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[Guide] Dell Inspiron 6400/9400/1520/1720/E1405/E1505/E1705 Intel Core Duo

devilhood

By devilhood,
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Shortyman87
Shortyman87
Posted
Posted

hi,

 

first let me thank you for your great support and your fast reply.

to me it seems that NVidiaEFI.kext is not loading at all. when i boot with the -v argument, i can't find a line that indicates about NVidiaEFI.

i just wanted to try NVidiaEFI.kext because of this post,...

 

Sleep works if u :

jas 10.4.8 install.

jas 10.4.9 combo upgrade.

 

I dont know if the video cards affect anything, but i use NvidiaEFI 1.0 for my 7900gs.

 

Then install the paulicat kernel, and sleep/resume works fine.

 

With the netkas kernel, sleep works, but the resume locks the display up, no keyboard, etc, might be able to still ssh in, though i don't know.

 

I'd really like to dig more into the display reinitializing issue, where the display goes to "sleep" but when u move a mouse, all it does is go from black, to back lit black.

 

If anyone has any ideas i'd be glad to help debug.

cos

 

...so that i could make sleep work.

rogabean
rogabean
Posted
Posted

Two quick things.

 

For those who are using the Sleep Trick to enable the second core (like I am now), hitting sleep yourself can be kind of a pain.. I'm using the following method to automate it.

 

Install Dockables! 1.0.3 Here is the Link

(it's freeware)

 

One of the dockable items is Sleep. You can then go to System Preferences->Accounts->Login Items (for your account). Add the application Sleep from the Dockables folder to your list of items.

 

This will then automatically send your computer to sleep as soon as it boots and logs you in. You can then just wake it up and be ready to go. The only downside is if you just log out of your account and log back in... it's going to sleep again. But I never logout so this wasn't an issue for me. This really works best for those who only have 1 user account.

 

Second... I've done a custom BIOS Splash screen for my E1705 that others might like. You are a little limited as the Dell BIOS only allows for 640x480 16 color images so I found Black and White to be good for me.

 

I've attached the image file... you can download the Dell Splash utility from Dell directly or use the floppy image file I've attached with a program such as nero (create a bootable cd and use the image file for the boot portion). If anyone is really interested I can give better instructions for it later.

 

basically boot from CD and type spl2 DELL.BMP

dell.bmp

dellsplash.IMA.zip

cyonix
cyonix
Posted
Posted

i found also a good app for scrolling without scrollpad drivers,

 

smart scroll x 2.5 -> demonoid

 

u can hold the control button and scroll like in windows. great app for those like us, without synaptics native driver

devilhood
devilhood
Posted
  • Author
Posted
I got pretty much everything working the only thing that I cant is the bluetooth. I have a Dell Inspiron 6400. Does anyone have any suggestions on getting it to recognize it? Thanks

 

Unusual, bluetooth should be recognized without any problems as far as I know?

 

Is it correctly enabled in the BIOS?

TheAfroman
TheAfroman
Posted
Posted

Ok, so i decided to install this yesterday (right when site was gone.. ARGH) but i'm glad it's back google cache is very limited.. it seems that i can;t get a working link for the IOnetworking 10.4.6 version to get my network card working on my e1705/9400 anybody have a working link?

devilhood
devilhood
Posted
  • Author
Posted
Devilhood

 

Do you have revision A00 or A01 of the dell 1500 card?

 

And does anyone have A00? i just ordered one on ebay but i didnt realize there was two different versions. Does it suck?

 

They make no difference.

A-ONE
A-ONE
Posted
Posted

Thank you for the info, there is a guy on ebay claiming that the A00 version has issues and thats what made dell 'dump' them.

 

Hes selling the A01 version of course, but what was it a martketing scheme or the truth?

 

Ill go by what you say

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Dell-Draft-N-1500-Wire...1QQcmdZViewItem

 

thats the A01 and this is the one i ordered

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/New-Dell-1500-Wireless...1QQcmdZViewItem

devilhood
devilhood
Posted
  • Author
Posted

Hmmm.

 

There have been known issues with 1500 wireless cards and Windows Vista.

It causes audio pops at random points, but the problem does not occur on Windows XP, Linux or Mac OS X.

Perhaps the new revision was aimed at resolving issues with Vista... who knows... I haven't read any reports on it nor can I seem to find any :D

 

There has been no official word from Dell either.

 

I luckily managed to pick up an A00 version of the Dell 1500 for a measly £8 off eBay quite some time ago, and yes, I get audio pops on Vista whenever the Wireless is enabled via BIOS.

Until I get an A01 version I wont be able to confirm anything else for you.

 

I'll try and obtain one next week if possible and let you know.

