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I bought this VAIO TR2 in US SonyStyle.com
(So this is a US version of TR2).
And AP3 means it is a model with 1GB main RAM.
The charm-points of this machine are the 1280x768 Wide clear black TFT
and the built-in DVD-ROM, I think.
Thanks to this DVD-drive, the installation of linux could be relatively
easy for you.
I can write down the basic hardware spec of VAIO TR2 as following.
CPU |
Intel Pentium M 1GHz
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default OS |
MS Windows XP Professional (c:15GB, d:21GB)
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LCD |
10.6inch Wide (1280x768) TFT Display
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Graphic |
intel 855GM (64MB from Main RAM)
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Memory |
1GB
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HDD |
40GB
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Optical Drive |
CD-RW/DVD combo built-in (MATSHITA : UJDA755)
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FDD |
None
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Ethernet |
Intel Pro/100 compatible
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Wireless LAN |
IEEE 802.11g Bus/Interface: mini PCI Radio frequency band: 2.4GHz
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Sound |
intel 8x0 compatible AC'97
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Memory stick seems also usable in default current linux.
But, motion eye does not work with meye module linux-2.4.22
(This module is for old C1 systems.
The camera in TR seems to be connected with USB.)
And the result of "/sbin/lspci -v" is
here.
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Basic strategy and choosing linux distribution
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I suppose that it is important to enable ACPI for the linux
installation in recent laptop computers (of course, including VAIOs)
in order to use their sound or some other newly features (IDE
DMA...).
So, I recommend you to use the linux kernel after ver 2.4.22(AC2)
or 2.6.x.
So, I chose "Fedora Core 1" (Its default kernel is the patched
linux-2.4.22) for my installation.
And I also recommend you to use GRUB for the boot-loader,
because TR has no boot-able FDD in default
(And I suppose some CD-boot-able linux systems, like KNOPPIX 4, is
also quite usable for the system rescue).
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You can boot from the installation CDROM.
It's quite easy.
No kernel options are necessary at the booting.
I like built-in DVD systems very much :)
I just installed my new linux systems instead of D: drive of default
Windows XP.
The default partition of TR2 is ... (hda1=hidden rescue
partition=5GB, hda2=C:=15GB, hda3=D:=20GB).
So, I think you could do the reconstruction of these partitions
booting with KNOPPIX before your installation.
Without any efforts, X window systems runs in 1024x768 resolution
with default XFree86.
(In Fedora Core 1, the default XFree86 has some bugs, which
the console display after X has some flickering).
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kernel configuration (ACPI, cpufreqd, HIGHMEM)
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-- kernel
I'm using kernel-2.4.22-1.2166.nptl (02/2004) of Fedora Core 1 now.
I just installed src-rpm of this kernel (you can installe with yum or
apt) and made it.
With "make install" in the kernel src, th kernel can be installed
and named like "linux-<version>custum" and also registered
in GRUB configuration.
Modules also should be installed in /lib/modules/<version
>custum, but "make modules_install" does not make such
named directory. So, I made it by myself.
I'm not sure that is the default feature of Fedore or Redhat.
Furthermore, some additional modules (like ALSA, madwifi...)
should be installed in /lib/modules/<version >
(They refferd the system kernel version with "uname -r" in usual.).
So, I did the following secquece to solve this problem.
mv /lib/modules/2.4.22-1.2149.nptl /lib/modules/2.4.22-1.2149.nptl-backup
ln -s /lib/modules/2.4.22-1.2149.nptlcustom /lib/modules/2.4.22-1.2149.nptl
And also about the kernel source directory, you should make the
symbolic link to make additional modules.
ln -s /usr/src/linux-2.4 /usr/src/linux
My current kernel configuration file is
this one
(kernel-2.4.22-1.2149.nptl).
I haven't customized it enough, because it's getting tired... :)
-- ACPI
Anyway, TR2 is very unstable without ACPI.
I tried to turn on ACPI function
with "apm=off acpi=on" in kernel booting option.
The default kernel of Fedora Core supports ACPI with its module.
(Now, I have built my kernel with ACPI function, instead of modules.)
And APM should be turned off, because TR2 has no APM BIOS.
You can do power-off with this ACPI function,
but if you turned on SMP or APCI (not ACPI... :) features in
the processor field of kernel configurations,
it does not work (same as the case with APM).
-- cpufreqd
The Pentium M in TR2 is based on Intel SpeedStep Technology,
which can control CPU speed considering the system load
average.
This function also can be used in linux systems.
In order to use it, you should configure your kernel
with "CONFIG_X86_SPEEDSTEP_CENTRINO=m"
in Processor--Frequency scaling.
This makes a speedstep-centrino module.
But, in kernel-2.4.22-1.2149.nptl, this modules does not support
Pentium M 1GHz of TR2.
So you should apply this patch
to /usr/src/linux/arch/i386/kernel/speedstep-centrino.c .
If you modprobe this speedstep-centrino module,
you can find the CPU frequency setting as the following.
[root@sei chimari]# cat /proc/cpufreq
minimum CPU frequency - maximum CPU frequency - policy
CPU 0 600000 kHz ( 60 %) - 900000 kHz ( 90 %) - performance
And you can change this setting like this way.
echo -n "0%100%100%performance" > /proc/cpufreq
This means your CPU runs with the 100% speed (1GHz) always.
You can also check the real CPU clock in /proc/cpuinfo .
Furthermore,
using CPUFreqd,
you can control the CPU clock in your system considering the
system load average (likely in Windows XP).
The installation of this software is quite easy.
I just typed in the source archive (ver1.1).
./configure;make;make install
You should prepare the configuration file in
/usr/local/etc/cpufreqd.conf .
And, my current configuration is
this one.
In WinXP, TR2 seems to save CPU clock even with AC power supply.
So, I imitete it in this configuration
(Of course, you should change the CPU clock to 100% with AC,
if you want.).
Then, you should prepare the init.d script of cpufreqd
in /etc/rc.d/init.d/cpufreqd.
This script does modprobe/rmmod of the speedstep-centrino module.
And
chkconfig --add cpufreqd
for the startup of this script at the system booting.
-- HIGHMEM trouble
Because of 1GB memory of my TR2, I turend on the HIGHMEM support
in my kernel.
But, after I run my linux systems on TR2 for a while,
I found some kernel error which seems to
relate to HIGHMEM support so often.
And this error is caused by some library load errors or system hang up
so many times.
Finally, I wrote the kernel option "mem=896M" in my /etc/grub.conf
(It means I turned off HIGHMEM support).
And my system is quite stable now.
I'm not sure this errors are caused by the memory area collision
with VM of intel 855GM or true HIGHMEM bugs.
As I can see in WInXP, the intel 855GM of TR2 steal 64MB from main
RAM for its VM.
Also at the starting of the xsvc module for Accelerated-X (We don't
use agpgart modules with Accelerated-X.),
you can see this message.
xsvc: v3.0 (devrel@xig.com) [$XiGDate: 2003/09/05 15:58:08 $]
xsvc: Intel 855G, 64MB at 0xe8000000 (00000000/00)
This means intel 855GM uses 64MB memory from 128MB upper in the kernel.
I think this area collide with the buffering area for linux HIGHMEM
access.
But, I'm also not sure whether I should turned on HIGHMEM support in
my system with JUST 1GB RAM.
It,s true?
In board driver configuration of Accelerated-X
(/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/AcceleratedX/boards/intel/i852.xqa),
I found it use 32MB RAM.
Furthermore, in the result of lspci -v,
it seems to be 128MB.
I'm confusing a lot about it.
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This is the special point of current VAIOs.
You can ONLY use Fn-key functions (Volume/Brightness configuration
etc.) designed and worked only in WindowsXP!!
In your default linux systems,
you cannot use these Fn-keys function.
(Is this normal way? In my old Panasonic CF-M1 systems,
Fn-keys function is completely supported by BIOS.
So, I can use it completely even from linux systems.)
Furthermore, VAIOs do not show any BIOS menu start up function
(It works with F2).
How wonderfult it! (--;
So, you have to use the "snoypi" module to watch sony special
hardware events and "jdmouse" application.
-- sonypi module
You can find it in the default kernel of Fedora Core 1.
So, just add these lines in your /etc/modules.conf .
alias char-major-10-250 sonypi
options sonypi minor=250 camera=1 nojogdial=1
Then, you should make the device for sonypi, using this command.
mknod /dev/sonypi c 10 250
-- jdmouse
This
jdmouse
is specialized for some VAIOs with jogdials.
So, for TR2 without jogdials, you have to customize it.
You can use this patch to controll
Volume/Brightness with Fn-key + F2-6 as following.
Fn + F2 : Volume down
Fn + F3 : Mute
Fn + F4 : Volume up
Fn + F5 : Brightness down
Fn + F6 : Brightness up
After installed this patched jdmouse, you have to make FIFO for jdmouse.
mkfifo /dev/jdmouse
Now, if you startup jdmouse, the snoypi module is automatically called
from it.
You should start jdmouse from /etc/rc.d/rc.local or somewhere.
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Sound system of TR2 is supported by intel 8x0 compatible.
And, the default kernel-2.4 OSS module (i810_audio) can be installed.
But, it seems not to work correctly (mixer problem?).
So, I gave up to use OSS modules and decide to use ALSA.
You can download ALSA files from
Fedora's page in
FreshRPMs.
In the kernel configuration, you can remain configs for OSS.
ALSA is a sort of sond modules.
So, you should configure SOUND="m" (maybe it's default).
At first, you should download src.rpm of alsa-driver and
install it with "rpm -iVh".
The source archive is extracted into /usr/src/redhat/SOURCES/ .
You should make it by yourselves.
At this time, if you don't have your kernel source tree in
/usr/src/linux, you should make the symbolic link as I decribed above.
cd /usr/src/redhat/SOURCES/alsa-driver-1.0.1
./configure --with-cards=intel8x0
touch include/linux/workqueue.h
make
make install
Then, the driver installation have finished.
The touch command in the 3rd line is for a bug fix.
Without this, you can make drivers, but some errors will occur in
"/sbin/depmod -a" .
Then, you should install alsa-lib and alsa-utils.
After all finished, your /etc/modules.conf should be like this way.
# --- BEGIN: Generated by ALSACONF, do not edit. ---
# --- ALSACONF verion 1.0.1 ---
alias char-major-116 snd
alias char-major-14 soundcore
alias sound-service-0-0 snd-mixer-oss
alias sound-service-0-1 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-3 snd-pcm-oss
alias sound-service-0-8 snd-seq-oss
alias sound-service-0-12 snd-pcm-oss
alias snd-card-0 snd-intel8x0
alias sound-slot-0 snd-intel8x0
# --- END: Generated by ALSACONF, do not edit. ---
post-install snd-intel8x0 /usr/sbin/alsactl restore >/dev/null 2>&1 || :
pre-remove snd-intel8x0 /usr/sbin/alsactl store >/dev/null 2>&1 || :
The first part is automatically wirtten by "alsaconf" command.
After succeeded to modprobe of snd-card-0,
you have to do mixer configuration with "alsamixer" command.
Maybe it is muted at the first time.
After the configuration and sound check,
you should save your configuration with "/usr/sbin/alsactl store"
command (it saved in /etc/asound.state).
You can start up with this setting from the next time.
Basically, ALSA sound works well.
But, I have a few problems.
The 1st is only CDDA does not work.
It works in WinXP, of course, so, maybe it's the problem related to
digital SPDIF or something? I suppose.
The 2nd is very noisy xmms (only in xmms).
This problem can be solved by xmms setting.
In xmms setting, "Options"--"Preference"--"Audio I/O Plugins",
you can find the configuration for ALSA output plugin.
In this config. you should set buffer time to 1000ms (the default
is 500ms) to cancel most of noises.
Also about above CDDA problem,
you can solve it selecting "Digital Audio Extraction" for play mode of
CD Audio Player plugin.
But it causes a little bit strong vibration caused by high speed roration
of CD-drive.
And, when you update your kernel, you should also re-install ALSA
driver.
So, your source tree of alsa-driver should be remained.
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X (Accelerated-X intel-855GM 1280x768)
[1280x768 is now avairable on XFree86!! See the
next section.]
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The most tricky point in linux on VAIO TR2 is X with 1280x768 wide TFT.
In conclusion, you cannot use 1280x768 resolution in normal XFree86
(in 02/2004) (Now, in June 2004, I'm heard that we can use
1280x768 resolution on XFree86 w/o Accelerated-X!
See the next section.).
