Installing Fedora 12 on a ThinkPad T60

NOTE! This is based on the x86-64 version of Fedora 12 with the default GNOME desktop. Your experience with the 32bit version and/or KDE may be different.

Success Chart - Out of the box experience

The SMOLT profile for the T60 used for testing Fedora 12 is here.

Item		Working	Notes
Installation	Local CD/DVD install	yes
	Network Installation	yes
	USB Installation	yes
Display - Intel 945GM	Laptop Screen	yes
	VGA	yes
	DVI	yes	Requires a dock
Display - ATI	Laptop Screen	yes
	VGA	yes
	DVI	unknown	Requires a dock
Power Management	Software Suspend (hibernate)	yes
	Suspend to Memory (ACPI sleep)	yes
Audio		yes
Wireless	WiFi - Atheros AR5414	yes	problems connecting with low signal strength
	WiFi - Intel	yes
	Bluetooth	yes
	WWAN - Verizon	unknown
	WWAN - Cingular	unknown
Input	Keyboard	yes
	TrackPoint	yes	Install gpointing-device-settings rpm for full configuration capabilities
	TouchPad	yes	Install gpointing-device-settings rpm for full configuration capabilities
	Extra keys	partial	see ThinkPad Extra keys section below
Ports	Ethernet	yes
	Modem	no	Requires closed-source driver. Should work with the Linuxant HSF driver
	Serial	yes	Requires port-replicator or dock
	IrDA	no	Device is detected, but does not work.
	PS/2 Keyboard/Mouse	yes	Mouse tested, Requires port-replicator or dock
	Parallel	unknown (should work)	Requires port-replicator or dock
	USB	yes
	PCMCIA/Cardbus	yes
Harddisk Active Protection		no	There is now a hdapsd rpm, but it is not installed by default, and neither is the hdaps kernel module getting automatically loaded. And even after install it is not started automatically. Starting it manually (modprobe hdaps; hdapsd), does not seem to work, as hdapsd complains it cannot find the input device. bugzilla
Ultrabay device hotswap		partial	see below, use with caution out of the box
Fingerprint reader		unknown
TPM (security subsystem)		yes	tpm_tis is automatically loaded. After installing the tpm-tools rpm, and starting the tcsd service, the tpm_* commands seem to work.

Tested and Verified on Fedora 12

Information in this section has been tested and verified using Fedora 12.

Installation

Installation is straight forward; you can follow the generic Fedora install instructions.

Configuration

X Server - Intel 945GM

Works out of the box, including Compiz and external displays (VGA and DVI). Can switch between displays with Fn-F7.

What does not work though is the following;

• combination of Compiz and extended desktop. Doing so freezes the system [1] - With upstream fixes the system no longer freezes, but Compiz still crashes.
• xvideo with a virtual desktop size >2048 resulting in a black window (easily reproduced with a webcam and Cheese). bugzilla. Workarounds are documented here.
• suspending, adding a display and then resuming causes gnome-screensaver to loose input focus. bugzilla
• Cycling through display modes with Fn-F7 there is one mode which does not work properly. Extended Desktop with the external display as primary, results in the LVDS being turned off (Extended desktop with LVDS primary works fine).

X Server - ATI

Seems to work well without any further configuration, even with compiz. However, installing the binary driver from ATI has not been tested, as the radeon driver included in the kernel provides good performance with video playback, and openGL. External displays have not been tested.

DPI

On the 1400x1050 (and 1600x1200) LCD Fedora comes up with a DPI (Dots per Inch) of 124 (or higher). While this is correct for the physical screen size, it waists a lot of screen real estate.

To change to the more typical 96 DPI, go to System -> Preferences -> Appearance. Now in Appearance Preferences select the Fonts tab and press the "Details ..." button. Here you can change the dots per inch to 96. Of course, many things will shrink, but that is what you wanted, after all.

OSD

By default OSD (On-Screen-Display) will only function for the brightness keys, not for other functions such as Volume.

For this you can install the 'tpb' package from the standard Fedora repository

yum install tpb

But afterwards, you need to edit /etc/tpbrc and change

#OSDBRIGHTNESS OFF

to (remove the #)

OSDBRIGHTNESS OFF

Otherwise you will get two OSDs when using the brightness keys, one from gnome-power-manager and the other from tpb.

