acpi=force

it didnt do this before I upgraded to 7.04

it also said something about acpi support

You can paste here your dmesg?

Of Course :D

[ 0.000000] Linux version 2.6.20-15-generic (root@palmer) (gcc version 4.1.2 (Ubuntu 4.1.2-0ubuntu4)) #2 SMP Sun Apr 15 07:36:31 UTC 2007 (Ubuntu 2.6.20-15.27-generic)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
[ 0.000000] sanitize start
[ 0.000000] sanitize end
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() start: 0000000000000000 size: 000000000009fc00 end: 000000000009fc00 type: 1
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() type is E820_RAM
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() start: 000000000009fc00 size: 0000000000000400 end: 00000000000a0000 type: 2
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() start: 00000000000f0000 size: 0000000000010000 end: 0000000000100000 type: 2
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() start: 0000000000100000 size: 000000000bef0000 end: 000000000bff0000 type: 1
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() type is E820_RAM
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() start: 000000000bff0000 size: 0000000000003800 end: 000000000bff3800 type: 2
[ 0.000000] copy_e820_map() start: 000000000bff3800 size: 000000000000c800 end: 000000000c000000 type: 4
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 000000000009fc00 (usable)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000000009fc00 - 00000000000a0000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 000000000bff0000 (usable)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000000bff0000 - 000000000bff3800 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000000bff3800 - 000000000c000000 (ACPI NVS)
[ 0.000000] 0MB HIGHMEM available.
[ 0.000000] 191MB LOWMEM available.
[ 0.000000] Entering add_active_range(0, 0, 49136) 0 entries of 256 used
[ 0.000000] Zone PFN ranges:
[ 0.000000] DMA 0 -> 4096
[ 0.000000] Normal 4096 -> 49136
[ 0.000000] HighMem 49136 -> 49136
[ 0.000000] early_node_map[1] active PFN ranges
[ 0.000000] 0: 0 -> 49136
[ 0.000000] On node 0 totalpages: 49136
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 32 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 0 pages reserved
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 4064 pages, LIFO batch:0
[ 0.000000] Normal zone: 351 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] Normal zone: 44689 pages, LIFO batch:7
[ 0.000000] HighMem zone: 0 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] DMI 2.3 present.
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDP (v000 COMPAQ ) @ 0x000f9970
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDT (v001 COMPAQ RSDB130 0x00000001 CPQ 0x00000001) @ 0x0bff4800
[ 0.000000] ACPI: FADT (v001 COMPAQ CPQB10F 0x19991201 CPQ 0x00000001) @ 0x0bff4828
[ 0.000000] ACPI: DSDT (v001 COMPAQ ARMADAE7 0x00010000 MSFT 0x0100000c) @ 0x00000000
[ 0.000000] ACPI: BIOS age (1999) fails cutoff (2000), acpi=force is required to enable ACPI
[ 0.000000] ACPI: Disabling ACPI support
[ 0.000000] Allocating PCI resources starting at 10000000 (gap: 0c000000:f4000000)
[ 0.000000] Detected 497.578 MHz processor.
[ 18.653004] Built 1 zonelists. Total pages: 48753
[ 18.653017] Kernel command line: root=UUID=e7b0ee64-4478-475c-a889-aefe14225d53 ro quiet
[ 18.653735] Local APIC disabled by BIOS -- you can enable it with "lapic"
[ 18.653762] mapped APIC to ffffd000 (0118a000)
[ 18.653775] Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
[ 18.653785] Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.
