BIOS upgrade for Asus 1005HA Netbook in Windows 7

The BIOS in the ASUS 1005HA netbook was shipped without support for ACPI in Windows 7. All the blue function keys on the netbook rely on the ACPI layer to work, therefore, I decided to upgrade the BIOS to the latest in order to run Windows 7.

There's only one problem -- the BIOS flash program, called ASUS updater, downloaded from the ASUS web site under 1005HA support, relies on ACPI to work :)

To get around the problem, you need a BIO flasher that can work without ACPI support. I searched the ASUS support site for the motherboard model and found this one:BIOS flash utility 6.10.02 I used it to flash the board with the latest ROM and everything works like a charm in Windows 7.

I also read some posts on the web that people has been downgrading the BIOS in order to get the flash utility to work, then upgrading the BIOS again. That's just too much busy work :)

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Dual Booting Windows 7 and Linux with EasyBCD

I decided to use Windows 7 bootloader instead GRUB to manage the dual boot.

I've been using GRUB before to manage Linux/Windows dual boot -- you need to edit the menu.lst file in the /boot folder under the Linux root partition; this time, I decided to give the Windows 7 bootloader a try.

Windows 7 uses the same bootloader as Windows Vista. One of the best tool for managing the bootloader is EasyBCD from NeoSmart

Interestingly, the easiest way to dual boot Linux (in my opinion)-- using the NeoGrub bootloader, is not well documented by the maker NeoSmart.

NeoGrub is made by NeoSmart as a bootloader within a bootloader. It can live anywhere on your Windows filesystem; you just make a reference to it inside EasyBCD. After you install NeoGrub from within EasyBCD, you want to click the Configure button and modify the menu.lst file (that's only way to modify it. the file is locked outside the program).

Just copy the boot entries from the old menu.lst file. (if you are wondering how in the world you would be able to reach the old menu.lst from inside Windows 7, you might want to read my old post on Ext2 IFS :) Those boot entries should look like the following:

title Ubuntu 8.04.1, kernel 2.6.24-19-generic
root (hd1,0)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-19-generic
root=UUID=c28b6727-d0e5-46c1-93a8-9b336033ff05 ro quiet splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.24-19-generic
quiet

Save the file and EasyBCD writes a new NeoGrub entry the into the Windows 7 bootloader for you. Done.



Result of the bootloader entries including the new NeoGrub entry:

Omega Drivers for nVidia

I've been having stability trouble with my nVidia graphics card on an old computer -- it's crashing it when accessing video intensive web sites. So instead of using the official nVidia driver, I switch to the Omega driver. Downloaded from http://www.omegadrivers.net

Omega makes drivers for both ATI and nVidia. And based on what I've seen so far, their drivers are better and have a better user interface. I am already less than happy that nVidia decided not to provide Vista support for my MX 440SE AGP card, which had been only a couple of years old when Windows Vista came out. After this episode of poor driver quality, I am going to make sure my next graphics card is not one from nVidia.

NVidia Geforce4 4400 AGP 8X in Windows 7

I have a 5-year-old Dell 400SC server with a Linksys USB wireless adapter and an Nvidia Geforce4 4400 AGP 8X video card. I wanted to try Windows 7 on it.

Everything seemed to work fine (after I gathered drivers from Dell and Linksys) with the exception of the AGP video card. The card, according to manufacturer, is not supported in Windows Vista.

A little digging (well, a lot of digging) on the Internet turned up this blog, which helped me out.

Apparently some versions of the NVidia drivers will semi-work in Vista, and therefore by extension, in Windows 7 as well. I downloaded the Forceware Version: 81.98 driver and manually installed it. Afterwards I even installed the Nvidia Control Panel plug-in by running under the compatibility mode for the installation.

Well, the installation actually took several back-and-forthness, but eventually I did end up with a semi-working video card in Windows 7. The max resolution is only 1280x1024, less than the 1600x1280 resolution the card can display in Windows XP, and I had to tweak a setting in the display control to set it to use the Card Rendering instead of Monitor Rendering.

But it's still better than having to buy a new graphic card...

Install Samsung ML-1740 driver on Windows 7

The Samsung GDI driver for ml-1740 et al. is packaged in an .exe file from the Samsung download web site. http://org.downloadcenter.samsung.com/downloadfile/ContentsFile.aspx?CDSite=US&CttFileID=1291152&CDCttType=DR&ModelType=&ModelName=ML-1740&VPath=DR/200701/20070129084454453_ML-1740_GDI_Vista.exe


However, the .exe file is not Windows 7 compatible. If you try to install the driver by clicking on the executable, the program will terminate. So what to do?

Well, it's simple really. The driver works fine in Windows 7; you just have to install it manually. To do so, follow these steps:

1. download the driver from the link above
2. double click on the downloaded file. there will be a windows error message informning you this program is incompatible with this version of windows. Don't close this error message window yet, because we need to access the temporary files the install program has extracted.
3. now go to the temp directory of your computer, typically, it's (user folder)\appdata\local\temp. It's a hidden folder; to view it you need to enable view of hidden files and folders in Windows folder option. The files contained in the .exe file above were extracted in this directory. Sort by date and you'll see a temp folder containing the following directories: printer\GDI\Vista. Copy the content of the directory to a permanent folder, for example, the download directory.

-- There's actually an easier way as pointed out by one of the comments below. You can right click on the Samsung exe file and choose properties --> compatibility --> and choose to run the program under the compatibility mode for Vista SP2. I tried it and it works.

4. Now go to Start --> Devices and Printers. Select Add a printer, when you reach the page for selecting printer drivers, click on Have Disk... and choose the driver file you had copied earlier.

Works like a charm. Have a look at my printer set up:

Installing Windows 7 on a Netbook without DVD drive

I installed Windows 7 on my son's Netbook ASUS 1005HA. Since it does not have a DVD drive, I wasn't sure if the installation would go smoothly. Well, indeed it did. So to report, what you need to do the install are:

1. An unused partition on the Netbook to house Windows 7 Operating System. His Netbook came preconfigured with two partitions. But if yours didn't, you can always create a new partition with a tool like BootIt.

2. A virutal CD/DVD mounting tool. I used DaemonTool to do that. With it you can simulate a DVD drive using an ISO file on the hard drive.

Once that's done, I copied the Windows 7 ISO onto his Netbook, mounted the ISO using the DaemonTool, and installed Windows 7 onto the second partition. Everything just worked. No sweat.

Here's a screenprint of the new OS: