COMPAQ ARMADA V300
The thing is not new,
but does what it has to do very fine. I am using it mainly with Linux,
(Slackware). Slackware version is 11.0, at the time of writing.
Here are some tips:
- Sound: the easy way is to use ALSA, the module is es1968.
It worked OK with distribution drivers (configured by
alsaconf, then alsamixer) but for some reasons I had to
compile my own kernel. Since I decided to use kernel 2.4.*, I
had to get alsa drivers from ALSA page, configure with
something like
./configure --with-cards=es1968 --with-sequencer=yes \
--with-oss=yes
then make
, checkinstall
,
etc. Now that I use 2.6.* kernel, I do not need to get
drivers, as they are included in kernel.
- Ethernet card: I use PCMCIA ethrnet cards, after
inserting them eth0 is ready to use, without any
configuration: of course you should tell the computer
some parameters of your ethernet connection, like IP
number, or that it has to use DHCP (use
netconfig
, for
example). My cards use module 8139too, yours may be
quite different, I did not have to do anything to make
it work, so I cannot say what kind of problems you may
encounter.
- Wireless LAN: I bought EDIMAX EW-7108PCg card and
I am very satisfied with it. The card has native linux
drivers. I took the file rt2500-1.1.0-b4.tar.gz from
sourceforge, unpack, then make install. The drivers
were installed with no problem, and wireless LAN is
ready to to work; the interface is called ra0. It
takes minimal changes in rc.inet1.conf and
rc.inet1.wireless.conf to connect to any possible
wireless LAN.
- Modem: The laptop has of course winmodem built
in. With such modems linux may have problems unless
someone writes a good driver. Luckily for this very
modem (lucent winmodem) there are drivers. These
drivers are provided both for 2.4 an 2.6 series of
kernel. I have no luck in compiling the driver for
kernel 2.6.*, the current 2.6 kernel at the time of
writing. So I switched to 2.4.* (.32 then .33),
got the file ltmodem-8.31a10.tar.gz, unpack
it, make the system do three commands describes in the
file 1ST-READ and got working and autoloading kernel
modules, device in /dev, /dev/modem linked and modem
working in its 56k.
But (hurrey!) I succesfully compiled new drivers (file
martian-full-20061110.tar.gz) under 2.6.18 kernel and
happily switched to 2.6.* series. I downloaded the
file martian-full-20061110.tar.gz, unpack, make, make install.
Then, when you want to use the modem, you have to modprobe
module martian_dev, then run utility martian_modem, that creates
apropriate entry in dev. When you stop the utility - the entry
dissappears. The entry is (in my case) /dev/ttySM0 and I
softlinked it to /dev/modem. Then, to use modem to connect to
internet, I use the script (configured with sudo for anybody
to use):
/sbin/modprobe martian_dev
/usr/sbin/martian_modem &
/opt/kde/bin/kppp;
/bin/rm ~/.ICEauthority
/bin/killall -9 martian_modem
/sbin/modprobe -r martian_dev
After switching to udev
I add a line
ln -sf /dev/ttySM0 /dev/modem
(just before calling kppp
)
since now /dev/modem does not survive between sessions.
- X11R6: did not do much about it, the
configuration given by Slackware installator worked
for me. But I like xorgcofig so much, I had to use it.
For my graphic card I choose "ATI Rage 128" with
driver "ati", 800x600, depth 24.
- ACPI: to enable ACPI under kernel
2.4.* I had to add option for my kernel acpi=force
(in my
/etc/lilo.conf
I put a line
append = "acpi=force"
) otherwise acpi
was disabled, as BIOS is too old. Under 2.6.* it was
not necessary.
- For proper powering off I had to check "use real
APM to turn off computer" in the configuration of
kernel
- suspending, hibernating For laptops it is essential to save
power in some situations (and to speed up starting the work) - so how to
suspend? With 2.4.* kernels it was not an easy task. But now with 2.6.*...
In Slackware there is no solution working out-of-the-box (that I am aware of).
If you compiled in your kernel full range of acpci options, then it takes only
echo -n mem > /proc/power/state
to suspend to ram this laptop. On page
"How to suspend and hibernate a laptop under Linux"
you can read how to do it more properly - to run a script which can do
more, like preventing your screen from not being woken properly. However, on
this laptop, the script was not neccessary. In very similar way (change
mem
to disk
or standby
) you can
hibernate or suspend your machine. The commands can then be executed after
clicking the object on your pulpit or pressing a button on your laptop (ACPCI
can be configured to do this).
- The rest of configuration is not specific to the
laptop, so I skip it. One advice: I use programs from
kde (like kppp or knetwalk :) but as a window manager
I recomend somethin lighter (icewm for example). Well,
it is only 466 MHz. But FireFox works ...
And TeX even better :)
Paweł Wlaź (Pawel Wlaz)