Now, the core development team of XFree86 has stopped their works.
So, I'm afraid that it is quite difficult to expect their 1280x768
support in XFree86.
But, it does make quite no sence to use VAIO TR2 in 1024x768 or lower
resolutions.
So, I installed one of the commercial X-servers,
"Accelerated-X" by XiG .
Precisely, I'm using the Silver type of
Accelerated-X Summit Line LX(Laptop).
This series seems products only for network order.
So, you can download a demo version and test it.
After testing, if it works well, you can order your License key
via network (You need a credit card and it costs about US$90.).
The demo version automatically stopps after 25min running
(But you can re-start it as many times as you like.).
If the working time of buisiness day in US,
the License key seems to be sent
within about one hour after your web order.
The installation of the demo version (You should see
Summit_LX-LINUX.txt in its archive) should be as follows.
rpm -i --nodeps xsvc-3.0-3.i386.rpm
rpm -i --nodeps Summit_LX-Silver-2.2-14.i386.rpm
After these installations, you should make a setup for your
environment with "Xsetup" coomand.
My configuration is like this way.
Graphic Board : Intel 852, 32MB
Colors : 16M
Monitor1 : LCD Panoramic (1024x600) -- You can chose any LCD, maybe.
Resolution : 1280x768
Desktop : Disabled
DPMS : Off
Keyboad : US American
Mouse Type : PS2 Mouse
Mouse Device : /dev/psaux
Font Path : (omitted...)
Bus : AGP 2x/1x
After this, I checked AGP 4x is supported by 852/855GM of TR2 in
WinXP.
So I enabled it.
It seems to work with no problems.
And I edited DisplayMemory from "32768" to "65536" in the board
configuration of Accelerated-X.
/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/AcceleratedX/boards/intel/i852.xqa
These settings are written in /etc/Xaccel.ini .
My configuration is here.
The "agpgart" module used in XFree86 seems not to be used in
Accelerated-X.
Instead of agpgart, the "xsvc" module is running.
The configuration for xsvc is also automatically
installed in /etc/modules.conf.
alias char-major-10-179 xsvc
The source code of xsvc is also installed into /usr/src/xig/xsvc/ .
So, you can re-make and re-install from this directory (make;make install).
Furthermore, the automatic-installed font-path is missed some
directories, compared with XFree86's one.
So, you should add them in manual.
You can find font paths in Xfs configuration (/etc/X11/fs/config) or
XF86Config file.
So, you should edit your font path on Accelerated-X referring them.
In my Xaccel.ini, my font path is like this.
[FONTPATH]
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/",
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/",
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/",
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/",
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/",
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/TTF/",
"/usr/share/fonts/default/Type1/",
"/usr/lib/openoffice/share/fonts/truetype/",
"/usr/share/fonts/ja/misc/",
"/usr/share/fonts/ja/TrueType/",
"/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/AcceleratedX/fonts/misc/",
"unix/:7100";
If you fail to configure your setting and cannot start X-server
correctly, you should add "3" in your kernel option at booting.
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X (XFree86 intel-855GM 1280x768)
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In June 2004, I'm heard that we can use 1280x768 resolution
on XFree86 (Please visit
shaice's
site for detail.).
This is not a patch for XFree86 sources, but a very easy way.
At first, make "1280patch" code which adds 1280x768 mode information
to TR's VIDEO BIOS.
Download source code from
here.
And run
gcc -o 1280patch 1280patch.c
in order to make it.
Then, copy the resultant "1280patch" executable file to
an appropreate directory (I'm using "/usr/X11R6/bin").
If you run this program code (root authority is necessary.), you should see the following messages
on your VAIO-TR.
[root@sei-sama]# 1280patch
Chipset: 855GM
BIOS Configuration area offset: 0x0c20 bytes
BIOS Version: 29
Timing parameter block: 025b
Patch complete.
This additional information to VIDEO BIOS will be expired at every
boot of your TR.
So, I'm using "1280patch" in my /etc/rc.d/rc.local .
(If I call it from /etc/rc.d/rc.local,
the boot-up fram buffer display is 1024x768 resolution,
but you can use 1280x768 after wdm statted up.)
Next, you should edit your /etc/X11/XF86Config .
This is also very easy.
