Linux driver for WLAN of Acer 1410

I just installed Ubuntu 12.04 on my Acer 1410. Everything is fine, but when using Wireless internet, fan heavily works and the temperature is high (56 C). It seem that a better driver should be installed for WLAN.

Is there a way to automatically install the best driver?

If not, where can I download official linux driver of WLAN?

 

What Wi-Fi card is it?

 

Atheros Communications Inc. AR928X Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express)

 

The AR928X is extremely common and incredibly well supported, you should have no problems with that card (I have had 4 machines with that wireless chipset).

More likely it is a problem with your BIOS/ACPI automatic fan settings, there is a module called acerhdf to control fan settings on the Aspire. You should already have this module if you are running 12.04.

http://piie.net/files/acerhdf_README.txt

 

Thanks for your descriptive note, yes, I have this model. However my worry is not only fan speed, but the temperature. Reducing fan speed will not resolve the problem. Here is the temperature reported by "sensors" command

Code:

Adapter: ISA adapter
Core 0:       +28.0°C  (high = +105.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)

acerhdf-virtual-0
Adapter: Virtual device
temp1:        +57.0°C  (crit = +63.0°C)

 

OK, first, are you sure it is actually that hot (by feel from the exhaust and radiant heat)?

If so, is your CPU usage high? if you run gnome-system-monitor or top is there anything that is taking up CPU time?

What does cpufreq-info say?

Someone posted their idle temps here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/acer/434638-linux-acer-1410-1810tz-1810t-20.html#post6343982

Finally, do you run any other OS to know if the CPU normally runs this hot?

 

The laptop does not seems to be that hot! You should be right about reporting wrong temperature.

BUT, apart from temperature, I have serious problem with the Wireless. When a WiFi network on my friend's MacBook is strong, on my Acer is weak. Moreover, it takes very long time to connect to a WiFi network (sometimes I need to retry several times).

 

To diagnose your wireless connection problems, look at /var/log/messages or /var/log/daemon.log as your connection attempt times out.

Code:

sudo tail -f /var/log/daemon.log

If that doesn't yield any clues, you can start wpa_supplicant by hand after stopping network-manager:

Code:

sudo /etc/init.d/network-manager stop
sudo killall wpa_supplicant
sudo wpa_supplicant -ddu

-dd is for more debugging verbosity, -u tells it to use dbus for interface configuration.

Then open a new terminal window and restart network-manager:

Code:

sudo /etc/init.d/network-manager start

Keep an eye on the terminal window that has wpa_supplicant running while you try to associate.