Acer Timeline 3830TG Install Guide

[nightalon]

OK, here's what worked for me: (I may have made my life more difficult by using the latest BIOS 1.05: I could never successfully boot the second disk/USB media)

1. Switch to iGPU only mode in BIOS (Optimus is only supported in Win7 and in Linux via Ironhide, silly)
2. Swap out crappy Atheros bgn card for a AR928x or Broadcom 9432b (Bluetooth is not on the same PCB with the WIFI card as I had thought)
3. Use another Mac or Hac to restore the SnowLeo 10.6.3 (the $30 copy you purchased ages ago) DVD/image to a partition on your drive
4. Boot that installer partition with the latest iBoot (non-Legacy, 10.6 only; I booted from the blue USB3 port and put the power USB connector with the skinnier cable in the adjacent USB2 port)
5. Install SnowLeo to a different partition
6. Boot the newly installed partition with iBoot, and install PS2Controller, NullCPUPM, PM states, and FakeSMC via MultiBeast (npci and PCIRootUID fixes not needed with latest version, build 1394)
7. Set up the app store and download Lion
8. Run xMove with a new small partition that you create
9. Boot the installer partition with rBoot LE
10. Clean install Lion on your SnowLeo partition (that was just for practice, right?!)
11. Boot the new Lion install with rBoot LE
12. Use the appropriate version of MultiBeast to configure all of the features you had previously in SL, including GraphicsEnabler for Intel 3000
12b. Upgrade to the latest version of Chameleon 2.1 with Chameleon Wizard (I like to do it to partition and bootfile)
13. Install the ethernet driver (AttansicL1C kext) in S/L/E
14. Use Kext Utility (Lion version) to rebuild your caches, repair permissions, and update to 10.7.2, then enable TRIM for your SSD via Terminal
15. Use Gparted on another laptop to copy you original Acer/Win7 install to the Windows partition on your brand-spanking new SSD (mine is a Crucial M4, but I recommend a Vertex 3 with FW 15 if you think the M4 is dated)
16. Run gptsync from the same Linux install you used Gparted from
17. Repair the Win7 bootloader with the Win7 installer booter DVD by running it multiple times and doing bootrec /fixmbr and bootrec /fixboot
18. Boot into Windows, verify that TRIM is working, and install EasyBCD so that you can access all of your OSes from the Win7 bootloader; use diskpart to mark your Win7 partition active if you want to use the Win7 bootloader
19. Install Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot without a swap partition and install the bootloader to the partition, not the disk, despite any warnings you see
20. Run gptsync again (you shouldn't have to reinstall the GRUB/Linux bootloader unless you add a storage partition at this point and the partitions are re-ordered)
21. Mark your Win7 partition active again and reinstall the Win7 bootloaders if you must; then boot into Windows and add the Ubu install into your EasyBCD config
22. Enjoy!


Other notes:
This is mostly time-intensive stuff I am contemplating:

1. Removing the heatsink/fan to address thermal issues with a little Arctic Silver 4 thermal paste
2. Attempt to replace the low-res 1280x768 LCD with the similarly-sized 1600x900 panel from the Asus UX31
3. Attempt to solder on a push-push type SIM-card slot and MiniPCI-E bracket to add an internal 3G modem (perhaps not worth voiding my warranty; I did try to get a European version with the slot, but that was an epic fail)
4. Fix brightness control/Fn keys and the RTC error with a DSDT patch
5. Figure out an audio solution better than VoodooHDA
6. Go outside and get a life :-D

 

[sulo251]

Hey, thanks for the guide. I also am trying to get a 13.3 1600x900 panel to work with the 3830tg. I can't seem to private message you yet but I would like to perhaps collaborate with you on this project. I definitely can send you a panel to play with if you'd like.

Sulo