Debian 3.1 refusing to support PCMCIA on IBM Thinkpad 600e

Lordandmaker · 05-08-2007, 08:54 AM

I've spent the past few days trying to get a form of Debian to install on my laptop (IBM Thinkpad 600e).

The netinstall CD for 4.0 doesn't find my NIC (a PCMCIA belkin one), and the full CD can't see itself.
I can't find an ISO of a complete 3.1 install, but I've got a 3.1 netinstall CD, which is what I'm installing from.

The final problem I'm having, and don't seem to be able to get around, is with the PCMCIA support. I get an error on startup saying that pcmcia_core couldn't load.
It works during and after the install, but doesn't survive the first reboot.

I can't modprobe it, and locating it points me at a .gz file which is apparently a man page.

I've followed this thread on the debian forums, but with no luck.

The kernel version didn't change between boots (or, at least, immediately prior to reboot it was the same as the one in grub's menu.lst).

From somewhere (i forget where) I got the package kernel-pcmcia-modules-2.4.27-3-386_2.4.27-10sarge5_i386.deb
but when I try to install it (dpkg -i) I get told I need kernel-pcmcia-modules-2.4.27-3-386 (which is, I thought, what I was trying to install?).

I then downloaded and tried to install kernel-pcmcia-modules-2.4-386_101sarge1_i386.deb
But doing dpkg -i to that gives me the following error (copied by hand):

Code:

dpkg-deb (subprocess): error in buffer_read(stream): failed to write to pipe in copy: Input/output error
dpkg-deb: subprocess paste returned error exist satus 2
free(): invalid pointer 0x401548co!
dpkg: error processing kernel-pcmcia-modules-2.4.27-3-386_2.4.27-10sarge5_i386.deb (--install):
 subprocess dpkg-deb --fsys-tarfile returned error exit status 2

Which sounds rather serious...

Erm, any ideas as to how I can fix this?

pentode · 05-08-2007, 10:35 AM

You might try the netinstall ISO for Lenny, the new testing version. For a laptop, you're going to want to be on the testing version of Debian anyway. The Stable release (now Etch) is basically never updated and is intended for use on servers and other systems requiring extremely high reliability.

I had a similar problem (no CD support) trying to install Sarge a couple of years ago on a Sony laptop. For some reason, the testing version of the netinstall CD worked fine.

I'd suggest starting over and doing a fresh install using Lenny.

rickh · 05-08-2007, 10:39 AM

Don't use the actual Lenny installer tho. It's probably still broken. Install Etch, then upgrade to Lenny ... or just stick with Etch. It's definitely time to dump Sarge. Installation suggestions.

Lordandmaker · 05-08-2007, 04:25 PM

Cheers! Just working my way through the install, and I've come accross two problems.

1) Dependencies are remaining unmet unless I remove the running kernel (2.4.273-386), which I am strongly advised against doing. That aside, in removing the kernel I will remove all modules? Such as that which gives me the internet connection with which I will (presumably) grab the new kernel? Should I be removing it?

2) Locales is refusing to be configured. I've come accross this on every previous Debian machine I've run, but I've still not managed to remember what it is that fixed it.

Current method is to install with 3.1 Netinstall CD, edit sources.list to reflect the one in that forum post, then do a dist-upgrade.
The apt-get dist-upgrade reported errors and suggested apt-get -f install. I did that, and it's this that's complaining about locales and kernels.

rickh · 05-08-2007, 04:30 PM

Quote:

Current method is to install with 3.1 Netinstall CD...

That's wrong. You're going to make a mess if you haven't already.

If you're going to upgrade from Sarge to Etch (ver 4.0), as opposed to a fresh install, read the Release notes, and follow the instructions there.

If you want to do a fresh install, use the Etch netinstaller, not the Sarge one.