Please add the following line in Section "Monitor" of your
/etx/X11/XF86Config .
Modeline "1280x768" 80.14 1280 1344 1480 1680 768 769 772 795
And add "1280x768" as the first mode in your Section "Screen".
Now, My XF86Config is this way.
If you are using Accelerated-X, you should change it to XFree86 .
You have to change the alias of /usr/X11R6/bin/X and edit
/etc/modules.conf not to start up xsvc.
cd /usr/X11R6/bin
rm X
ln -s XFree86 X
vi /etc/modules.conf
Then comment out the line of xsvc.
Don't forget to do "/sbin/depmod -a", after you changed your
modules.conf .
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Cabled ethernet on TR2 is working with e100 module.
And you can also use wireless LAN with the
madwifi
(Multiband Atheros Driver for WiFi) driver.
You should download and use CVS version of madwifi.
cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/madwifi login
cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/madwifi co madwifi
After these commands, the source code of madwifi should be downloaded
in madwifi/ directory.
CVS server is very busy. So, you have to wait, if it failed.
In downloading, you should type just enter-key,
if you requested a password.
Before making this dirver, you should check the kernel configuration
as following.
CONFIG_NET_WIRELESS=y,CONFIG_NET_RADIO=y
CONFIG_CARDBUS=y,
CONFIG_HOTPLUG=y, CONFIG_HOTPLUG_PCI=m
These are the configurations of wireless LAN ,CardBus and PCI-HotPlug.
In order to make madwifi driver,
you should run these in madwifi/ directory.
make clean
make
su
make install
If you find some erros about uuencode/uudecode in "make install",
you should install "sarutils" package.
The default interface is named as "ath0".
So, you should make and edit /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-ath0 .
And, at the booting, it is automatically named as "eth1".
So, I made a symbolic link for it.h
cd /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/
ln -s ifcfg-ath0 ifcfg-eth1
Here is my ifcfg-ath0.
When you want to use Wireless-LAN, you should turn on the switch of
Wireless-LAN on TR2 and do the following command in root user.
su
ifdown eth0
ifup eth1
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-- emacs can edit ONLY UTF-8 files
(From FAQ in Fedora JP Project)
In /usr/share/emacs/site-lisp/site-start.d/lang-coding-systems-init.el,
the languyage environment cannot set in Japanese.
So, there are some difficulties in using Japanese coding.
You can solve this problems to edit
lang-coding-systems-init.el as follows.
--- lang-coding-systems-init.el.orig 2003-10-27 22:40:42.000000000 +0900
+++ lang-coding-systems-init.el 2003-12-22 02:05:18.000000000 +0900
@@ -13,6 +13,9 @@
;; CJK utf-8 locale needs Mule-UCS
(require 'un-define)
;; use Mule-UCS utf-8 coding-system for subprocess IO
+ (cond ((equal lang "ja")
+ (set-language-environment "Japanese")))
+ (set-terminal-coding-system 'utf-8)
(prefer-coding-system 'utf-8))
(set-keyboard-coding-system 'utf-8))
((equal lang "ja")
-- poor Kanji conversion in Canna
You should remove these comment outs (;) in ~/.canna file.
;"fuzokugo"
;"iroha"
I want to install Wnn7 (--;.
-- LaTeX in Japanese
You should use euc-Kanji code for tex.
And, you should use pxdvi,plpdvi instead of xdvi,lpdvi.
It is better for you to install VFlib2-conf-ja and VFVFlib2-VFjfm
packages (I installed them via yum).
-- watch DVD
After installed xine, just make a symbolic link for dvd device.
ln -s /dev/scd0 /dev/dvd
It's quite easy :).
There are no problems also in full screen mode.
During playing DVDs, the CPU load is about 10 and several %.
You should turn on Video--de-interace, when you play a DVD.
I'm not sure thi reson why, but my DVDROM is working without any region checking
now (I can play US version (Region1) and Japanese version (Region2)
with this drive and xine (Drive region is still region1).
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This site is maybe the reconstruntion of informations in these
wonderful web pages.
Many thanks to everyone!
- Linux on SONY PCG-TR2/B
- Linux
Installation into Panasonic Let's note CF-T2
- Fedora Core on VAIO PCG-Z1R/P
- (Unofficial) Fedora JP Project Wiki
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