Inspiron 1525 Hardware

[Alexandre "Sunny" Kovalenko]

On Fri, 2008-09-05 at 20:43 -0700, Jeremy Chadwick wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 05, 2008 at 02:26:33AM -0700, Jeremy Chadwick wrote:
> > On Fri, Sep 05, 2008 at 03:06:42PM +0900, Pyun YongHyeon wrote:
> > > On Thu, Sep 04, 2008 at 10:54:23PM -0700, Jeremy Chadwick wrote:
> > >  > On Fri, Sep 05, 2008 at 02:34:55PM +0900, Pyun YongHyeon wrote:
> > >  > > On Thu, Sep 04, 2008 at 01:22:32PM -0500, Stephen Montgomery-Smith wrote:
> > >  > >  > The http://people.freebsd.org/~yongari/msk/msk.88E8040.patch patch for 
> > >  > >  > the 88E8040 simply doesn't work.  It is not because of lack of testing 
> > >  > >  > (which I have performed for Pyun who wrote the patch), but apparently 
> > >  > >  > because of lack of reliable documentation.  There is a driver for 
> > >  > > 
> > >  > > Another problem is lack of hardware. 88E8040 seems to be intialized
> > >  > > after applying the patch but link establishment seem to fail. :-(
> > > 
> > >  > I can purchase and send you a Marvel 88E8040 NIC, assuming we can find a
> > >  > PCI or PCIe card somewhere that uses one.  Otherwise, I could purchase a
> > >  > motherboard which uses the IC and send that to you.
> > >  > 
> > > 
> > > I failed to find a standalone PCI/PCIe NIC based on 88E8040
> > > controller in local store.
> > 
> > I'll look around, and if I can't find anything, contact Marvell asking
> > which of their clients use their 88E8040 in standalone PCI/PCIe NICs.
> > 
> > If push comes to shove, I'll pick up a motherboard that has the 88E8040
> > on it and ship it to you free of cost.
> 
> I cannot find a single PCI/PCIe card that uses the 88E8040.  There do
> not appear to be any consumer motherboards that use the 88E8040 either.
> I haven't mailed Marvell yet, but I doubt they'd disclose to me a list
> of their customers who purchase said chip.
> 
> The only product I can find on the market which uses this chip are a two
> Dell laptops: the Inspiron 1525 and the XPS M1530.  The Inspiron 1525 is
> approximately US$499, and the XPS M1530 is approximately US$1000.  Both
> of these are quite expensive, so purchasing one solely for this project
> would put a pretty large hole in my pocket.
> 
> Ironically, I just bought an Inspiron 1525 for a friend of mine's son as
> a birthday gift, so I do have access to one indirectly, and can probably
> borrow it for a day or two if need be.  It lacks a serial port, so I'd
> have to buy a USB serial adapter for serial console if remote console
> was needed.

Actually, you might not need to -- according to the Dell's website 1525
has Firewire port. I do not have access to the machine in question, but
Firewire console works beautifully on my ThinkPad X60. You will need the
second machine with Firewire port running FreeBSD, though, and you might
want to invest in the long Firewire cable for convenience.

HTH,

-- 
Alexandre "Sunny" Kovalenko (Олександр Коваленко)