Installing Debian on an Angel 3000C / Clevo M350C

My wife and I recently bought an Angel 3000C laptop. The store claimed that they'd pre-install Linux on it, but they had some trouble. Once they told us the machine was actually a relabelled Clevo M350C, we were able to get things done.

If you want to use RedHat on this machine, there's another site by someone else, though it's sometimes down.

You can contact us at linux at paip dot net if you've got questions or comments. Please include the word "Clevo" in your subject line, or we're likely to miss it. :-p

Specs

Here's what the machine's got installed:

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Host Bridge (rev 02)
00:00.1 System peripheral: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 3584 (rev 02)
00:00.3 System peripheral: Intel Corp.: Unknown device 3585 (rev 02)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Device (rev 02)
00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Device (rev 02)
00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB (Hub #1) (rev 03)
00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB (Hub #2) (rev 03)
00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB (Hub #3) (rev 03)
00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB USB2 (rev 03)
00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corp. 82801BAM/CAM PCI Bridge (rev 83)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corp. 82801DBM LPC Interface Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.1 IDE interface: Intel Corp. 82801DBM Ultra ATA Storage Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.5 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82801DB AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 03)
00:1f.6 Modem: Intel Corp. 82801DB AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 03)
01:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd.  RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ (rev 10)
01:02.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments TSB43AB21 IEEE-1394a-2000 Controller (PHY/Link)
01:09.0 CardBus bridge: ENE Technology Inc CB1410 Cardbus Controller

Note: we don't have the model with the built-in wireless; we use an Orinoco PCMCIA card for that. We've got 512MB of RAM in the machine, and a DVD-ROM drive (not a writer).

Get yourself a Debian 3.0 install CD. You only need disk 1. We used an ethernet connection to install the packages not on the CD.

Basic Debian Installation

Go into the System Configuration Utility by using Ctrl-Alt-S when prompted on boot (be quick; you've only got around 1 second).
- enable booting from CD:
  - Startup -> Boot Device ->
  - 1st Device: CD-ROM Drive
  - 2nd Device: Hard Disk C
- Set Video RAM to 32MB:
  - Memory -> VGA Shared Memory ->
  - 32MB
- Save and Exit:
  - Exit -> Save and Exit
Boot the Debian 3.0 disk
- Use the "bf24" bootimage
Partition your disk. Make your swap partition at least 1.3 to 2 times as large as the amount of memory you have. This will be important for suspend-to-disk to work.
- I use:
  hda1 32MB /boot partition [Bootable, beginning of disk]
  hda2 large / partition
  hda3 1GB swap partition [end of disk]
Activate hda3 as your swap partition
Initialize hda2 as / with ext3
Initialize hda1 as /boot with ext3
Install kernel and driver modules
- Use the CDROM for installation
Configure Device Driver Modules
- Just "Exit"
Configure the Network
- Follow the instructions
Install the Base System
Make System Bootable
- Install LILO in the MBR
Reboot the System
- Be sure to eject the CDROM before rebooting

Set hardware clock to GMT
Set local timezone
Enable MD5 passwords and shadow passwords
Select a root password
Create a user account
If it asks you to remove the PCMCIA packages, you may as well; you'll install a newer version later.
Reinsert your Debian CDROM and select cdrom installation
Select other apt sources near you
Run tasksel
- Select only the C/C++ development tools for installation
- Don't bother installing X yet; we'll get the right version for your video card later. (The version Debian would install for you doesn't support your video card.)
Don't run dselect
Let the rest of the installation happen

Building and Installing a new kernel

Building a custom kernel will get a bunch of things working, including audio, ethernet and USB. We'll also add some patches (see below).

