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
This describes what my Notebook has. Maybe yours will slightly differ, but it
should work the same way.
| Datum | Shipped | Upgraded to/Special note |
|---|
| Model | Toshiba Satellite 2430-201 |
|---|
| Model Nr. | PS243E-06PQS-GR | ACPI says PS243E-06P4S-GR |
|---|
| Board Name | BTS88 |
|---|
| Battery | Sony/Toshiba PA3250U 6450mAh | |
|---|
| Chipset | Intel Corp. 82845G/GL [Brookdale-G] Chipset | (from lspci) |
|---|
| CPU | Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.53GHz | (from /proc/cpuinfo) |
|---|
| CPU Cache | 512kB |
|---|
| HDD | Hitachi IC25N040ATCS04-0 (40 GB) | |
|---|
| Display | 15" TFT XGA(1024x768) | |
|---|
| BIOS | V1.40 | V1.60 (05/19/2003) |
|---|
| ACPI | Partly Supported | See dsdt note for full support |
|---|
| Graphic Card | nVidia Corporation NV17 [GeForce4 420 Go] (rev a3) | (from lspci) |
|---|
| Sound | Intel Corp. 82801DB AC'97 Audio | |
|---|
| USB | Intel 82801DB USB | 2xUSB1.1 & 1xUSB2.0 |
|---|
| Firewire | Texas Instruments TSB43AB21 IEEE-1394a-2000 | |
|---|
| Network | Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ | |
|---|
| SD Card | Winbond 518(?) | extracted from ACPI |
|---|
| WLAN | Dell TrueMobile 1150 1.01 | (usually not shipped ??) |
|---|
| Modem | Intel 82801DB AC'97 Modem | |
|---|
| IR Port | present | SIR only yet |
|---|
| Removable Media | CD-RW/DVD-RW Writer | |
|---|
| Removable Media | FDD | partly HotPluggable with CD |
|---|
| | |
|---|
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.
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.
The following Hardware components worked out of the Box with a Vanilla 2.6.12.1 :
| What | Module |
|---|
| USB | ehci_hcd |
| Firewire | ohci1394 |
| Network | 8139too |
| WLAN | orinoco_cs * |
| CD/DVD-Rom | none |
| FDD | none |
| Sound | ALSA modules |
* v.0.13e from Vanilla Kernel works fine, but if you want Accesspoint Scanning
and RFMon support, you should try my patch
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.
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.
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.
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...
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.
Use the p4-clockmod driver for this.
X works fine and with 3D support, running with nvidias drivers v.1.0-7664 on Xorg.
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...
