Linux on a Toshiba Satellite 2430-201

This Site is still under construction as I plan to get everything working ! Especially I will clean it up, add proper TOC and links and so on ;)

This Site is about how to get Linux running on a Toshiba Satellite 2430-201 Notebook. Although I use SuSE 9.1 for first install, all other distros should work fine, since I use a vanilla Kernel.

Table of Contents

Hardware

This describes what my Notebook has. Maybe yours will slightly differ, but it should work the same way.
DatumShippedUpgraded to/Special note
ModelToshiba Satellite 2430-201
Model Nr.PS243E-06PQS-GRACPI says PS243E-06P4S-GR
Board NameBTS88
BatterySony/Toshiba PA3250U 6450mAh
ChipsetIntel Corp. 82845G/GL [Brookdale-G] Chipset(from lspci)
CPUIntel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.53GHz(from /proc/cpuinfo)
CPU Cache512kB
HDDHitachi IC25N040ATCS04-0 (40 GB)
Display15" TFT XGA(1024x768)
BIOSV1.40V1.60 (05/19/2003)
ACPIPartly SupportedSee dsdt note for full support
Graphic CardnVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 420 Go] (rev a3)(from lspci)
SoundIntel Corp. 82801DB AC'97 Audio
USBIntel 82801DB USB2xUSB1.1 & 1xUSB2.0
FirewireTexas Instruments TSB43AB21 IEEE-1394a-2000
NetworkRealtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+
SD CardWinbond 518(?)extracted from ACPI
WLANDell TrueMobile 1150 1.01(usually not shipped ??)
ModemIntel 82801DB AC'97 Modem
IR PortpresentSIR only yet
Removable MediaCD-RW/DVD-RW Writer
Removable MediaFDDpartly HotPluggable with CD

Linux

Kernel 2.4

It started properly with 2.4.x but due to poor support of the latest features I never tried to get anything else working with it.

>Kernel 2.6

With this Kernel you can get almost full functinality of what the Laptop offers you. I use Kernel 2.6.12.1 and recommend to do so (or any later). I also applied the following patches :

- ACPI for Linux 2.6.12.1 from 26.03.2004
- ACPI DSDT initrd Patch v0.7d for 2.6.12.1
- ACPI defer EC (maybe later available in vanilla, for recent Kernels u have to manually edit it ito the kernel)
- Softwaresuspend 2 v.2.1.9.5 for 2.6.12.1

For what all those patches are needed, we will discuss in the next sections of what is supported.

Out of the Box

The following Hardware components worked out of the Box with a Vanilla 2.6.12.1 :
WhatModule
USBehci_hcd
Firewireohci1394
Network8139too
WLANorinoco_cs *
CD/DVD-Romnone
FDDnone
SoundALSA modules
* v.0.13e from Vanilla Kernel works fine, but if you want Accesspoint Scanning and RFMon support, you should try my patch

Modem

I did not tried it yet, but I heard with some ugly hacked drivers it should work. It seems to work with some slmodem stuff, but only on 14.4k. For full speed you need to pay ~25$ for a driver.

SD-Card Reader

I did not manage to get it work, it does not even list in the USB device section, although it works (and is listed as USB device) in Windoze. I suspect an ACPI issue, since it is mentioned there, so perhaps I can enable it via ACPI (or it is enable when a card is plugged in through an ACPI event). Since Kernel 2.6.10 there is a mmc support and a wbsd driver which recognizes the card slot, but I did not yet managed to read a card with it.

Battery

When workind moderately the Battery could be used for slightly more than 4 hours. But now it degrades performance rapidly, but I think I have a solution, testing it currently.

IR Port

The IR Port works fine with the ircomm-tty module, but only in SIR mode. I have not yet managed to get it work with the donauboe module, although it *should* work and the module is loading properly and I seem to be able to access the device properly... it just does not do anything...

ACPI

The ACPI Support on the 2430 seems first to be really ugly. Even the entries in /proc for the battery don't show the correct information, they say the battery has 4000mAh of capacity. The real Battery has 6450mAh capacity, but the gauge is displayed correctly.
Also the LID state and the Power Button works fine. And even some of the Special Buttons when loading the evdev module.

To solve some other ACPI related Problems, I have rewritten the ACPI DSDT which can be found here. Together with the DSDT initrd loader Patch you can replace the BIOS dsdt by this here.
( If you dont know how to replace it or what to do with it, have a look at this excellent posting) It will give you proper thermal_zone info (CPU Temp only) and FAN activity info support. It also tries to correct the bad battery values, I was able to fix all but the current rate. It also enables the display of power resource settings, which are not fully implemented yet.

I'm working on :
Configurable auto CPU Throttling, depending on CPU Temperature.
Proper FAN activity display and controls.
LCD Brightness display and control.
Full support of all ACPI driven Buttons

Some of this functionality can be found when loading the omnibook module, but with a proprietary interface.

Theres also a problem with the Embedded Controller initialization, so please apply the defer EC patch as mentioned above. Of course you should also apply the latest ACPI patches.

CPU Throttling

Use the p4-clockmod driver for this.

X

X works fine and with 3D support, running with nvidias drivers v.1.0-7664 on Xorg.

Software Suspend 2

I do now maintain the complete description on how to get Software Suspend 2 to work with my Notebook at suspend2.net Wiki Anything I forgot ? Drop me a line...

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