Log in as root
apt-get install libncurses5-dev wget bzip2
cd /usr/src
Download a copy of linux-2.4.23.tar.bz2:
- wget http://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/v2.4/linux-2.4.23.tar.bz2
Get the ACPI patch for 2.4.23:
- This will make your computer able to respond to events like pushing the power button and hitting Fn-Esc to sleep.
- wget http://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/lenb/acpi/patches/release/2.4.23/acpi-20031203-2.4.23.diff.bz2
Get the SWSUSP patches for 2.4.23:
- This will make your kernel actually able to do suspend-to-disk. The BIOS in this laptop doesn't support APM, and also doesn't support S1 ACPI mode; all it supports is S3 (suspend-to-memory) and S4 (suspend-to-disk). Suspend-to-memory doesn't work under Linux for various reasons you can find on the net, so we need to patch the kernel to support S4.
- wget http://aleron.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/swsusp/software-suspend-2.0-linux-2.4.23.bz2
- wget http://aleron.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/swsusp/software-suspend-2.0-core-rc3A.bz2
Get my config file for the kernel:
- wget http://www.cypherpunks.ca/m350c/config-clevo-m350c
Unpack and patch the kernel:
- tar xjvvf linux-2.4.23.tar.bz2
- chown -R root.root linux-2.4.23
- ln -s linux-2.4.23 linux
- cd linux-2.4.23
- bzcat ../acpi-20031203-2.4.23.diff.bz2 | patch -p1
- bzcat ../software-suspend-2.0-linux-2.4.23.bz2 | patch -p1
- bzcat ../software-suspend-2.0-core-rc3A.bz2 | patch -p1
Configure the kernel:
- make menuconfig
- Scroll to the bottom, and choose "Load an Alternate Configuration File"
- Use /usr/src/config-clevo-m350c
- Now you can customize your configuration, if you wish.
- When you're done, Choose Exit, and save your new kernel configuration.
Build your new kernel:
- make dep && make bzImage && make modules && make modules_install
Install your new kernel:
- cp System.map /boot/System.map-2.4.23
- cp arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/bzImage-2.4.23
Edit /etc/lilo.conf:
- Under "image=/vmlinuz", change "label=Linux" to "label=linux-orig".
- Add the following between "default=Linux" and "image=/vmlinuz". Note that hda3 should be your (large) swap partition:
```
	image=/boot/bzImage-2.4.23
		label=Linux
		append="resume2=swap:/dev/hda3"
		read-only

	image=/boot/bzImage-2.4.23
		label=noresume
		append="resume2=swap:/dev/hda3 noresume2"
		read-only
	
```
Run lilo to install the new kernel:
- lilo
From now on, when you boot, you'll have three choices at the lilo prompt. [Press "Shift" when you see "LILO 22.2" to get the prompt.] "Linux" is the default, and should be what you'll use most of the time. "linux-orig" is the kernel that came with Debian. You can use this to boot if something went wrong with building the new kernel. "noresume" is for booting after suspend-to-disk, if you just want a clean boot, and not to resume from the saved state.
Reboot into the new kernel (be sure to eject the CDROM):
- reboot

Building and Installing PCMCIA

Log in as root
cd /usr/src
Download a copy of pcmcia-cs-3.2.7.tar.gz:
- wget http://aleron.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/pcmcia-cs/pcmcia-cs-3.2.7.tar.gz
Unpack and build it:
- tar xzvvf pcmcia-cs-3.2.7.tar.gz
- cd pcmcia-cs-3.2.7
- make config (all the defaults should be correct)
- make all
- make install
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc0.d/K89pcmcia
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc1.d/K89pcmcia
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc2.d/S11pcmcia
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc3.d/S11pcmcia
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc4.d/S11pcmcia
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc5.d/S11pcmcia
- ln -s ../init.d/pcmcia /etc/rc6.d/K89pcmcia
Start PCMCIA:
- /etc/init.d/pcmcia start

X Windows

This is going to be a little tricky. Support for the video card in this laptop was only added to XFree86 version 4.3.x, which isn't even in Debian unstable (at time of writing), but it is in experimental.

