ACPI and laptop in mandrake 9.2
 

Okay here is the problem. I have installed mandrake 9.2 recently on my laptop and i can't get acpi to work correctly. When i enable acpi i get the following error on boot up

Looking for DSDT in initrid ... not found!
ACPI breakpoint: Executed AML Breakpoint opcode

I really really need to get acpi working so that i can check my battery life. Thanks in advance.

btw it worked perfectly in mandrake 9.1 right out of the box.

Same thing happen here. I even tried a couple of different kernels. Your not alone on this.

I beleive I once did a upgrade from 9.1 to 9.2 and when I used the 9.1 stock kernel it worked.

By the way in my lilo.conf it states acpi=ht (I think it was ht not at home now)

what does that mean? I get the same error when I change it to acpi=on.

I also posted this on the mandrakeusers board. They are real helpfull over there too.

http://www.mandrakeusers.org/index.p...t=0#entry78118

it might not be related but on my pc with 9.1 acpi was cool but with 9.2 acpi wouldnt work with acpi=on, i had to chnge it to acpi=force
worked ok then

Found it

http://www.mandrakelinux.com/en/errata.php3#nolapic

Error scenario: When enabling ACPI in the kernel (by removing acpi=ht from the kernel boot options), the system freezes very early
Why: There seems to be a bad interaction with Local APIC, which is enabled by default in the kernel. This can be seen by adding vga=0 to try to see the last kernel message before it locks solid (a message like "Looking for DSDT in initrd... not found"). This seems to happen with certain HP laptops. Other reports also indicate that if you remove AC power from a laptop (ie. Dell latitude C640; possibly others) it will freeze requiring a power off. (re: Bugzilla #5821)

Solution: Add "nolapic" to the kernel boot options to resolve both issues.

If it works can you post your lilo.conf file and is lilo the only thing that needs to be configured? I'm using the stock kernel in 9.2
Thanks

Well that didn't work. I might try again later. Though more interesting stuff. I installed Suse 9 Pro to see what the luck would be with it. Installed pretty easy though it didn't like the weird resolution that my laptop want's to run at 1280x854 very much so that has to be worked out but the battery monitor worked PERFECTLY without modification. Unfortuneately my wifi and keyboard are acting pretty funky. If i get this working i think suse would be a nice choice. It's very nice and refined looking. Who knows. What is another good choice to try? If i could combine the good aspects of every distro i have tried into one i think linux would be perfect. Give me acpi from suse with the polished administration with urpmi and hardware detection from mandrake add the speed from some other distros and you have something just amazing. So where should i start next? I wouldn't mind trying one of the "harder" distros that you have to do more manual configuration if it will give me a working computer.

I put my acpi problem at www.mandrakeusers.org in their "Other distributions" section since I need help with it on my laptop for SuSE 9.0. I also will be installing MDK9.2 in a few weeks on my Toshiba 5005-S507 and eventually my Toshiba 5205-S703. Both require acpi enabled in order for sound to work.
A moderator of that board, named Dragonmage, gave me some really good advice for both SuSE 9.0 as well as MDK 9.2. I will cut and paste it below:

"To run mandrake 9.2 with acpi=on without hanging I have to update the kernel to the newest one."....

" The updated kernel should be available in any mandrake mirrors. But just in case, here are some links
ftp://ftp.club-internet.fr/pub/unix/...ates/9.2/RPMS/
http://mandrake.contactel.cz/Mandrak...ates/9.2/RPMS/

Make sure you download these files
kernel-2.4.22.21mdk-1-1mdk.i586.rpm
kernel-source-2.4.22-21mdk.i586.rpm

APCI patch is already built in the regular mandrake kernel.. so there will be no recompiling needed. The kernel source will be needed in order to compile nvidia driver, modem driver, cpad touchpad driver, and other stuff."

Some of the newer Toshiba Satellite laptops have a "legacy free bios". In addition, acpi is needed not only for laptop power management, but for sound as well.

I hope this will help some of you!

Cuzzle, what is the make and model of your laptop?????

I'm using GRUB instead of LILO because you can edit it upon boot-up. It is really easy to do with SuSE 9.0's GUI design.

When I installed SuSE 9.0 Pro, at the beginning of the install at the bottom of the screen, it showed the resolution at the bottom of the screen, when I clicked on it a pop up screen appeared with possible resolutions; I had to pick 1600 x 1200 so that SuSe would be full screen. At lower resolutions, KDE and Gnome would be small and in the center of the screen.

After you install, you can change the screen resolution in Yast2 by going to Hardware, then click on Monitor where you can edit the resolution numbers. (Yast2 will ask for your root password.)

If anyone is using SuSE 9.0 on a similar laptop as mine and has problems with acpi=on (or a solution); please see my thread at;

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...hreadid=117416

Best regards,

Richard L.

Hope this helps!

Yes that helps alot I didnt know acpi was needed for sound, thats been a thorn in my side for awhile, I have a Toshiba 5205 S503. And if it helps I think both of those laptops you refered to have linux install notes on the Tux Mobile web site, I think.

Well i'm writing this message in Suse 9. I seem to have gotten most of the major problems fixed with it. It actually has a really nice feature for putting in custom resolutions and it auto updater can even download the latest nvidia drivers for you! Also the Microsoft true type fonts! It's nice not to have to do this manually. I have done both a number of times so i don't feel like i'm missing out on an experience. Still don't have wireless working but i haven't tried to hard yet, but the best part is ACPI works! I know how long till my battery croaks! I do admit suse is one of the nicest looking distros out there! Just wonderful how they have pulled everything together. It's not perfect but seems pretty solid.

I hope that the issues with mandrake get sorted out in the next release so that i can go back to it and have my laptop working correctly. I really enjoyed the parts that worked in 9.1 and the parts that worked in 9.2 i just need all of them to work!

Thanks for all your help. Oh and this is my record day for linux installs I installed: mandrake 9.2, suse 9, Fedora, 1 knoppix boot, and vector linux all in a 12 hour period!

Got it to work for me:

lilo.conf:

boot=/dev/hda
map=/boot/map
vga=normal
lba32
default="WindowsXP"
keytable=/boot/us.klt
prompt
nowarn
timeout=100
message=/boot/xray-blue.boot
#message=/boot/penguins.boot
#message=/boot/message
#menu-scheme=wb:bw:wb:bw
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.22-10mdk
label="Mandrake9.2"
root=/dev/hda7
initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.22-10mdk.img
append="devfs=mount hdc=ide-scsi acpi=on nolapic resume=/dev/hda9 splash=silent"
vga=788
read-only
other=/dev/hda2
label="WindowsXP"
table=/dev/hda
other=/dev/fd0
label="floppy"
unsafe
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.22-10mdk
label="backup"
root=/dev/hda7
initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.22-10mdk.img
append="devfs=mount hdc=ide-scsi acpi=ht resume=/dev/hda9 splash=silent"
vga=normal
read-only
###

notice in order for it to work I had to use acpi=on

I read somwhere that acpi=force also works for some.

Posting that is tempting me to go and try again but for the time being i'm gonna try suse out. So far everything is going great. I got the wireless to work so now everything is happy!