[ 18.653816] Initializing CPU#0
[ 18.653936] PID hash table entries: 1024 (order: 10, 4096 bytes)
[ 18.655510] Console: colour VGA+ 80x25
[ 18.656082] Dentry cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
[ 18.656648] Inode-cache hash table entries: 16384 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)
[ 18.679283] Memory: 183872k/196544k available (1992k kernel code, 12172k reserved, 893k data, 328k init, 0k highmem)
[ 18.679326] virtual kernel memory layout:
[ 18.679331] fixmap : 0xfff4e000 - 0xfffff000 ( 708 kB)
[ 18.679337] pkmap : 0xff800000 - 0xffc00000 (4096 kB)
[ 18.679343] vmalloc : 0xcc800000 - 0xff7fe000 ( 815 MB)
[ 18.679349] lowmem : 0xc0000000 - 0xcbff0000 ( 191 MB)
[ 18.679355] .init : 0xc03d7000 - 0xc0429000 ( 328 kB)
[ 18.679360] .data : 0xc02f2264 - 0xc03d16d4 ( 893 kB)
[ 18.679366] .text : 0xc0100000 - 0xc02f2264 (1992 kB)
[ 18.679380] Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok.
[ 18.757895] Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 996.25 BogoMIPS (lpj=1992510)
[ 18.758048] Security Framework v1.0.0 initialized
[ 18.758069] SELinux: Disabled at boot.
[ 18.758134] Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
[ 18.758570] CPU: After generic identify, caps: 0383f9ff 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000 00000000
[ 18.758610] CPU: L1 I cache: 16K, L1 D cache: 16K
[ 18.758621] CPU: L2 cache: 256K
[ 18.758632] CPU: After all inits, caps: 0383f9ff 00000000 00000000 00000040 00000000 00000000 00000000
[ 18.758669] Compat vDSO mapped to ffffe000.
[ 18.758690] Remapping vsyscall page to ffffe000
[ 18.758721] Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
[ 18.774180] SMP alternatives: switching to UP code
[ 18.774716] Freeing SMP alternatives: 11k freed
[ 18.775358] Early unpacking initramfs... done
[ 19.955778] CPU0: Intel Pentium III (Coppermine) stepping 03
[ 19.955800] SMP motherboard not detected.
[ 19.955809] Local APIC not detected. Using dummy APIC emulation.
[ 19.955952] Brought up 1 CPUs
[ 19.956826] Booting paravirtualized kernel on bare hardware
[ 19.957029] Time: 15:09:27 Date: 04/15/107
[ 19.957137] NET: Registered protocol family 16
[ 19.957498] EISA bus registered
[ 19.961616] PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xf0478, last bus=1
[ 19.961627] PCI: Using configuration type 1
[ 19.961634] Setting up standard PCI resources
[ 19.965555] ACPI: Interpreter disabled.
[ 19.965570] Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay
[ 19.965600] pnp: PnP ACPI: disabled
[ 19.965611] PnPBIOS: Scanning system for PnP BIOS support...
[ 19.965666] PnPBIOS: Found PnP BIOS installation structure at 0xc00f5500
[ 19.965680] PnPBIOS: PnP BIOS version 1.0, entry 0xf0000:0x552e, dseg 0xf0000
[ 19.968140] PnPBIOS: 16 nodes reported by PnP BIOS; 16 recorded by driver
[ 19.968314] PCI: Probing PCI hardware
[ 19.968331] PCI: Probing PCI hardware (bus 00)
[ 19.968932] PCI quirk: region 5000-503f claimed by PIIX4 ACPI
[ 19.968947] PCI quirk: region 4000-400f claimed by PIIX4 SMB
[ 19.968962] PIIX4 devres C PIO at 0100-0107
[ 19.968977] PIIX4 devres I PIO at 00e0-00e3
[ 19.968987] PIIX4 devres J PIO at 00f8-00fb
[ 19.969122] PCI: Firmware left 0000:00:09.0 e100 interrupts enabled, disabling
[ 19.969531] Boot video device is 0000:01:00.0
[ 19.971947] PCI: Discovered primary peer bus 04 [IRQ]
[ 19.971970] PCI: Using IRQ router PIIX/ICH [8086/7110] at 0000:00:07.0
[ 20.017823] NET: Registered protocol family 8
[ 20.017833] NET: Registered protocol family 20
[ 20.019119] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:01.0
