Ibm-acpi
Contents
ibm-acpi - IBM ThinkPad ACPI Extras Driver
This is a Linux ACPI driver for the IBM ThinkPad laptops written by Borislav Deianov. It aims to support various features of these laptops which are accessible through the ACPI framework but not otherwise supported by the generic Linux ACPI drivers. As a kernel module, ibm-acpi works as a bridge to deliver information about certain hardware events like key presses or control the state of certain hardware features by software.
Features
- triggers ACPI Events for
- Fn key combinations (FnF1, FnF2, FnF3, FnF4, FnF5, FnF6, FnF7, FnF8, FnF9, FnF10, FnF11, FnF12)
- UltraBay device eject
- Display lid, Power button, Undock button
- enables software control of
- Bluetooth
- Video output switching, video expansion control
- Docking and undocking (limited)
- Fan (on most models, only enable/disable; speed control is added by a further patch)
- Volume
- LCD Brightness
- ThinkLight
- LEDs
- Beep codes
- Several CMOS states
- can show values of
- Eight temperature sensors
- Embedded Controler registers
- Fan status and speed
Project Homepage / Availability
http://ibm-acpi.sourceforge.net/
Included with the Linux kernel since 2.6.10. (Keep in mind, however, that the version included with the official kernel, or with some particular distribution, is not always the latest one.)
Kernel 2.6.14 included version 0.12 (versus version 0.8 in prior kernels).
Status
In development, usable, author does not reply to patch proposals.
Thermal sensors
Eight thermal sensors are exposed at /proc/acpi/ibm/thermal:
# cat /proc/acpi/ibm/thermal; temperatures: 44 41 33 42 33 -128 30 -128
On some models there are additional sensors at EC offsets 0xC0 to 0xC2, which can be read by parsing /proc/acpi/ibm/ecdump:
# perl -ne 'm/^EC 0xc0: .(..) .(..) .(..) / or next; print hex($1)." ".hex($2)." ".hex($3)."\n"' < /proc/acpi/ibm/ecdump 40 48 43
The meaning of these sensor varies with models. See the comments at the top of this ACPI fan control script for the known mappings. The only ones which appear to have a constant meaning are CPU, GPU and battery.
Packages
- Debian Packages: http://debian.isg.ee.ethz.ch/public/
- Gentoo ebuild: http://packages.gentoo.org/packages/?category=app-laptop;name=ibm-acpi
Application support
- GKrellM supports fan and thermal information
- gaim-thinklight is a gaim plugin which makes the ThinkLight blink, when a message arrives.
- IBM ACPI applet is a small gnome panel applet which shows the fan speed and thermal informations
- ACPI fan control scripts can be used to control the system fan according to system temperatures (overriding the firmware)