As an alternative to tpb, putting the following in your /etc/rc.local will also get the OSD working on most thinkpads:

sudo cp /sys/devices/platform/thinkpad_acpi/hotkey_all_mask /sys/devices/platform/thinkpad_acpi/hotkey_mask

This isn't persistent, and will be reset on the next reboot. For permanence, you can add this line (without sudo) to your /etc/rc.local file.

Atheros AR5414 WiFi

Atheros was tested and works, but it seems that there are some problems connecting when the distance between ThinkPad and WiFi AP/Router increases (low signal strength).

Intel WiFi

Intel 3945ABG works without any further configuration.

ThinkPad Extra keys

ThinkPad keys are handled by a mixture of the thinkpad_acpi, acpi button, acpi dock and acpi video drivers.

Key	Function	Handled by	Event	Works	Notes
Fn-F2	lock screen	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	yes
Fn-F3	battery	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	yes
Fn-F4	suspend	acpi button	HAL	yes
Fn-F5	wireless	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	partial	Works as a radio kill switch, kills WiFi but not Bluetooth
Fn-F7	videomode	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	yes	Cycles through LCD only, external only, both (mirrored), and both (extended desktop)
Fn-F8	mouse input select	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	partial	No default action, but can be associated with gnome-keybinding-properties
Fn-F9	undock	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	partial	No default action, but can be associated with gnome-keybinding-properties
Fn-F12	hibernate	acpi button	HAL	yes
Fn-Home	brightness up	acpi video	HAL	yes	includes on-screen display of brightness level
Fn-End	brightness down	acpi video	HAL	yes	includes on-screen display of brightness level
Fn-PgUp	thinklight	-	no	yes	no default OSD. Install the tpb rpm as a workaround.
Fn-Space	zoom	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	no	Known Xorg limitation, scheduled to be fixed with the new XKB2 extension, whenever that may be.
VolumeUp	Volume Up	-	no	yes	no default OSD. Install the tpb rpm as a workaround.
VolumeDown	Volume Down	-	no	yes	no default OSD. Install the tpb rpm as a workaround.
Mute	Mute	-	no	yes	no default OSD. Install the tpb rpm as a workaround.
ThinkVantage	Vendor key	thinkpad_acpi	HAL	partial	No default action, but can be associated with gnome-keybinding-properties
NextTab	Browser Next tab	standard keyboard driver	HAL	yes
PreviousTab	Browser Previous tab	standard keyboard driver	HAL	yes
Fn-Up	Stop	standard keyboard driver	HAL	yes
Fn-Left	reverse	standard keyboard driver	HAL	yes
Fn-Right	forward	standard keyboard driver	HAL	yes
Fn-Down	play/pause	standard keyboard driver	HAL	yes
Power	Power button	acpi button	HAL	yes	Need to press button for ~1 second to trigger event. Causes a dialog asking you what to do.
Lid	Lid button	acpi button	HAL	yes
Dock	Dock eject button	acpi dock	udev	yes	Works, but check out this page for some potential issues and workarounds
Ultrabay	Ultrabay eject switch	acpi dock	udev	no	Missing handler, see Ultrabay instructions below
Radio switch	Radio kill switch	thinkpad_acpi	udev	yes

Ultrabay

The Ultrabay has some glitches out of the box with respect to hotswapping. It is possible to lock the machine when pulling out devices, even the CD/DVD device.

The culprit is that the Ultrabay pre-eject switch is not hooked into anything useful. It does cause udev events, but nothing is listening for them. When a device that has a mounted partition or CD is actually pulled out it is too late to do the right thing. Fedora 11 will usually just complain, sometimes bitterly, but may also lock up for some unknown reason, even if just pulling out a CD/DVD device with a mounted CD.

Manually unmounting before removal will help. Manual powering down may also be required for correct performance.

A better solution is to set up a udev rule and script to handle the pre-eject switch event for Ultrabay devices that have mountable things in them as in How to hotswap Ultrabay devices.

IrDA

IrDA is detected, but does not work. Part of the problem is that the default Fedora configuration expects to find the IrDA port at /dev/ttyS2, while it should use /dev/ircomm0 instead. This can be fixed in /etc/sysconfig/irda after which the irda service can be started (# service irda start).

However, even after this communication with other devices fails. irdadump does not show any output when something like a mobile phone with IrDA is sending data.

Untested on Fedora 12

The following options have not been tested yet. If you try it with Fedora 12, please update the table.

• ATI Graphics (DVI output)
• WWAN
• parallel port
• Fingerprint reader