[ 20.019132] IO window: 2000-2fff
[ 20.019146] MEM window: 40000000-410fffff
[ 20.019157] PREFETCH window: 20000000-200fffff
[ 20.019170] PCI: Bus 2, cardbus bridge: 0000:00:04.0
[ 20.019179] IO window: 00001000-000010ff
[ 20.019190] IO window: 00001400-000014ff
[ 20.019202] PREFETCH window: 10000000-13ffffff
[ 20.019214] MEM window: 14000000-17ffffff
[ 20.019225] PCI: Bus 6, cardbus bridge: 0000:00:04.1
[ 20.019234] IO window: 00001800-000018ff
[ 20.019245] IO window: 00001c00-00001cff
[ 20.019257] PREFETCH window: 18000000-1bffffff
[ 20.019269] MEM window: 1c000000-1fffffff
[ 20.019314] PCI: setting IRQ 11 as level-triggered
[ 20.019324] PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 0000:00:04.0
[ 20.019339] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:04.1
[ 20.019363] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:01:00.0
[ 20.019392] PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 0000:00:04.1
[ 20.019405] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:04.0
[ 20.019430] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:01:00.0
[ 20.019509] NET: Registered protocol family 2
[ 20.049542] IP route cache hash table entries: 2048 (order: 1, 8192 bytes)
[ 20.049806] TCP established hash table entries: 8192 (order: 4, 65536 bytes)
[ 20.050025] TCP bind hash table entries: 4096 (order: 3, 32768 bytes)
[ 20.050141] TCP: Hash tables configured (established 8192 bind 4096)
[ 20.050151] TCP reno registered
[ 20.061737] checking if image is initramfs... it is
[ 22.336483] Freeing initrd memory: 6738k freed
[ 22.337643] audit: initializing netlink socket (disabled)
[ 22.337685] audit(1179241768.872:1): initialized
[ 22.338116] VFS: Disk quotas dquot_6.5.1
[ 22.338180] Dquot-cache hash table entries: 1024 (order 0, 4096 bytes)
[ 22.338343] io scheduler noop registered
[ 22.338355] io scheduler anticipatory registered
[ 22.338364] io scheduler deadline registered
[ 22.338405] io scheduler cfq registered (default)
[ 22.338431] Limiting direct PCI/PCI transfers.
[ 22.339092] isapnp: Scanning for PnP cards...
[ 22.692352] isapnp: No Plug & Play device found
[ 22.801626] Real Time Clock Driver v1.12ac
[ 22.801862] Serial: 8250/16550 driver $Revision: 1.90 $ 4 ports, IRQ sharing enabled
[ 22.802091] serial8250: ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 22.802854] serial8250: ttyS2 at I/O 0x3e8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 22.804724] 00:0d: ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 22.805403] PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 0000:00:09.1
[ 22.805436] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:08.0
[ 22.805447] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:09.0
[ 22.806218] mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice
[ 22.808447] RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 65536K size 1024 blocksize
[ 22.809249] input: Macintosh mouse button emulation as /class/input/input0
[ 22.809377] Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00alpha2
[ 22.809393] ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
[ 22.809936] PNP: PS/2 Controller [PNP0303,PNP0f0e] at 0x60,0x64 irq 1,12
[ 22.812882] i8042.c: Detected active multiplexing controller, rev 1.0.
[ 22.813882] serio: i8042 KBD port at 0x60,0x64 irq 1
[ 22.813901] serio: i8042 AUX0 port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12
[ 22.813913] serio: i8042 AUX1 port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12
[ 22.813924] serio: i8042 AUX2 port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12
