Installing Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) on a ThinkPad T60

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Ubuntu 7.04 Feisty Fawn is the current release and works fine on:

  • T60 UT-049GE and 2007-72U.
  • T60p

This is a distribution to watch for Thinkpad users.

Features

The new Network Manager is great and now supports a useful roaming mode.

The system includes the new Linux kernel 2.6.20 which provides almost-perfect ACPI functionality.

Feisty polishes Thinkpad support for media buttons (ACPI), and gives a much more usable machine immediately following installation than Edgy.

Installation

The installation has no problems.

!attention: when I booted the live cd of Feisty, I got a message that I could install the drivers for my ATI X1400, I did this. Later on, while installing Feisty, X got broken. I tried again to install Feisty (without installing the drivers when using the live cd) and this time X didn't break.

Known Problems

(Please note that these fixes will not help with Ubuntu 7.10. Problems with Suspend/Resume on that version of Ubuntu are due to yet another ATI driver problem with the kernel used in 7.10, so we are at their mercy for releasing a bugfix)

Suspend to RAM

Suspend to RAM fails during suspend, leaving the Moon blinking indefinitely.

  • At one point, the Ubuntu apt-installed fglrx packages had the driver version 8.33.6, which is one of the versions that supposedly "breaks" suspend to RAM. Resuming from an otherwise successful suspend will cause the machine to resume with a blank screen without the fix below. That said, the current version in Feisty is now 8.34.8, whose release notes say "A system hang no longer occurs when attempting to resume from hibernation mode," so if you simply allow Ubuntu to update itself from the internet you can skip that step. Note however if you install the 64-bit version of Ubuntu, you may have problems with suspend to RAM not coming back on wakeup, at least with the ATI graphics option on a recent (mid-2007) T60P.
  • The optional Intel Pro Wireless 3945 wireless card will often stop working even after a successful suspend, requiring a restart.
  • FR, 2007may9: Actually, I have a different experience with suspend and hibernate, with a T60 15.4" (core 2 duo 2GHz, intel graphic chip 945GM): Both suspend and hibernate work for me. Initially, I had an issue with a slightly corrupted video after resume from suspend (a couple of lines near the bottom right of the screen), that I fixed by using the intel X driver instead of the i810 (that comes stock with ubuntu feisty fawn). Just load xserver-xorg-driver-intel, that will uninstall xserver-xorg-driver-i810. No other modifications necessary, stock acpi-support and xorg.conf. I can also hibernate, but I loose sound when resuming. Restarting alsa does not restore it. UPDATE: I had trouble with the video getting corrupted during the vt switch (vt 7->1) that occurs during the suspend to RAM (or hibernate). These were solved by : (1) using uswsusp (s2ram and s2disk) as s2ram -f -a 3 (forces s3_bios and s3_mode), appending acpi_sleep=s3_bios,s3_mode vga=0 to the kernel boot parameters (/boot/grub/menu.lst) and removing splash from the same kernel options. I have done that 8 days ago, and gone through 3 countries, around 50 s2ram and 4-5 s2disk without a hinch (note: I'm still using the intel video drivers)

Solution

Disable powernowd during suspend

This solution will disable the powernowd when going into Suspend, and re-enable it upon resume. For whatever reason, powernowd causes intermittent suspend problems.

  1. Open a terminal and type: sudo gedit /etc/acpi/suspend.d/10-thinkpad-standby-led.sh
  2. Add to the bottom of the file: /etc/init.d/powernowd stop
  3. Save the file and go back to the terminal.
  4. Type: sudo gedit /etc/acpi/resume.d/90-thinkpad-unstandby-led.sh
  5. Add to the bottom of the file: /etc/init.d/powernowd start
Unload IPW3945 module

If the Intel Pro Wireless card is installed, prevent it from disappearing during Suspend.

  1. Open a terminal and type: sudo gedit /etc/default/acpi-support
  2. Find the line MODULES="" and change it to MODULES="ipw3945".
  3. Save the file.
Disable video card warm boot

Prevent blank screen on Resume.

  1. Open a terminal and type: sudo gedit /etc/default/acpi-support
  2. Next, find the line POST_VIDEO=true and change it to POST_VIDEO=false.
  3. Save the file.

If running the 64-bit version of Ubuntu on a T60P with the ATI graphics option, and suspend problems persist, consider installing the 32-bit version.

Related Ubuntu bugs

Tips dist-upgrading from Ubuntu 6.10

fglrx

If you have an ATI graphics card, Mesa may be active, by default, despite your xorg.conf configuration in Ubuntu 6.10. Check whether there is hardware acceleration:

$ fglrxinfo

The above should print "OpenGL vendor string: ATI Technologies Inc", among other output. If "Mesa" is present, then reinstall the fglrx driver:

$ sudo apt-get remove xorg-driver-fglrx fglrx-control

$ sudo apt-get install xorg-driver-fglrx fglrx-control

$ sudo depmod -a

Then logout, kill the X server with control+alt+delete, and login again. Now the command 'fglrxinfo' will print the proper vendor string.


If the error persists and there is no 3D acceleration: comment out the line involving 'fglrx' in /etc/modprobe.d/lrm-video , then

$ sudo modprobe -v fglrx

and restart the X server (control+alt+del). Check that the driver is loaded:

$ lsmod 

   fglrx                 540004  11
   agpgart                35400  2 fglrx,intel_agp


The driver fglrx should be listed.


If this error is reported in the Xorg logs (under System / Administration / System Logs): 

  (EE) AIGLX error: dlsym for __driCreateNewScreen_20050727 failed (/usr/lib/dri/fglrx_dri.so: undefined symbol: __driCreateNewScreen_20050727)
  (EE) AIGLX: reverting to software rendering

Turn off AIGLX by adding the following to /etc/X11/xorg.conf: 

 Section "ServerFlags"
   Option "AIGLX" "off"
 EndSection


To avoid the garbled display problem, remember that /etc/X11/xorg.conf should have the Composite option disabled. It should only be enabled for Compiz, which is not ready for Ubuntu 7.04 with ATI cards. 

 Section "Extensions"
   Option      "Composite" "0"
 EndSection

Metacity window manager

If an unofficial compiz beta was installed at some point, then there will be two disruptive settings files under your home directory. These will prevent Metacity from displaying window decorations. 

.gnomerc
.dmrc

Look at .gnomerc , which may contain a line specifying a window manager listed under .gnome-compiz-manager/openbox . The second file, .dmrc, may be pointing to a Compiz desktop session that no longer exists in the system. Remove both files.

Resources

References

See also

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