Mandrake 9.2 power problems

Hey, guys! How are you? Hope you can help me on this one:

I have a Dell Inspiron 8100. It works fairly well.... up to mandrake 9.1. Mandrake 9.2 has brought me a couple of problems. Let's start:

If I unplugged the ac power, the box completely freezes. It doesn't matter if I use apm or acpi. It doesn't matter if I'm finely working or just booting.. it freezes. If the power source changes, It freezes. I checked bios settings, disabled some capabilities of the laptop, microprocessor speed doesn't change, just to give it a try... didn't work. It still freezes. Due to that problem, I'm using the old kernel instead. That way, It's OK. Due to the fact that it froze once I chaged the power source when loading the kernel, I guess it's a kernel related problem.

Another thing I noticed was that with this new kernel my laptop doesn't turn off itself. I have to press the power button to turn it off. I noticed it with Knoppix 3.3, which I had just tried 3 minutes before updating mandrake 9.2... but haven't made sure knoppix has the same trouble again a again. Could it be kernel related too?

That's it for my power problems.

I'm having problems letting mandrake configure my nic, so I guess I will have to do it with my bare hands, but That's just another crap-pile. The power problems are keeping me tied to the old kernel. Any ideas here? Hope you do?!

Thanks for at least reading it.

i've been dealing w/ that problem on my desktop, not a laptop, but i hope maybe this would get u start here:

log as root
go to: /boot, type: cat conf | grep APM,
then type: cat conf | grep ACPI

see what u got. if you don't have those on, go to:
/usr/src/linux<version number>/

type: make xconfig, and turn those option (i think acpi and stuff are under general, but u wanna view everything)

then save, and here goes the happy compile kernel process
should i walk u through how to do it? or would u rather read kernel-howto?

i briefly walk u through (i'm not good at compile kernel either heheh)
type: make dep

if you wanna make ur own kernel name:
edit: /usr/src/linux/Makefile change EXTRAVERSION

type: make clean
type: make bzImage
type: make modules
type: make modules_install

type: rm -rf /boot/System.map
type: rm -rf /boot/vmlinuz
type: cp /usr/src/linux/arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/vmlinuz-x.x.x
type: cp /usr/src/linux/System.map /boot/System.map-x.x.x

type: ln -s /boot/vmlinuz-x.x.x /boot/vmlinuz
type: ln -s /boot/System.map-x.x.x /boot/System.map

type: rm -rf /boot/initrd.x.x.x.img
type: /sbin/mkinitrd /boot/initrd-x.x.x.img x.x.x (x.x.x is the ur new modified kernel #, ...)

then edit ur lilo.conf under /etc

image = /boot/vmlinuz-x.x.x
label = New Kernel
root = /dev/hdx
read-only

for hdx, look at ur other image to see whast root is = to...

type: lilo
reboot, and ur acpi and apm should be running.

OK. I have compiled a kernel, can deal with that.

But let's talk about the source of the problem. Is it that the kernel as compiled by mandrake for 9.2 comes without the ACPI or APM support?

I tried installing both deamons, but didn't work either of them. Once I changed the power source, the box froze up. And I thought that the deamons needed the support by the kernel... therefore I thought the kernel was comppiled with it.

I'll do it as you tell anyway... and thanks. Tell you about the result once I try.

Thanks!

I have the same problem on my Dell c640. It freezes when ever a BIOS call is made, I think it doesn't power down because the computer really locks up right when the bios tries to turn it off. If I close my lid and the bios signals the panel to turn itself off, the computer locks up. I haven't tried initiating a suspend, but I suspect it would cause the same thing. I used apm in 9.1 and everything worked fine, with 9.2 it doesn't. Apm is running; I get a battery status when I type apm in a shell. Switching to acpi (which is mostly broken on this laptop) doesn't change anything. Perhaps a kernel recompile would work if anybody knew what change in the mandrake kernel has caused this. Does anyone have an ideas?

UPDATE:
Guys: I took a very deep breath, opened up my eyes.... and downloadad kernel 2.6.0. Fine tuned it for my laptop, compiled it, installed it... it's working now... COOL DOWN, COOL DOWN. It's not like i'm surfing the web, listening to music through it. I still have my own business to take care of with it... but it certainly doesn't have the prower problems the MDK 9.2 kernel comes with.

I had to install a module-init-tools before doing make modules_install. (in fact i tried without it but the make modules_install failed and told me to try WITH it ).

so... what are the problems now? Well.... I have a win-modem in this laptop... so I have to get the modules for it. I have to get the sound to work, and get the virtual terminals show up.... I must have f***ed something up with that. The computer is turning itself off just like it always did before. The klaptop icon is working properly, my computer doesn't freeze anymore.

I'm working with the mdk 9.1 kernel right now.

Well..... any comments?

Good look!

To work around power management issues with stock kernel, pass the following kernel parameters: acpi=ht nolapic

It's a known issue and the solution was in mandrake 9.2 errata.

SuperUPDATE
Guys, I chaked ManK's comment... and it happens to work perfectly well!

I'm working with the mdk 9.2 kernel. Can unplug just like that.. and it turns off the laptop. Hope ity works for you too, guys!

Can't complain. Thanks, ManK. I love the linux community.

Hy guys,
I have your same problems on my dell 8k, I try to solve it by myself but I was not able.
I read the massage posted by ManK, and the errata in MDK site, but the problem is that I do not know I can pass the kernel parameter "acpi=no lapic"

Then, if acpi will work , can anyone give me some tips to use it:
I have seen I have to define the right commands in klaptop to let my lap go in suspend mode and standby mode. Who know this commands

Thank you

It's not thah difficult. The easiest way (I think) is editing the file /etc/lilo.conf

There you will find the entries that mandrake has setup up for lilo when the computer starts.

Find the new kernel's entries. Each one of them has to have a append line. There is where you will add the apci=ht nolapic words, resulten in an item like this:
image=/boot/vmlinuz
label="linux"
root=/dev/hda5
initrd=/boot/initrd.img
append="quiet devfs=mount splash=silent acpi=ht nolapic"
vga=788
read-only

look at the line append. There it is.

After you have edited and saved the file. Run this command:
lilo
and that's it. Restart.

There's a way with the drakconf, but I think it's kind of more annoying to explain.

Thank you eantoranz

I learned an other thing