[ 22.813935] serio: i8042 AUX3 port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12
[ 22.814384] EISA: Probing bus 0 at eisa.0
[ 22.814406] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 1
[ 22.814416] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 2
[ 22.814426] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 3
[ 22.814436] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 4
[ 22.814445] Cannot allocate resource for EISA slot 5
[ 22.814469] EISA: Detected 0 cards.
[ 22.814755] TCP cubic registered
[ 22.814783] NET: Registered protocol family 1
[ 22.814854] Using IPI No-Shortcut mode
[ 22.814950] Magic number: 7:327:184
[ 22.816059] Time: tsc clocksource has been installed.
[ 22.816385] Freeing unused kernel memory: 328k freed
[ 22.835980] input: AT Translated Set 2 keyboard as /class/input/input1
[ 23.453922] Capability LSM initialized
[ 23.638959] thermal: Unknown symbol acpi_processor_set_thermal_limit
[ 25.444576] PIIX4: IDE controller at PCI slot 0000:00:07.1
[ 25.444616] PIIX4: chipset revision 1
[ 25.444624] PIIX4: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
[ 25.444644] ide0: BM-DMA at 0x3420-0x3427, BIOS settings: hda:DMA, hdb:pio
[ 25.444673] ide1: BM-DMA at 0x3428-0x342f, BIOS settings: hdc:pio, hdd:pio
[ 25.444696] Probing IDE interface ide0...
[ 25.496138] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
[ 25.496238] usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
[ 25.496328] usbcore: registered new device driver usb
[ 25.501797] USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver v3.0
[ 25.590341] e100: Intel(R) PRO/100 Network Driver, 3.5.17-k2-NAPI
[ 25.590355] e100: Copyright(c) 1999-2006 Intel Corporation
[ 25.902799] hda: TOSHIBA MK3017GAP, ATA DISK drive
[ 26.078106] Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
[ 26.105612] FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
[ 26.350600] hdb: Compaq DVD-ROM SD-C2402, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
[ 26.407212] ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
[ 26.407422] Probing IDE interface ide1...
[ 27.012403] SCSI subsystem initialized
[ 27.014283] PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 0000:00:07.2
[ 27.014349] uhci_hcd 0000:00:07.2: UHCI Host Controller
[ 27.015334] uhci_hcd 0000:00:07.2: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
[ 27.015398] uhci_hcd 0000:00:07.2: irq 11, io base 0x00003400
[ 27.017341] usb usb1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 27.018101] hub 1-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 27.018173] hub 1-0:1.0: 2 ports detected
[ 27.054623] libata version 2.20 loaded.
[ 27.124318] PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 0000:00:09.0
[ 27.124354] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:08.0
[ 27.124367] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:09.1
[ 27.213372] e100: eth0: e100_probe: addr 0x41280000, irq 11, MAC addr 00:D0:59:12:64:8E
[ 27.241920] hda: max request size: 128KiB
[ 27.511586] hda: 58605120 sectors (30005 MB), CHS=58140/16/63, UDMA(33)
[ 27.511609] hda: cache flushes not supported
[ 27.511715] hda: hda1 hda2 < hda5 >
[ 27.607227] hdb: ATAPI 24X DVD-ROM drive, 128kB Cache, DMA
[ 27.607254] Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20
[ 27.935429] Attempting manual resume
[ 27.935442] swsusp: Resume From Partition 3:5
[ 27.935449] PM: Checking swsusp image.
[ 27.935887] PM: Resume from disk failed.
[ 28.032379] kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
[ 28.032414] EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
