Skip to main content

Crunchbang Linux on the Acer Aspire One

I did the following to install Crunchbang (8.10) on my Acer Aspire One (SSD). (Most is taken from https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AspireOne, which has more detailed information. This is just a reminder for myself.)

  • Create a bootable usb stick from the iso image using unetbootin.

  • Install crunchbang, choosing ext2 file systems.

  • Download, compile and install madwifi, and add ath_pci to /etc/modules.

  • Add the following to /etc/rc.local to enable the wireless led:

sysctl -w dev.wifi0.ledpin=3
sysctl -w dev.wifi0.softled=1
  • Install luvcview to use the webcam. This doesn't work yet.

  • Download acerfand and acer_ec.pl into /usr/local/bin, and make acerfand executable. Check wether sudo perl acer_ec.pl ?= 58 returns something that could be the cpu temperature (hexacecimal), and add this line to /etc/rc.local to keep the fan down if the CPU temperature is below 70°:

/usr/local/bin/acerfand
  • Edit /etc/fstab and change the the option “relatime” to “noatime”.

  • Add elevator=noop as boot option for the current kernel, and to the # defoptions line.

  • Add the following to /etc/fstab:

tmpfs      /tmp            tmpfs        defaults           0    2
tmpfs      /var/tmp        tmpfs        defaults           0    2
  • Change concurrency=none into concurrency=shell in /etc/init.d/rc

  • For power saving, create a file /etc/sysctl.d/60-aspireone.conf with the following content:

###################################################################
# Settings for the Acer Aspire One
#
# Strongly discourage swapping
vm.swappiness = 1
# As suggested by PowerTOP
vm.dirty_writeback_centisecs = 1500
# Suggested by https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AspireOne
vm.vfs_cache_pressure = 0
vm.dirty_ratio = 20
vm.dirty_background_ratio = 10
vm.laptop_mode = 5
  • Add the following to /etc/rc.local:

echo ondemand > /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor
echo ondemand > /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu1/cpufreq/scaling_governor
cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/ondemand/sampling_rate_max > /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/ondemand/sampling_rate

echo 1 > /sys/devices/system/cpu/sched_smt_power_savings
echo 10 > /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save

### Decrease power usage of USB while idle
## commented out; doesn't seem to work
# [ -w /sys/bus/usb/devices/1-5/power/level ] && echo auto > /sys/bus/usb/devices/1-5/power/level
# [ -w /sys/bus/usb/devices/5-5/power/level ] && echo auto > /sys/bus/usb/devices/5-5/power/level
  • Add the following line to /etc/profile:

export INTEL_BATCH=1
  • Change the section 'Device' in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.

Section "Device"
        Identifier      "Configured Video Device"
#       Driver          "vesa"
        Option          "MonitorLayout" "LVDS,VGA"
        Option          "Clone" "True"
        Option          "AccelMethod" "EXA"
        Option          "MigrationHeuristic" "greedy"
        VideoRam        229376
        Option          "CacheLines" "1980"
        Option "NoDDC"
EndSection
  • and add this line to the 'Monitor' section:

DisplaySize 195 113

Interesting firefox add-ons:

Add the string browser.cache.disk.parent_directory to Firefox's about:config, and assign the value /tmp/firefox. In 'options', 'security' disable the phishing filter. (dangerous!)

Comments

Comments powered by Disqus