258.134    Million pixels/second
   Vertical Lines        :       23.483    Million pixels/second
   Horizontal Lines      :       42.688    Million pixels/second
   Diagonal Lines        :       28.765    Million pixels/second
   Text Render           :      174.461    Million pixels/second
   -----------------------------------------------------------------------
   Total                 :      138.867    PM-Graphics-marks
« Last Edit: December 20, 2016, 01:32:21 am by Richard Crowley »

Doug Bissett

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #8 on: December 20, 2016, 05:09:52 am »
Quote
Bluetooth wireless adapter does not work as yet and the battery life seems a bit low.

I have never heard of a Bluetooth driver for eCS. It is on the todo list, AFAIK, but not even started yet.

Battery life will be a lot better, when you spend the money for the Arca Noae driver package, which includes a proper ACPI program. That should also fix your IRQ problem, with the latest update.

To use more memory, you will need the QSINIT package (not part of the Arca Noae collection). Look for links on this web site.

Quote
I went with the default driver which was the Realtek r8169 mentioned in the error messages

The R8169 driver works, in most cases, but the new MMRE driver, from the updated Multimac package (part of the Arca Noae driver package), is more likely to work, and it will be updated, while R8169 will not.

Quote
The video Driver Wizard allows using the SNAP, GRADD or VGA drivers as well. So, I'd say that Windows and eCS are even in terms of screen (non-Touch, of course)

Panorama is likely the best choice, but it is not accelerated (none of them are).

I think there is a touch screen driver, that might work, if you can find it. Whether it will work, or not, is a question that you would need to answer. I assume that the screen has the feature.

Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #9 on: December 20, 2016, 02:52:29 pm »
Quote
Bluetooth wireless adapter does not work as yet and the battery life seems a bit low.

I have never heard of a Bluetooth driver for eCS. It is on the todo list, AFAIK, but not even started yet.

I mentioned the bluetooth wireless device because it is a part of this machine and is fairly common on recent laptops. I know that it is probably unavailable but I wanted to list every component that did not have a workable driver. My goal is to produce a working, internet-connected workstation from this low-end laptop.[/quote]
Quote
Battery life will be a lot better, when you spend the money for the Arca Noae driver package, which includes a proper ACPI program. That should also fix your IRQ problem, with the latest update.

I wanted to use the stock drivers from XEU until I could know absolutely which ones work and which do not (and why).  I am a subscriber to the eCS  software subscription and support and I literally didn't think of buying an additional one from Arca Noae. I just wanted to review this laptop in particular. For this review, I am assuming that an OS/2 user has a media pack for eCS and a basic software and update subscription.

Quote
To use more memory, you will need the QSINIT package (not part of the Arca Noae collection). Look for links on this web site.

It's a 64-bit system board and a 32-bit operating system. I expected that some of the memory would not be addressed.

Quote
I went with the default driver which was the Realtek r8169 mentioned in the error messages

Quote
The R8169 driver works, in most cases, but the new MMRE driver, from the updated Multimac package (part of the Arca Noae driver package), is more likely to work, and it will be updated, while R8169 will not.
Thank you. I'll try that. I used the R8169 because it was the default choice of the installer.

Quote
The video Driver Wizard allows using the SNAP, GRADD or VGA drivers as well. So, I'd say that Windows and eCS are even in terms of screen (non-Touch, of course)
Quote
Panorama is likely the best choice, but it is not accelerated (none of them are).
I think there is a touch screen driver, that might work, if you can find it. Whether it will work, or not, is a question that you would need to answer. I assume that the screen has the feature.

Inspiron 15 5755 with AMD A8. It is not a touch-screen.

To get touch screen on a consumer-grade  Dell, I would need to go with an Intel system board: the Intel Core i3, the Intel Pentium 4405 or the Intel Celeron N3060. Alternately, the XPS line includes touch (which adds $1,000 USD). Just a review of the AMD Inspiron.
« Last Edit: December 20, 2016, 03:13:15 pm by Richard Crowley »

roberto

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #10 on: December 20, 2016, 03:01:45 pm »
WARNING: Some devices could not be assigned an interrupt (out of range).
This can solved with any update of ACPI drivers.
 
Quote
r8161$ driver was not loaded

8169 <> 8161
You can check with this program the real driver installed :
pci.exe or PCI104VKA

Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #11 on: December 20, 2016, 05:14:48 pm »
WARNING: Some devices could not be assigned an interrupt (out of range).
This can solved with any update of ACPI drivers.
 
