X crashes on batteries
 

Hi All,

I have a DELL Inspiron 8100 running RH 7.3.
The system/installation is very stable when running plugged in, but when the power cord is pulled out, or if I try to start X when running on batteries it goes to blank screen and I have to restart X.

I think it has to do with the laptop package installed on the box...
I use KDE 3.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Matt

First guess is a power management problem. Are you running apmd or apcid? How is your BIOS setup to handle power-saving?

mcleodnine,

Thanks for your response.
I am running apmd with the following options:

-p 10 -w 5 -W -P /etc/sysconfig/apm-scripts/apmscript

The BIOS power settings are just as they are when the computer was shipped, here are the details:

-------------------------------------------------------

Power Mgmt: Enabled
Display TIme-Out: Batt: Enabled, AC: Disabled
Disk Time-Out: Batt: 3 Mins, AC: Disabled
Suspend Time-Out: Batt: 10 Mins, AC: Disabled
S2D Time-Out: Batt: 8 Hours, AC: Disabled
Smart CPU Mode: Batt:Enabled, AC: Enabled
Display Close: Batt: Suspend, AC: Active

Alarm Resume: Enabled
Wakeup on LAN: Disabled
Intel SpeedStep: Enabled
CPU on AC: Max Performance
CPU on Battery: Battery Optimized
Auto On Mode: Disabled
Auto On Time: 00:00

-------------------------------------------------------

That's pretty much all I have..

I have a similar problem.

Travelmate 350TM
RHat 8. + Linus Kernel 2.4.18 + KDE 3.1
Freezes randomly. (no mouse, no keyboard, no network).
Will try ACPI & APM off and 2.4.20
Freezes with or without power plugged.

sometimes apm is evil even windows systems can become unstable from it.

might i suggest looking at readhats site to see if its a global issue also try killing the apmd deamon and unplugging power and see if it becomes unstable while not not running apm at all

this will help test for the possibility that the systems apm could be incompatable with the linux apm commands .

could also be a bios issue from factory . maybe the latest bios is in order

hope this helps to give you some leads

just to clarify, since I run on a laptop too.

If you use ACPI you shouldn't use APM? I thought they were two different things?

Hi all,

I have RH8 Kernel 2.4.20, APIC installed and have the same problem than Pablo. My laptop freeze when battery gets uncharged, or if I have the charger plugged and I unplug it

Beware it is not the same thing APIC and ACPI.
I compiled a kernel without APM or ACPI at all.
Since then, I've got no hangs BUT my 2hours battery only lives for 20 minutes. I'll wait for another hang (if it comes), and will test some other things.