• Welcome to OS2World OLD-STATIC-BACKUP Forum.
 

News:

This is an old OS2World backup forum for reference only. IT IS READ ONLY!!!

If you need help with OS/2 - eComStation visit http://www.os2world.com/forum

Main Menu

OS/2 Notebook

Started by ivan, 2010.02.10, 02:12:18

Previous topic - Next topic

ivan

I will soon have to replace my Acer Aspire 9300 notebook.

What I need to know is if there is a notebook with similar physical characteristics that will run OS/2.  By that I mean, the screen can be run at its native resolution, LAN works as does USB.

I must have a full keyboard i.e. it must have a dedicated numeric keypad.  Also it needs an ATI video, Nvida is a dead loss with wide screen notebooks.

Also I don't envisage paying an arm and a leg for it - about 600 euro max.

The question is - is there such an animal?

warpcafe

Hey Ivan,

I recently was suprised to see that notebooks (laptops) with numeric keypads are not that uncommon anymore and I know that there are a couple of models with that full-sized keyboard in your targeted price range. However, it is usually hard to tell the chipsets that were used.
Okay, no problem for the graphics card since this is usually stated even in the advertisements, but especially for WiFi and network it will require thorough checks of tech specs at the manufacturer... let me check some websites and I'll see what I can find... but, how about Acer themselves?

Cheers,
Thomas
"It is not worth an intelligent man's time to be in the majority.
By definition, there are already enough people to do that"
- G.H. Hardy

ivan

Hi Thomas,

Yes I know there are several notebooks out there that I could force to work well with OS/2 - the problem is finding those I can put a CD in and test without upsetting the store staff, not an easy task (I'm banned from touching in one of our local stores because I did that - after I asked and they agreed, I assume they thought I was playing with windows).

Therefore I'm looking to see what other peoples experience is which will, hopefully, give me a starting point.

miturbide

Hi

Just my two cents.

I had the worst laptop for Running eCS. It's HP Pavillion dv6. Stay out of that one. The problem is that you can't install eCS, since the BIOS does not have the option to make the SATA HDD run in compatibility/legacy mode. And it seems that eCS does not boot fine without that BIOS feature. (I'm maybe wrong, comments are welcome)

1) check that the BIOS has the compatibility/legacy support mode for HardDisks and DVD-RAM.

2) If by any chance you are going to dual boot Windows and want to run virtual Machines, check that the machine has the v-TX stuff, since virtualbox uses it to be able to run ecs-OS2.

Beside all the chipset configuration and checking for driver compatibility, also check that two points I'm telling you.

Regards.
Martín Itúrbide
OS2World.com NewsMaster
Open Source Advocate

Skype - martiniturbide
Google Talk - martiniturbide@gmail.com

ivan

Thanks Martin,

That is the kind of information I need to know.

Knowing what doesn't work is as important as knowing what does, after all mini PCI wireless cards can be swapped if necessary but changing the bios is a much more radical move and may not work.

ivan

To reply to myself.

After upsetting several store droids I have come up with a short list:

MSI CR720

Samsung R730

Acer Aspire 7740G

Compaq CQ71-312SA

Does anyone have any experience of any of the list and if so what?


StefanZ

#6
Hi Ivan,

I also bought a replacement notebook about 4 months ago.

Now I'm running on MSI GX623X (version GX623X-026CZ to be more precise).

http://www.dailydigitals.com/msi-gx623-elegant-laptop.html

I'm running on both cores, with full widescreen 1680x1050 support. BIOS is very "friendly", you can turn AHCI on/off. Some BIOS versions also offer "a ton" (!) of other settings - including i.e. the NorthBridge and SouthBridge chipset settings. This notebook is also sold without the OS by default, although since this is a gaming notebook, I have installed Win as a gaming console on second partition as well. It has a full keyboard including numerical part, although since - again - this is a gaming notebook, the keyboard is modified a bit. The pricing is very "friendly" too.

I'm generally very satisfied with this one. Although there are some drawbacks:
- wireless (Intel Wifi 5100) is not working/not supported currently. I also saw modifications with i.e. Intel 4965AGN or something similar, so if you are patient, you will find those configurations too. If you opt for cable only, then you should have no issues here,
- there are slight problems with Intel / Realtek HD Audio - but this is a general issue with Uniaudio, so should be solved within the upcoming months. Currently I HAVE audio support, the only issue is the stability of audio. Don't worry, it will be possible to play MP3s and watch DVDs and porn on the internet ;) ,
- ATI Mobility Radeon HD4670 runs very well with Panorama, no issues here,
- BlueTooth + FireWire + CardReader + WebCam are of course not supported currently on OS/2.
- honestly have no idea about support of pccard slot - not using it.

One side note here: should somebody think about ranting for the missing support in eCS for some hardware, know this:
Windows 7 (that super modern, technologically superior must have OS everybody is using anyway, you know :) ) does not detect Wireless, FireWire, card reader and webcam upon installation as well. The sound support is not that stable - requires re-installation of original Realtek drivers. So from a certain perspective, eCS (2.0 RC7) is on my laptop >even< with Win7 ;)

Please let me know should you need more details.
St.

ivan

Very informative Stefan.  The information about the bios confirms what I found for the MSI CR720.  I didn't see any reason why the WiFi card couldn't be replaced with one that does work with OS/2.


Saijin_Naib

#8
Strange Stefan. Win7 32bit got everything but my webcam for me on my Sungworld VIA netbook. Are you using 32bit or 64bit? If 64bit, you have to have drivers in 64bit from the manufacturer. Many have been really loathe to release proper 64bit drivers :\

StefanZ

@Ivan:

yes, of course the wireless module can be replaced, but that would mean to cancel the warranty. Currently I'm waiting if there will be any issues with the laptop, since the general "manufacturing quality" of MSI notebooks is generally mediocre to good, but not exceptional when compared to i.e. IBM Thinkpads (and I'm used to those ;-) ).

So currently I decided to wait for some months whether the MSI notebook will behave :)

If it will, I will open it and look into the innards of the beast :)

StefanZ

#10
@Saijin_Naib:

It was 32-bit Vista, upgraded with 32bit w7 - and I was surprised too. Good that there was a CD included with all the drivers (win drivers of course  :-\ ).

Sigurd

Hi Stefan,

good news from you. May I ask - with the UNIAUD for HDA - do you have sound in Virtual PC for OS/2 - if you have this application installed. Unfortunately I do not have sound in Virtual PC..

StefanZ

Sigurd,

did not try that yet, I'm usually using VBox and gave up all the virtualized sound a looong time ago. ::)

But give me some days, I will try that out. :)

Pete

Hi Sigurd

I find that different builds of uniaud HDA (basically the uniaud32.sys file) cause different results when trying to get sound in VPC.

I can only suggest that you experiment with the different builds to, hopefully, find a build that works fine. There are quite a few uniaud32 builds here to play with http://download.smedley.info/ - I think I'd start with uniaud-1.9.22-release.zip and work backwards.

Regards

Pete