Quote
r8161$ driver was not loaded
8169 <> 8161

I was hoping that the users would see that the two errors are both mentioned in the boot sequence:
Quote
r8161$ driver was not loaded
See the lantran.log for more information.
SYS1201: The device driver C:\IBMCOM\MACS\R8169.OS2 specified in the DEVICE statement
on line 42 of the CONFIG.SYS file was not installed. Line 42 is ignored

Quote
You can check with this program the real driver installed :
pci.exe or PCI104VKA

Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #12 on: December 20, 2016, 06:24:02 pm »
I couldn't find an executable named pci.exe or PCI104VKA so I used Sysinfo/2
Here is the output from SystemInformation/2 System Device Tree:
Quote
SysInfo/2 --> System Device Tree --> RTL8139/810x Family Fast Ethernet NIC --> Device Info

from: Realtek Semiconductor

PCI Device Info
Vendor ID: 0x10EC Device ID: 0x8136 Revision ID: 0x07
Bus Num: 0x02 Device Num: 0x00 Function Num: 0x00
Header Type: 0x00 Latency Timer: 0 Cache Line size: 0
Device Class: Network Interface Controllers (Ethernet Adapter)


Power Saving states: D2 D1, Current Power state: Online, MSI function can generate 64-bit address, Vital product data exists

and under <Network>

Quote
SysInfo/2 --> Network
IBM Multi-Protocol Transport Network
--> Realtek Gigabit 8111/8168/8169 driver from Mensys
----> DriverName: R8169$

---> IBM OS/2 NETBIOS OVER TCP/IP
Protocol version: 2.0
DriverName: tcpbeui$
BINDINGS: R8169_NIF,,,
NODETYPE: "B-Node"
OS2 TRACEMASK: 0x0
SESSIONS: 130
NCBS: 225
NAMES: 21
SELECTORS: 15
USEMAXDATAGRAM: "NO"


ivan

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #13 on: December 20, 2016, 07:14:40 pm »
Quote
I couldn't find an executable named pci.exe or PCI104VKA

You wouldn't unless you went to hobbes.  There you will find it and an updated picdev.text to use with it.

http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/download/pub/os2/util/misc/pci104vka.zip
http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/download/pub/os2/util/system/pcidevs_20140301.zip

The pci104vka zip includes a windows version that does not appear to work with anything beyond XP.  The OS/2 version works well, just read the documentation.

Rich442

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Re: Dell Inspiron (late 2015) 5000 series (AMD A8)
« Reply #14 on: December 20, 2016, 07:46:25 pm »
Thank you all so much!  :)
output of pci > pci.txt for the device mentioned above (The 8136h appears to be the correct driver and device For Realtek's PCI Express.
Quote
Bus 2 (PCI Express), Device Number 0, Device Function 0
 Vendor 10ECh Realtek Semiconductor
 Device 8136h Unknown

 Command 0007h (I/O Access, Memory Access, BusMaster)
 Status 0010h (Has Capabilities List, Fast Timing)
 Revision 07h, Header Type 00h, Bus Latency Timer 00h
 Self test 00h (Self test not supported)
 PCI Class Network, type Ethernet
 Subsystem ID 06BF1028h Unknown
 Subsystem Vendor 1028h Dell Computer Corp
 Address 0 is an I/O Port : E000h
 Address 1 is not present or not configured!
 Address 2 is a Memory Address (64-bit) : FEA00000h
 Address 4 is a Memory Address (64-bit, Prefetchable) : F0800000h
 System IRQ (disabled), INT# A
 New Capabilities List Present:
   Power Management Capability, Version 1.2
     Supports low power State D1
     Supports low power State D2
     Supports PME# signalling from mode(s) D0, D1, D2, D3hot, D3cold
     PME# signalling is currently disabled
     3.3v AUX Current required : 375 mA
     Current Power State : D0 (Device operational, no power saving)
   Message Signalled Interrupt Capability
     MSI is disabled
     MSI function can generate 64-bit addresses
   PCI Express Capability, Version 2
     Device/Port Type :
       PCI Express Endpoint Device

     Device Capabilities :
       Unsupported Request Severity is Non-Fatal
     Device Status :
       Correctable Error Detected
       Unsupported Request Detected
       AUX Power Detected
     Link Capabilities :
       Maximum Link speed : 2.5Gb/s
       Maximum Link Width : x1
       Link Port Number   : 0
     Link Control :
       Common Clock Configuration In Use
     Link Status :
       Current Link speed : 2.5Gb/s
       Current Link Width : x1
   MSI-X Capability
   Vital Product Data Capability
     VPD Data not present
« Last Edit: December 20, 2016, 08:19:00 pm by Richard Crowley »