Installing Fedora Core 5 on a ThinkPad T60

Installation of Fedora Core 5 (Bordeaux) on a ThinkPad T60 (2007-46G). The installation works fine, but the system hangs during the first boot. It can only be circumvented by booting the rescue system and modifying a Fedora startup file.

Summary

What works out of the box

• Network card (e1000 module)
• Keyboard light and brightness control (not controlled by the OS)
• Dual CPU (uses SMP kernel by default)
• Graphics Card (recogized as ATI unknown device 7149)
• SATA controller (in AHCI mode)

What needs to be fixed post-install

• System boot
• Fingerprint Scanner
• Sound

Not tested

• PCMCIA Slots (at least lspci shows Texas Instruments CardBus bridge)
• Monitor out
• Wireless
• Bluetooth
• Modem

Details

Getting the system booted

Boot from the Fedora Core 5 CD and enter rescue mode (linux rescue).

Edit the file /etc/sysconfig/modules/udev-stw.modules and delete parport_pc parport lp (don't forget to chroot into /mnt/sysimage or adjust the path of the edited file). So the for loop will iterate only over nvram and floppy.

I also disabled the parallel port in the BIOS, but it does not seem to be necessary. Now reboot and enjoy the first clean boot of your Fedora Core 5 on your T60.

If anybody has an idea why the system hangs while trying to load this modules, please let us know.

Activating the Fingerprint Scanner

FC5 recognizes the integrated fingerprint scanner as an USB device. All you have to do is follow the instructions of How_to_enable_the_fingerprint_reader. The script works, but make sure you have installed all necessary packages (like gcc-c++, pam-devel, ...). Within the script you are asked to swipe the finger, it install all necessary entries into the /etc/pam.d files and it works afterwards :-)

Controlling the fan and system LEDs

• LEDs

The LEDs can be controlled out of the box. Type "cat /proc/acpi/ibm/led" to see the detailed usage. Unfortunately there is no mapping between number and LED. Just try out and reset it if necessary.

(For example "echo 7 blink > /proc/acpi/ibm/led" will make the rightmost (crescent) LED blinking.)

• Fan

Add the following line to your /etc/modprobe.conf: options ibm_acpi experimental=1

After the next reboot you will have a new entry in your proc-fs: /proc/acpi/ibm/fan

Now type "cat /proc/acpi/ibm/fan" to see the current status (including speed). Feel free to control your fan with "echo [disable|enable] > /proc/acpi/ibm/fan". (But remember: it's at your own risk! I wouldn't switch off the fan during kernel compilation ;-) )