Just got my new IBM T42 and put slack on it. But I was in such a hurry that I just installed the default bare.i to install. Everything seems to be running fine, but like in kde there is no battery display, etc. Should I reinstall slack with the bareacpi.i kernel or will it really matter? Just installed it so it wont hurt to reinstall.

No, you should configure your kernel with laptop configs.

go to kernel.org and download latest kernel 2.6.10
save it to your home dir, go to console and su to root
then cp linux-2.6.10.tar.gz /usr/src/
then go to /usr/src tar zxvf linux-2.6.10 and type rm linux
ln -s linux-2.6.10 linux (this makes a symbolic link from linux-2.6.10 to linux, which is the default kernel dir)

inside /usr/src/linux/

you should be root for all of this:

type
pico Makefile <- uncomment #export INSTALL_PATH=/boot

make menuconfig

go trough all the options carefully, select most of it to compile in kernel,
and plugable devices as modules.
remember to save configuration, this file will be called .config
then

make clean
make bzImage
make
make install
make modules
make modules_install

Your new kernel should be ready
Reboot
always go trough the /var/log/dmesg after a new kernel install-reboot
Look for kernel errors, write them down and correct them doing another make menuconfig (doing this will help you build a stable system)

If you encounter any errors, just boot with the slack cd and type

bare.i root=/dev/hdx noinitrd ro

(hd(x) being your root linux partition drive, primary master is hda1)

Hope that works for you!

cheers

At what point of installing the new kernel will I run into configs for laptops? I've installed slack a 4-5 times before but im not sure what I would need to config for a laptop. Would I not gain anything from using the acpi kernel?

Thanks for the help

You should try bareacpi.i first. Provided you have apmd and acpid installed, the battery stuff should work.

agreed, you can re-run setup.. and choose not to format your drives... and then just configure the kernel.

Should not be a big problem.

EDIT: you can install the bareacpi.i kernel from pkgtool, just go to setup select install kernel and liloconfig.

Hello dslboy

After reading your post about upgrading to 2.6.10, I thought why not?

There was copy of 2.6.9 on a dvd from Linux Format on my desk, so I followed your writeup.

Smooth and easy. Only thing I see messed up is ssh, and that was fixed in another thread.

I had/have 2.4.26acpi Slackware10 on a Sony grz530 and now because of you I have something faster.

Thanks for being here.

Ok, I now am running kernel 2.4.26acpi and everything seems to be runing fine. While I'm at it I guess I should go ahead and update to the newest kernel. By following dslboy's advice, where would I choose for it to run with acpi? When installing slack, it just ask which kernel I would like to install.

Just curious, IBM has software under windows that allows for extended battery life(LCD sharpness, refresh rate, processor speed, etc.). Under kde fully charged it says my battery time is around 2 hours, where in windows it will be 3+ hours. Are there any projects or such that could help me out in this position?

Thanks again for all your help

so how do you fix the ssh issue, i remeber compiling a new kernel (2.6.9) for a server at home, and couldn't use ssh after the whole kernel compile, big nightmare.... had to redo the whole server back on 2.4.26....

To find the ACPI portion of the kernel configuration. Look under the heading of power management. You want this enabled. Under power management you will find two sections. ACPI and APM. I'd recommend you should go with ACPI and leave APM out unless you want it for some reason. (ie: an older laptop with a unsupporting BIOS).

One thing i felt that was left out in all these posts is that once you wander into
/usr/src/linux
Dont forget to go into ./Documentation
I know its a bore but we all end up there sooner or later. I would recommend you read the relevant documentation in /power and /cpu-freq. These two dirs hold information i used to get acpi working on my laptop.

One last thing. Make sure you know a lot about your hardware before configuring your kernel and keep a backup of your old kernel.

I think i have rambled on way to long for a newbie like me but I only just got my new kernel working and TBH, the only words of wisdom i found to help me do it were, 'dont give up yet'

recursv made a couple really good points. If you're not sure about your hardware, read up on it. And most importantly, keep your old kernel. If it means installing the new kernel in a different directory and symlinking to it, do it. Just make sure to edit your /etc/lilo.conf and run /sbin/lilo before you reboot. I don't know how many times I've compiled a new kernel and then wanted to boot into the old kernel... either cause it didn't boot right or because I wanted to do some more tweaking. Either way, it's good to have a working kernel so you can play with the new one.

Hello recursv

The fix for ssh not working in 2.6.whatever is the link below

http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=lin...2008965&w=2


Good Luck