[ 47.748900] e100: eth0: e100_watchdog: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex
[ 48.105319] NET: Registered protocol family 10
[ 48.105651] lo: Disabled Privacy Extensions
[ 51.357899] Linux agpgart interface v0.102 (c) Dave Jones
[ 51.383667] agpgart: Detected an Intel 440BX Chipset.
[ 51.389409] agpgart: AGP aperture is 64M @ 0x50000000
[ 51.416127] Yenta: CardBus bridge found at 0000:00:04.0 [0e11:b113]
[ 51.416158] Yenta: Enabling burst memory read transactions
[ 51.416171] Yenta: Using CSCINT to route CSC interrupts to PCI
[ 51.416179] Yenta: Routing CardBus interrupts to PCI
[ 51.416191] Yenta TI: socket 0000:00:04.0, mfunc 0x00000000, devctl 0x64
[ 51.442289] pci_hotplug: PCI Hot Plug PCI Core version: 0.5
[ 51.647626] Yenta: ISA IRQ mask 0x06b8, PCI irq 11
[ 51.647640] Socket status: 30000006
[ 51.648062] Yenta: CardBus bridge found at 0000:00:04.1 [0e11:b113]
[ 51.648089] Yenta: Using CSCINT to route CSC interrupts to PCI
[ 51.648098] Yenta: Routing CardBus interrupts to PCI
[ 51.648111] Yenta TI: socket 0000:00:04.1, mfunc 0x00000000, devctl 0x64
[ 51.879520] Yenta: ISA IRQ mask 0x06b8, PCI irq 11
[ 51.879533] Socket status: 30000006
[ 51.904661] shpchp: Standard Hot Plug PCI Controller Driver version: 0.4
[ 52.090610] piix4_smbus 0000:00:07.3: Found 0000:00:07.3 device
[ 54.137282] IBM TrackPoint firmware: 0x0b, buttons: 3/3
[ 54.157130] input: TPPS/2 IBM TrackPoint as /class/input/input2
[ 55.666030] input: PC Speaker as /class/input/input3
[ 55.710243] parport: PnPBIOS parport detected.
[ 55.710287] parport0: PC-style at 0x378, irq 7 [PCSPP,TRISTATE,EPP]
[ 55.967345] irda_init()
[ 55.967389] NET: Registered protocol family 23
[ 56.055631] found SMC SuperIO Chip (devid=0x0a rev=00 base=0x00e0): FDC37N971
[ 56.055662] smsc_ircc_present: can't get sir_base of 0x3e8
[ 57.003666] PCI: Found IRQ 11 for device 0000:00:08.0
[ 57.003702] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:09.0
[ 57.003713] PCI: Sharing IRQ 11 with 0000:00:09.1
[ 57.557606] cs: IO port probe 0x100-0x3af: excluding 0x100-0x107
[ 57.558576] cs: IO port probe 0x3e0-0x4ff: excluding 0x4d0-0x4d7
[ 57.559047] cs: IO port probe 0x820-0x8ff: clean.
[ 57.559445] cs: IO port probe 0xc00-0xcf7: clean.
[ 57.560127] cs: IO port probe 0xa00-0xaff: clean.
[ 57.562095] cs: IO port probe 0x100-0x3af: excluding 0x100-0x107
[ 57.563068] cs: IO port probe 0x3e0-0x4ff: excluding 0x4d0-0x4d7
[ 57.563523] cs: IO port probe 0x820-0x8ff: clean.
[ 57.563948] cs: IO port probe 0xc00-0xcf7: clean.
[ 57.564865] cs: IO port probe 0xa00-0xaff: clean.
[ 57.604189] es1968: clocking to 48000
[ 57.771413] Linux video capture interface: v2.00
[ 58.140809] lp0: using parport0 (interrupt-driven).
[ 58.231258] Adding 554200k swap on /dev/disk/by-uuid/3b1bf220-665c-4746-aa85-461795d856d4. Priority:-1 extents:1 across:554200k
[ 58.342640] EXT3 FS on hda1, internal journal
[ 59.095488] eth0: no IPv6 routers present
[ 60.731485] NET: Registered protocol family 17
[ 69.462265] acpi_cpufreq: Unknown symbol acpi_processor_notify_smm
[ 69.462547] acpi_cpufreq: Unknown symbol acpi_processor_unregister_performance
[ 69.463358] acpi_cpufreq: Unknown symbol acpi_processor_preregister_performance
[ 69.463730] acpi_cpufreq: Unknown symbol acpi_processor_register_performance
[ 77.344855] ppdev: user-space parallel port driver
[ 81.945264] apm: BIOS version 1.2 Flags 0x03 (Driver version 1.16ac)
[ 3008.405718] e100: eth0: e100_watchdog: link down
[ 3124.352718] e100: eth0: e100_watchdog: link up, 100Mbps, full-duplex
[ 3342.253355] e100: eth0: e100_watchdog: link down
sacater@trinity:~$

