Re: experience with late model laptops?

[Stefan Goessling <debian@goessling.de>]

Hi Charlie (and the rest),

I have installed Debian (a mix of unstable/testing) via Knoppix 3.2 on my
(university's) Acer Travelmate 803 LCi (Pentium M 1600 MHz, ATI Radeon
9000 Mobility, 512 MB RAM, 40 GB HD CD-RW, DVD,....) and it runs OK.

Kernel 2.4.21 patched with laptop patch:
http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/laptopkernel/

plus:

-Battery life is very good (~ 4 hours)
-Fan almost never comes on (when CPU frequency is reduced to 1200 MHz)
-Video adapter support via radeon driver works very well (3D functionality
not tested, but DRI driver reports no problems)
-LAN interface Broadcom 4401 working w/o any problems
-Sound works fine (but do not ask me why, it just does :-)
-Synaptics touchpad with excellent support (multi-finger control, slide
bars..., use synaptic driver)

minus:

-ACPI runs only rudimentary (swsusp does not work, klaptop does not work
well with ACPI, tried sleepd: no success, poweroff works)
-WLAN not supported whatsoever (Intel Pro/Wireless LAN 2100 3B MiniPCI)
-Softmodem not working (Agere Systems AC'97)

do not know/not tested:

-PCMCIA card
-USB
-Firewire
-IR

Maybe that gives you an idea?
Greetings, Stefan