[Debian-eeepc-devel] Bug#559578: eeepc-acpi-scripts: EeePC 701 freezes with garbled screen while booting

[Darren Salt]

I demand that Axel Beckert may or may not have written...

> Package: eeepc-acpi-scripts
> Version: 1.1.3
> Severity: critical
> Justification: Breaks whole system

> After the upgrade to 1.1.3 my EeePC 701 4G freezes on shortly after setting
> the console fonts with a garbled screen (no more readable, looks like lines
> being out of sync or so). I have to power it off by pressing the power
> button 4 seconds. No more ping, nothing. Due to the garbled screen, I do
> not know if there was any kernel panic or so.

netconsole may help to determine that, but I wouldn't hold out any hope of it
doing so.

> It does not happen if I:
> * unplug the power supply (not very usable).
[snip]
> It does happen:
[snip kernel-independent]
> * as soon as I plug in the power supply (in case I had it unplugged on
>   startup) the system freezes and garbles the screen, also if running
>   under X.

Interesting. That'd be when it switches, or tries to switch, to high-speed
mode. I wonder if this could be BIOS-related; listing both known-good and
known-bad BIOS revisions may be useful since we can then blacklist (or
whitelist?) and encourage upgrades, or possibly downgrades, where
appropriate.

ftp://ftp.asus.com.tw/pub/asus/EeePC/EeePC4G%28701%29/ should be right for
what you have. I see five BIOS versions there: 0401, 0703, 0801, 0910 (all
EeePC4G*.zip), and 1302 (701-ASUS-1302.zip).

[snip]
-- 
| Darren Salt            | linux at youmustbejoking | nr. Ashington, | Doon
| using Debian GNU/Linux | or ds    ,demon,co,uk    | Northumberland | Army
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