Edit your /etc/apt/sources.list:
- Remove the reference to the CDROM
- For everything except the security.debian.org line, change "stable" to "unstable".
- Add the following line:
  - deb http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian/ ../project/experimental main
apt-get update
Fetch the list of packages in experimental:
- cd
- wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian/project/experimental/main/binary-i386/Packages
Examine that Packages file, and for each of the following, note the version of the package listed. (That's the version that's currently in experimental, and it's the version you'll need to explicitly specify.). In parentheses, I've also listed the version that was there at the time of writing, but it changes rapidly, so it'll likely be wrong for you. It's likely they will all be the same version, but not for sure.
- lbxproxy (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libice6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libsm6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libx11-6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libx11-dev (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxaw7 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxext-dev (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxext6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxft1 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxi6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxmu6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxmuu1 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxp6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxpm4 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxrandr2 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxt6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxtrap6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- libxtst6 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- proxymngr (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- twm (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- x-dev (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- x-window-system (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- x-window-system-core (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xbase-clients (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xdm (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfonts-100dpi (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfonts-75dpi (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfonts-base (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfonts-scalable (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfree86-common (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfs (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xfwp (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibmesa-dri (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibmesa-gl (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibmesa-gl-dev (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibmesa-glu (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibmesa-glu-dev (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibs (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xlibs-data (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xnest (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xprt (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xserver-common (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xserver-xfree86 (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xterm (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xutils (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
- xvfb (4.3.0-0pre1v5)
Use the version numbers you found to construct an apt-get install command (this is all one single command on one line):
- apt-get install lbxproxy=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libice6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libsm6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libx11-6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libx11-dev=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxaw7=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxext-dev=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxext6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxft1=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxi6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxmu6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxmuu1=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxp6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxpm4=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxrandr2=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxt6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxtrap6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 libxtst6=4.3.0-0pre1v5 proxymngr=4.3.0-0pre1v5 twm=4.3.0-0pre1v5 x-dev=4.3.0-0pre1v5 x-window-system=4.3.0-0pre1v5 x-window-system-core=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xbase-clients=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xdm=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfonts-100dpi=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfonts-75dpi=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfonts-base=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfonts-scalable=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfree86-common=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfs=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xfwp=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibmesa-dri=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibmesa-gl=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibmesa-gl-dev=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibmesa-glu=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibmesa-glu-dev=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibs=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xlibs-data=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xnest=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xprt=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xserver-common=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xserver-xfree86=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xterm=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xutils=4.3.0-0pre1v5 xvfb=4.3.0-0pre1v5
Select the "i810" X server driver when asked
"/dev/psaux" for the mouse port
"PS/2" protocol
Yes, your monitor is LCD. Choose Advanced settings. The horizontal sync range is "31-60", and the vertical refresh range is "56-75". Choose "1024x768", "800x600", and "640x480" for your video modes. Choose 24 default colour depth.
Answer Y to all questions about replacing configuration files.
Now go back and remove the "experimental" line from your /etc/apt/sources.list files. Leave the "unstable" lines alone.
apt-get update
Now install Gnome (this will install a whole lot of packages):
- apt-get install gnome
- If it gives you an error about gnome-games, do "mkdir /var/games" and try again. Don't worry, you won't have to download anything a second time.
Install gdm:
- apt-get install gdm
- Select it as your default display manager
- Answer Y to all questions about replacing configuration files.
Edit /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 to reflect the amount of video RAM you configured way above (minus a little for overhead). Find the line that says "VideoRam", and change the value to 32626. (Assuming you chose 32MB video RAM.)
Try it out!
- /etc/init.d/xfs start
- /etc/init.d/gdm start
- You should see the gdm screen come up, and the mouse should work. Switch back to the text console with Ctrl-Alt-F1.

Trackpad scroll buttons

If you want the up/down scroll button on the trackpad to work, you need to install a special driver.

Download and install the driver:
- cd /usr/src
- wget http://w1.894.telia.com/~u89404340/touchpad/files/synaptics-0.12.2.tar.bz2
- tar xjvvf synaptics-0.12.2.tar.bz2
- chown -R root.root synaptics
- mv synaptics synaptics-0.12.2
- cd synaptics-0.12.2
- make
- make install

Configure XFree86 to use the driver. Edit /etc/X11/XF86Config-4:

At the end of the "Module" section, add:
- Load "synaptics"
Remove the line Option "CorePointer" from the "InputDevice" section called "Configured Mouse".

