Author Topic: Us vs. The Modern Laptops  (Read 6750 times)

Martin Iturbide

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Us vs. The Modern Laptops
« on: February 21, 2016, 02:24:20 am »
Hi

This is just for general discussion about modern laptops and the OS/2-eCS platform.

I just noticed today (it is new to me) that there are some laptops that has the video output port located as a USB-C port. An adapter is required to connect the laptop to a projector or external monitor.
I was looking the specs (I don not have it) of the "Lenovo YOGA 900 - YOGA 900-13ISK". I really do not know if this is the tendency for the future. And if it uses some "USB based Video chipset" to allow the output as an additional monitor. 

Will it be required USB 3.0 and USB Video support drivers to connect an external monitor/projector on this kind of laptops with OS/2-eCS? Any thoughts?

Regards

Martin Iturbide
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Dave Yeo

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Re: Us vs. The Modern Laptops
« Reply #1 on: February 21, 2016, 06:17:12 am »
I believe it's just using USB to replace display port as USB-C has enough bandwidth to carry the video data.
Video drivers will still need to support it though.

Martin Iturbide

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Re: Us vs. The Modern Laptops
« Reply #2 on: February 22, 2016, 04:36:59 pm »
Hi

I was also trying to list what modern laptops and/or Ultranotebooks has as hardware component these days compared to what can be supported on OS/2-eCS.

1) AHCI, Audio (Speakers, audio jacks, mic), Video, Keyboard, Trackpoint, Trackpad.
AHCI: It works. So if there is a machine that only works with AHCI we have no issues with the driver.
Video: We have hope with the New SNAP and Panorama works fine too.
Audio: Uniaud Needs improvement
Keyboard: Maybe there is no issue here
Trackpoint: It works with Mouse drivers but (according to the device) can not be configured (Turn on/off, sensitivity, etc)
Trackpad: It works with Mouse drivers but (according to the device)  can not be configured (Turn on/off, sensitivity, etc)
USB 2.0: It works.

2) Modern Laptop/PC stuff - ACPI / GPF UEFI
ACPI: With Arca's Driver it is something that works good.
UEFI: We have no support for UEFI, but activating the Legacy mode on the BIOS is working fine. I'm not sure if there are UEFI machines that has not legacy mode on it.
GPF: It is not supported, the workarround is to repartition the HDD, it is good for eclusive OS/2-eCS Laptops but it is hard when you want to do dual boot with GPF supported OSes.

3) Wifi
Wifi: We hope to have drivers someday. We have very limited old wifi support

4) USB 3.0
There is no USB 3.0 support. The USB 3.0 ports are not working. If there is a machine that was only USB 3.0 there is not way to make it work at least as USB 2.0. (Correct me if I'm wrong)

5) SD Card Reader
I never try it.

6) Accelerometer
There is no driver for it. This is used to know the orientation of the machine to adjust the monitor position (flip the screen vertical or horizontally). It is used on Thinkpad Yoga and other "reversible" ultranotebooks.

7) Webcam
Some may work with USBCD driver, but we are missing some videoconference software to use it.

8) Touch Screen / Pen Support
USBCD driver works good for the Pen support and touch screen.  But I think we are missing some control software for multigesture and not only to recognize touches as mouse clicks.

9) Light Sensor.
None: I have see this may be useful for auto-dim the display according to the light. I think it is something that evolved from the Phone/Tablet world that was included on "Laptop-Tablets".  Not critical but a driver is required if you want to use this feature.

Any brainstorming is welcome.  What else I'm missing according to what the market is showing on Laptops / Ultranotebooks?

Regards.
Martin Iturbide
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onlineuser2

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Re: Us vs. The Modern Laptops
« Reply #3 on: February 23, 2016, 12:10:01 pm »
What a about ethernet?
About wifi, it is worth while to remember the successfull experiment-workaround by Sigurd
Isn't it?

Waiting for further news....
Onlineuser2
« Last Edit: February 23, 2016, 12:13:31 pm by onlineuser2 »

Alex Taylor

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Re: Us vs. The Modern Laptops
« Reply #4 on: February 24, 2016, 03:27:17 pm »
Quote
Any brainstorming is welcome.  What else I'm missing according to what the market is showing on Laptops / Ultranotebooks?

Bluetooth
Hardware function keys (e.g. volume, screen brightness, sometimes including video output) which don't work with ACPI.