Installing Gentoo on a ThinkPad 770E
Contents
Installing Gentoo Linux on a Thinkpad 770E
This is the gentoo installation guide for the linux Thinkpad 770E. This is not meant to replace the gentoo handbook, but rather, as a guide to help fine tune certain options. Please refer to the gentoo handbook, gentoo docs/wiki and the gentoo forums for more help.
Partitioning
Until linux supports ibm thinkpad controls like ps2.exe, it is recommended you keep a small bootable partition (10-100MB for a DOS partition). You will need this if you want to change or find out irq, mem address, and dma settings.
Kernel configuration
For PCMCIA support you have to load the yenta_socket module and change the configuration file /etc/conf.d/pcmcia (replace PCIC=i82365 with PCIC=yenta_socket).
For Frame Buffers support, do NOT load any frame buffer drivers besides vesafb. Do NOT even load vesafb-tng. Even though the video card is a trident card, the tridentfb does not work. It will produce a flickery screen. All you want to do is compile vesafb into your kernel or as a module, then add vga=791 to your boot line. Do not even bother with video=mtrr or any other options. VGA=791 is all you need for 1024x768 frame buffers support.
Sound support
FIX
I have since been able to get sound working on my 770E, but I had to use the OSS drivers. The procedure I used was to boot into a windows partition and use IBM's ps2.exe utility to determine irq, port, and dma information. After I got this information, I had to reinitialize the hardware from the BIOS before the sound would work in linux. (Hold F1 while booting to get to the BIOS menu) After the reinitialization, I modprobed:
modprobe cs4232 io=0x530 irq=5 dma=1 dma2=0 mpuio=0x330 mpuirq=9
I believe these are the factory default settings. Please insert your settings from the ps2.exe reading. If modprobe completed with no errors, try playing a sound and it should work.
All 770's should get sound using the ALSA snd_cs4232 module, although they have a cs4610 chip. Similar to Problem with broken sound on ThinkPad 600. Try
modprobe snd-cs4232 port=0x530 cport=0x538 fm_port=0x388 irq=5 dma1=1 dma2=0
I tried using those parameters on a 770E and I get a "no such device" error when modprobe'ing. If anyone finds the right parameters for Alsa, please insert it here.
See also DAG: Linux on 770
Power management
X11 configuration
Follow the Gentoo Xorg howto. It should work from there.