>ACPI: BIOS age (1999) fails cutoff (2000), acpi=force is required to enable ACP

What it says here is that your BIOS is dated 1999, therefore ACPI support is disabled since older BIOSes might not support or not support it well. If you're sure that your BIOS supports ACPI then you can force the kernel to use it by giving the acpi=force option in the boot command line.
Alternatively if you can find and install a more recent BIOS this should also help.

okay, any ideas how to do either,

i think to do the acpi=force thing I tinker with grub... though I am 80% on that, not entirely sure.

where and how do I upgrade my BIOS, I have never done it before...

1) To add acpi=off edit your /boot/grub/menu.lst file and add acpi=force to your kernel line. For instance:

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.20-15-generic root=UUID=51270779-0fb3-447d-b429-01710687e545 ro acpi=force quiet splash

2) You can download the latest BIOS for your PC from here:

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareDescription.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodTypeId=321957&prodSeriesId=96235&prodNameId=96721&swEnvOID=20&swLang=13&mode=2&taskId=135&swItem=PSG_I14207-35855

You can follow the instruction from the site for the installation,
If you don't have access to a Win OS is a bit more complicated, let me knwo if this is the case.

I am pure linux, but will give the kernel extensions a try first

okay, I still get the error message

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.20-15-generic root=UUID=e7b0ee64-4478-475c-a889-aefe14225d53 ro acpi=force quiet

should it go before ro?

also, any ideas on how to upgrade the bios with linux?

I don't think the position should matter much, try at the end.

For installation of your BIOS on linux, if the file is a zip archive we can open it with unzip, and see which file is the .rom file.
We should then try to save this to a FAT32 formatted floppy, I guess we may need to make it bootable too.
Lets first check if it is zipped and what is inside.

ok, at the end it is, i shall update you when i reboot

how on earth do I find the .rom file in an .exe.

Step by step instrucs would be helpful :D

sorry, forget the star :P

You might be young, but you sure are not stupid! I'm quite sure you will manage to install the updated bios and learn a couple of things in the meantime.

Well, maybe, but I would have someone guide me through it, I am a bit worried I am going to f*ck it up, and be left with a weird BIOS.

P.S thanks for the compiment

P.P.S Would running the .exe with wine be any use?

The easiest would be if you can find a winXP computer; I really don't know if Wine can help as I don't know if it can make a "boot" diskette.
If you manage to download the bios (apparently the Compaq site has been down the last couple of days) you can give it a shot.

I'm really surprised that acpi=force didn't work, anything interesting in dmesg when that option is used?

Well, after a review, it may have worked...

 0.000000] ACPI: RSDP (v000 COMPAQ ) @ 0x000f9970
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDT (v001 COMPAQ RSDB130 0x00000001 CPQ 0x00000001) @ 0x0bff4800
[ 0.000000] ACPI: FADT (v001 COMPAQ CPQB10F 0x19991201 CPQ 0x00000001) @ 0x0bff4828
[ 0.000000] ACPI: DSDT (v001 COMPAQ ARMADAE7 0x00010000 MSFT 0x0100000c) @ 0x00000000
[ 0.000000] ACPI: BIOS age (1999) fails cutoff (2000), acpi=force is required to enable ACPI
[ 0.000000] ACPI: acpi=force override
[ 0.000000] ACPI: PM-Timer IO Port: 0x5008

what do you think?

Well, it seems so. Later on there were some messages like

ACPI: Interpreter disabled.
pnp: PnP ACPI: disabled

Have they disappeared?
Check also if acpi_cpufreq is now working.

i put the output of dmesg into a text file and searched, that string never came up

:(

You can also check with dmesg | grep acpi

Don't be surprised if acpi_cpufreq will not work, I would be surprised of the contrary!

sacater@trinity:~$ dmesg | grep acpi
[ 0.000000] ACPI: BIOS age (1999) fails cutoff (2000), acpi=force is required to enable ACPI
[ 0.000000] ACPI: acpi=force override
[ 17.371215] Kernel command line: root=UUID=e7b0ee64-4478-475c-a889-aefe14225d53 ro quiet acpi=force
[ 8.120000] Time: acpi_pm clocksource has been installed.
[ 52.216000] ibm_acpi: ec object not found
[ 52.580000] pcc_acpi: loading...
sacater@trinity:~$

thats the output

Thanks Cesare Tirabassi, that solved my question.