Add an additional "InputDevice" section just before the "Device" section:

Section "InputDevice"
  Driver        "synaptics"
  Identifier    "Mouse[1]"
  Option        "Device"        "/dev/psaux"
  Option	"CorePointer"
  Option        "Protocol"      "auto-dev"
  Option        "LeftEdge"      "1900"
  Option        "RightEdge"     "5400"
  Option        "TopEdge"       "1900"
  Option        "BottomEdge"    "4000"
  Option        "FingerLow"     "25"
  Option        "FingerHigh"    "30"
  Option        "MaxTapTime"    "180"
  Option        "MaxTapMove"    "220"
  Option        "VertScrollDelta" "100"
  Option        "MinSpeed"      "0.02"
  Option        "MaxSpeed"      "0.18"
  Option        "AccelFactor" "0.0010"
#  Option        "SHMConfig"     "on"
#  Option       "Repeater"      "/dev/ps2mouse"
EndSection

In the "ServerLayout" section, remove the lines InputDevice "Configured Mouse" and InputDevice "Generic Mouse". Replace them with the line InputDevice "Mouse[1]" "CorePointer".
Here's a copy of what the XFConfig86-4 file looks like at the end.

Restart gdm to activate the new driver:
- /etc/init.d/gdm restart

Power management

This laptop uses ACPI instead of APM to do power management. We've already compiled the important pieces into the kernel, but we still need the user-lever daemons.

apt-get install acpi acpid
cd /tmp
wget http://aleron.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/swsusp/suspend.sh
bash suspend.sh --install
cd /etc/acpi/events
cp powerbtn sleepbtn
Edit sleepbtn:
- Change every occurrence of "power" to "sleep".
- In vi, that's: :%s/power/sleep/g
cd ..

Make the file sleepbtn.sh containing:

	    #!/bin/sh
	    /usr/local/sbin/hibernate

chmod 755 sleepbtn.sh
/etc/init.d/acpid restart
Now you should be able to hibernate the machine by hitting Fn-Esc. (It takes a bit of time sometimes.) When you turn it back on, it will boot Linux, and then restore the saved state from disk.
If you push the power button, it will do a clean shutdown.

Winmodem

You need special drivers to get the Winmodem to work under Linux.

Build and install the drivers:
- cd /usr/src
- wget http://linmodems.technion.ac.il/packages/smartlink/slmdm-2.7.10.tar.gz
- tar xzvvf slmdm-2.7.10.tar.gz
- chown -R root.root slmdm-2.7.10
- cd slmdm-2.7.10
- Now there's a weird bit, as mentioned at http://www.vgcomputing.com.au/lrtecras1.html#Modem: edit amrmo_init.c, and change the number in line 75 from 0x2486 to 0x24C6 (just like the line below it).
- make
- make install-amr
- Edit /etc/modutils/aliases, and add the following at the bottom:
```
	    alias char-major-212 slmodem
	    alias slmodem slamrmo
	    options slmdm country=USA
	    
```
- (Set your own country, of course. You can use /usr/src/slmdm-2.7.10/slver -c to get a list of countries.)
- update-modules
Test it:
- apt-get install minicom
- minicom
- You should see lines like "AT S7=45 S0=0"... and "OK". If you see the "OK", the modem is responding properly.
- Type Ctrl-A followed by X to exit Minicom.

Leftovers

Using Fn-F6 to switch CRT/LCD output works fine at the LILO prompt, but not once the machine is booted, for some reason. (The machine seems to crash hard.) I don't know why that is. But if you just leave the machine in the state where it outputs to both the LCD and the CRT, it seems to happily stay there, even across reboots. So then just plugging in something to the VGA port will work.

I haven't tested the S-Video Out, but I doubt it'd work; I've never seen that work under Linux.

I think Firewire is the only thing left. Unfortunately, we don't have any Firewire devices to test with. The kernel build, above, compiled Firewire support as modules, so it may very well work, or it may need some more hacking.

Last update: 20040102