Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 16 Comments on Installing Ubuntu 10.04 LTS in Acer Aspire One D255E

Installing Ubuntu 10.04 LTS in Acer Aspire One D255E

Since I’d like to try Xibo Python Linux client, I’ve decided to install Ubuntu 10.04 LTS in my netbook Acer Aspire One D255. The bad news is that it did not go so smoothly, the good news is that since the wired & wireless network and SD card did not work I can blog the solution about it.

Installing Ubuntu 10.04 from a USB thumb drive.

First, I went to Ubuntu Download page, change the version to Ubuntu 10.04 LTS – Long Term Support and downloaded the ISO file (ubuntu-10.04.3-desktop-i386.iso).

Then I downloaded the Universal USB Installer (For Windows XP) to install the ISO in my USB thumb drive.

Finally, I inserted the USB thumb drive in my netbook and performed the default installation, except for partitioning, where I used the 3rd partition in my hard disk and an extra swap partition to install Ubuntu.

After installation, everything seems to work fine, as Ubuntu booted and I could login without issues. But I soon noticed three problems:

  • Ethernet is not working
  • The Wireless connection is not working
  • The SD card cannot be mounted

Fixing Wired and Wireless Ethernet

For let’s have a look at my hardware (Since not all Aspire One D255 seem to have the same Wifi card):

# lspci
01:00.0 Ethernet controller: Atheros Communications AR8152 v1.1 Fast Ethernet (rev c1)
02:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation Device 4727 (rev 01)

So I have a Broadcom Wireless card, where I has seen some other people have an Intel Wifi Card with the D255.

Here’s how to install the Atheros Ethernet Driver:

  1. Go to http://linuxwireless.org/download/compat-wireless-2.6/
  2. Download compat-wireless-2.6.tar.bz2
  3. Decompress the archive, then compile and install atl1c driver:

    tar xjvf compat-wireless-2.6.tar.bz2
    cd compat-wireless*
    ./scripts/driver-select atl1c
    make
    sudo make install

  4. Reboot your computer or try to load the driver (modprobe atl1c)
  5. Your Ethernet network connection should now work properly.

Source: http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=9446984&postcount=6 

Here’s how to install the Broadcom Wifi driver:

  1. Compile and install brcm80211 driver from compat-wireless-2.6:

    cd compat-wireless*
    ./scripts/driver-select brcm80211
    make
    sudo make install

  2. Install git:

    sudo apt-get install git-core

  3. Install Broadcom firmware for b43xx:

    git clone git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/dwmw2/linux-firmware.git
    sudo cp linux-firmware/brcm /lib/firmware -rf

  4. Reboot your computer or try to load the drivers (modprobe brcmutil, modprobe brcmsmac)
  5. Your Wireless network connection should now work properly after you’ve entered the Wifi password (if any)

If you fail to follow step 3, you’ll find the following error with dmesg:

[ 13.963989] brcm80211: fail to load firmware brcm/bcm43xx-0.fw
[ 13.963993] brcm80211: Failed to find firmware usually in /lib/firmware/brcm

Source: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1593354&page=3

Fixing the SD Card Reader

  1.  Download the keucr driver at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/530277/+attachment/1714152/+files/keucr.tgz
  2. Uncompress the driver:

    tar zvxf keucr.tgz

  3. Add the following two lines in usb.c in the driver source code after the include part (line 19):

    #define usb_alloc_coherent(a, b, c, d) usb_buffer_alloc(a, b, c, d)
    #define usb_free_coherent(a, b, c, d) usb_buffer_free(a, b, c, d)

  4. Build and install the driver:

    make -C /usr/src/linux-headers-uname -r M=pwd modules
    sudo make -C /usr/src/linux-headers-uname -r M=pwd modules_install
    sudo depmod -a

  5. Insert an SD Card, it should be mounted automatically and a window should popup to ask you what to do with the SD Card.

Source: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/530277

That’s it. Let me know if you have any problems or if there are other issues in Ubuntu running on Acer Aspire One D255E in the comments section.

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16 Replies to “Installing Ubuntu 10.04 LTS in Acer Aspire One D255E”

  2. The command is: lspci
    – it’s a typing mistake (thanks for giving the sources, so I realised 😉

    The package gcc is needed for the make.

    And thank you very much 🙂
    IT WORKED!!
    (I canceled the git-stuff because it?s not available anymore.)

    Reply

    1. Hi Nobbi,

      Thanks for the feedback. I corrected the typo.
      I’m glad it worked for you.

      But I’m quite surprised you managed to get Wifi working without the firmware files…

      Reply

  3. Glory! This is awesome! There were a few things I had to go into your references to figure out, (ie. apt-get update, build-essential and I had to put keucr.tgz into /usr/src …). But, I am a newbie. Anyways, I got things working and thank you so much!

    Reply

  4. @ Kevin
    Thanks for the comment and nice to hear it eventually worked for you. I think I had to try quite a few solutions before having it work on my netbook, so I may have missed some steps while writing the instructions.

    Reply

  5. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS on a Acer Aspire One with a non-working ethernet and SD card.

    Tried your wired connection and that works fine. However, I have lost my wireless connection. Any suggestions how to get it back?

    ~$ lspci

    Network controller: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9285 Wireless Network Adapter (PCI Express) (rev 01)

    It did work after the original netbook re-mix install, with an entry in

    Thank you,
    Dave

    Reply

  7. I tried your suggestion, however it appears that there are no ath9k related files in linux-firmwares. I will search around for the required file and follow your process.

    Thank you.
    Dave

    Reply

  8. Sorry, got the wireless working by reverting /etc/network/interfaces from static back to
    DHCP.

    Doing lsmod | grep ath9k showed plenty of installed drivers, so had to work out what else I had changed 🙁

    BTW, the SDcard procedure sorted that issue as well. Thank you for posting this information.
    Dave

    Reply

  9. Have run into another problem with eth0. This netbook will communicate directly with some PCs (using a cross-over cable if necessary) but not to a particular dev board. Other PCs can talk to the dev board.

    ARP requests are not acknowledged by the dev board just from the Acer Aspire ONE. If I interpose a switching or non-switching hub or a USB to ethernet adapter all is well. Appears that there is something non-standard either HW or SW wise with the Atheros AR9285.

    I have searched around for a solution and now I am hoping that this rings a bell here.

    Thanks,
    Dave

    Reply

  10. @davef
    I’m not really sure what could cause this. It could be some hardware compatibility issues.

    I think the Atheros AR9285 is the Wifi chipset, you’d have to check your Ethernet controller. Maybe some people had the same issue. Some Ethernet controllers support Auto-MDIX, so you could do direct connection with both a crossover cable or a normal cable. AFAIK, using a crossover cable should work in all cases.

    Reply

  11. Thanks for the details. I have just checked the TX levels out of the Acer Aspire ONE (single-ended measurements) and they are about 1/2 the peak-to-peak level as from my other machines.

    I’ll focus on Atheros AR8152 issues.

    Regards,
    Dave

    Reply

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