Installing Fedora Core 4 on a ThinkPad T42p (2373-HBU)

Currently Working

• Video (FireGL) - Unaccelered 3D, Other tweeks for speed
• Ethernet (10/1000) - Working
• Sound (AD1981B) - Working
• Function Keys - Brightness,Keyboard light,Bluetooth on/off,Sound,Sus-Mem
• Bluetooh (BMDC-2) - Untested (I do see the drivers loaded)
• Modem (BMDC-2) - Untested (I do not see drivers loaded)
• Wireless (ipw2200) - Working + Monitor mode (aka Kismet)
• DVD-RW - Working
• Fingerprint reader - Working + Pam module
• Suspend Memory - Working
• Suspend Disk - Not Working
• IBM Active Protection System (HDAPS) - Not working

Basic Install

After loading the Fedora Core 4 i686 CD here is the basic lay of the land.

• Video (FireGL) - Unaccelered default setup, but it worked
• Ethernet (10/1000) - Working
• Sound (AD1981B) - Working
• Basic Function Keys - Brightness,Keyboard light,Bluetooth on/off
• Bluetooh (BMDC-2) - Untested (I do see the drivers loaded)
• Modem (BMDC-2) - Untested (I do not see drivers loaded)
• Wireless (ipw2200) - Not Working
• DVD-RW - Working
• Fingerprint reader - Not Working
• Suspend Memory - Not Working
• Suspend Disk - Not Working
• IBM Active Protection System (HDAPS) - Not working

Basic Hardware

Wireless

I really needed this first so I could have the easy freedom to work on the machine throughout my house. All you really need here is the firmware loaded in to the right spot. This is an old version of the driver and firmware and it will not run Kismet. Later, I will show how to get this working.

Goto http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net/firmware.php. Download and install the version 2.2 in /lib/firmware. Reboot and your wireless should work. Go here for some more tips: ipw2200

Updating

At this point I setup my system to get all of the current updates for Fedora Core 4. I just ran the up2date program and let it do it's thing.

Video

I am currently using the default raedon driver. I am looking a later loading the fglrx driver.

xorg driver

I read Additional options for the radeon driver page to come up with what I have. Here is the radeon device section from my xorg.conf

Section "Device"
        Identifier  "Videocard0"
        Driver      "radeon"
        VendorName  "Videocard vendor"
        BoardName   "ATI FireGL Mobility T2"
# accelration
        Option          "backingstore" "on"
        Option          "AGPFastWrite" "on"
        #may need to turn of enablepageflip
        Option          "EnablePageFlip" "on"
        Option          "AGPMode" "4"
        Option          "EnablePageFlip" "on"
        Option          "RenderAccel" "on"
        # enable PowerPlay features
        Option          "DynamicClocks" "on"
        # use bios hot keys on thinkpad (aka fn+f7)
        Option          "BIOSHotkeys" "on"
        #Xvmc
        Option          "XvMCSurfaces" "7"
EndSection

Fingerprint Reader

I followed for the most part the instructions given at according HOWTO. the only thing that I changed was the /etc/pam.d/system-auth. Mine looks like:

#%PAM-1.0
# This file is auto-generated.
# User changes will be destroyed the next time authconfig is run.
auth        required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_env.so
auth        sufficient    /lib/security/pam_bioapi.so {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350} /etc/bioapi1.10/pam/
auth        sufficient    /lib/security/$ISA/pam_unix.so likeauth nullok
auth        required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_deny.so
 
account     required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_unix.so
account     sufficient    /lib/security/$ISA/pam_succeed_if.so uid < 100 quiet
account     required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_permit.so
 
password    requisite     /lib/security/$ISA/pam_cracklib.so retry=3
password    sufficient    /lib/security/pam_bioapi.so {5550454b-2054-464d-2f45-535320425350} /etc/bioapi1.10/pam/
password    sufficient    /lib/security/$ISA/pam_unix.so nullok use_authtok md5 shadow
password    required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_deny.so
 
session     required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_limits.so
session     required      /lib/security/$ISA/pam_unix.so
 

I just try to find the correct place in the list for the pam_bioapi line. I am currently looking for ways to have the scan graphic come up faster. Also note that with the KDE screen saver that the fingerprint reader does not quite work correctly, and it also has some error when comming out of suspend. I will be working on this and hopefully creating a patch and submitting it.

Links

• Intel IPW2200 - http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net
• Fingerprint Reader - according HOWTO