A-ONE
A-ONE
Posted
Posted

Well if i do get the A00 ill be sure to dual boot XP. No vista.

 

And as far as the whole bios thing, i know that dell has a bios update for these notebooks thats corrects some issues with compatibility for the 1500.

 

Ive got a e1405 but i dont have the latest bios update, yet. Im running A08 and i plan to update to A10 when i receive my card. Ill let you know if anything.

rogabean
rogabean
Posted
Posted

Just a quick question.. and I'm NOT promising anything... but are there enough people using the 1505/6400/1705/9400, that if I were say put together a special install disk, it would be of use to you guys complete with different install options for different hardware?

 

Or even just a special post install package?

 

Right now my time is being taken up in iDVD doing some work for the girl but when that's done I'm gonna need a new project since I can't work on EFI at the moment anyway.

OSX-Fanatic
OSX-Fanatic
Posted
Posted
Two quick things.

 

For those who are using the Sleep Trick to enable the second core (like I am now), hitting sleep yourself can be kind of a pain.. I'm using the following method to automate it.

 

Install Dockables! 1.0.3 Here is the Link

(it's freeware)

 

One of the dockable items is Sleep. You can then go to System Preferences->Accounts->Login Items (for your account). Add the application Sleep from the Dockables folder to your list of items.

 

This will then automatically send your computer to sleep as soon as it boots and logs you in. You can then just wake it up and be ready to go. The only downside is if you just log out of your account and log back in... it's going to sleep again. But I never logout so this wasn't an issue for me. This really works best for those who only have 1 user account.

 

so what i need for that trick? can i do it with osx 10.4.8? Which kernel should i use?

 

i would try it, but iam afraid, that after booting up the screen stays black and i cant get it back to normal...

FlipHDK
FlipHDK
Posted
Posted
Just a quick question.. and I'm NOT promising anything... but are there enough people using the 1505/6400/1705/9400, that if I were say put together a special install disk, it would be of use to you guys complete with different install options for different hardware?

 

Or even just a special post install package?

 

Right now my time is being taken up in iDVD doing some work for the girl but when that's done I'm gonna need a new project since I can't work on EFI at the moment anyway.

 

I can be a beta tester or even help you do it, haven't had much experience with projects on OS X. I might not be able to help, I am waiting for someone to contact me about a web project.

I can also host a development wiki or forum for this project, SVN if needed.

quasar_x
quasar_x
Posted
Posted
so what i need for that trick? can i do it with osx 10.4.8? Which kernel should i use?

 

i would try it, but iam afraid, that after booting up the screen stays black and i cant get it back to normal...

 

Depending on your GFX-card, that might well be possible. Correct me if I am wrong, but so far I haven't seen anybody with a GMA950 (945GM) who successfully managed to also wake up the display from sleep. It always stays dark, so there is no work-around to enable both Cores on these machines.

 

Is it maybe a bug in the Video BIOS that prevents the display to wake up from sleep? In the latest Intel-drivers for the GMA950/945GM (15.4.3), there is a DOS-utility for flashing the Video Bios. There are also BIOS-versions much newer than the one I am using on my Dell Inspiron E1505/6400.

Has anyone already tried to flash the Video BIOS in order to see if it fixes the "No display wakeup from sleep" issue?

Namor
Namor
Posted
Posted

That sounds like an interesting idea.. Flashing the video bios..... Might try that out....

 

Same here... Blank screen on wake... only way.. plug in an external monitor.. and it wakes...

warning... only can do this once per boot for me .. second time.. the image gets all messed up and frozen/not moving

quasar_x
quasar_x
Posted
Posted
That sounds like an interesting idea.. Flashing the video bios..... Might try that out....

 

The latest Intel driver includes VBIOS for 945G, 945GM (e.g. many GMA950 notebooks) and 965.

 

You need to upgrade the VBIOS from MS-DOS, it doesn't work in Windows. So download a bootdisk or boot into DOS using a pen drive.

 

"To use the TSR VBIOS, the ZIP format graphics drivers must be unzipped to a folder on the hard disk (eg. C:\INTEL), the VBIOS ZIP file must be extracted to a folder on the hard disk (eg. C:\INTEL\VBIOS945GM), and a line (eg. C:\INTEL\VBIOS945GM\cal_1413.exe) must be added to the AUTOEXEC.BAT file that runs the TSR at startup. Please note that this TSR will not work with operating systems that do not support TSRs, such as Windows* XP, 2000, Me, or NT*."

 

The Intel website also says that sometimes, you can only upgrade the VBIOS as part of a general BIOS upgrade. Unfortunately, Dell hasn't included it in most BIOS upgrades, so my E1505/6400 BIOS is still very old. :-/

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