Debian GNU/Linux on the IBM ThinkPad R40

The content of this page is from 2006.

System
X11
Sound
Network
Centrino WLAN
ACPI
CPU Frequency scaling
Hotkeys (Fn key combinations)

System

Debian unstable with kernel 2.6.17. This is my kernel config.

X11

Graphics

With a new version of xorg, 3D-acceleration is no problem with the radeon-driver.

Mouse

With the xfree86-driver-synaptics package you can use really great features with the touchpad. The module evdev has to be loaded. The trackpoint also works.

Section "InputDevice"
  Identifier "PS/2 Mouse"
  Driver     "synaptics"
  Option     "CorePointer"
  Option     "Protocol"          "auto-dev"
  Option     "Device"            "/dev/psaux"
  Option     "Edges"             "1900 5400 1800 4000"
  Option     "Finger"            "18 25"
  Option     "MaxTapTime"        "100"
  Option     "MaxTapMove"        "220"
  Option     "VertScrollDelta"   "100"
  Option     "MinSpeed"          "0.02"
  Option     "MaxSpeed"          "0.18"
  Option     "AccelFactor"       "0.0010"
  Option     "EdgeMotionSpeed"   ".01"
  Option     "SHMConfig"         "on"
  Option     "LockedDrags"       "on"
  Option     "CircularScrolling" "on"
  Option     "CircScrollTrigger" "3"
  Option     "RTCornerButton"    "0"
  Option     "RTCornerButton"    "0"
EndSection

You should read /usr/share/doc/xfree86-driver-synaptics/README.gz if you want to know all features.

Sound

ALSA-Sound is working with the module snd_intel8x0 without any problems.

Network

The network driver is the e100 which was not available in the Debian (woody) installation. I had to build a new kernel with Knoppix at the reboot. Of course with the driver built in, because I had no make for installing the modules at that time.

Centrino WLAN

I have WLAN working with the ipw2100 driver which is included in the vanilla kernel since 2.6.15. My WLAN start script contains these lines:

iwconfig eth1 nick $NICK
iwconfig eth1 key restricted $KEY
iwconfig eth1 essid $ESSID

ifconfig eth1 up

dhclient eth1

ACPI

When I bought the laptop the S3-state (suspend to RAM) was not working, but it works since kernel 2.6.9. Since kernel 2.6.11 or so I get errors from ext3 after suspending to RAM.
With kernel 2.6.17 it works without problems.
The S4 state (suspend to disk) works (again in 2.6.15). It did not work in two or three earlier versions.
This can be put into the /etc/lilo.conf:
```
append="resume=/dev/hda1" 
```
Replace /dev/hda1 by your swap-partition.
It doesn't explode at normal booting. You can suspend to disk by typing
```
echo disk >/sys/power/state
```
The battery charge state works, I have written a small bash script which shows it and calculates the remaining battery operation time.

I use acpid for catching ACPI events.

CPU Frequency scaling

Works out of the box after installing cpufreqd. I changed this options in the /etc/cpufreqd.conf:

poll_interval=10
acpi_workaround=1

With the second option it does not need 3 percent of the CPU, but 0.3 percent maximum. Until now I let the rest unchanged.

Hotkeys (Fn key combinations)

Since kernel 2.6.10 ibm-acpi is integrated into the kernel. If switched on with

echo enable > /proc/acpi/ibm/hotkey

the key combinations Fn+F3, Fn+F4 and Fn+F12 throw acpi-events.

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