Update 23/08/2005 : Warning : I have experienced some strange crashes on this model, wich seem to be caused by a deffect of some kind related to the attachment holes for the anti-theft cables which are located on the sides of the laptop.

More specifically, I get poweroff problems when I lock an anti-theft cable on the front left side hole of the machine, which occur when I happen to touch the metallic parts of the lock with my metal watch’s wristband (the lock happens to be just at the right place under my wrist, when I’m typing on the keyboard : bad design decision for sure !). There must be some static charge that passes to the internal parts of the machine through the lock, causing a security safeguard poweroff of some kind. From the various calls to the hotline, I got the advice from Dell to connect the lock to the right side… but I still can’t tell what exact cause there is and is it’s really a good workaround. Dell is supposed to be working on the issue.

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I’m collecting here some notes about the installation of Debian Sarge Etch on a Dell Latitude D505 laptop.

Apart from the above-mentioned hardware issue, the setup works fine with GNU/Linux, and more specifically Debian.

This page is a work in progress, so don’t expect a fully detailed howto, but more a collection of random notes that should be useful compared to your own findings.

Note that I’m now running etch on that machine (aka stable sooner or later).

References

I’ve used the following pages as references, so I won’t detail all steps here. You may refer to these for the details of the procedure.

• Fedora Core 3 Linux on a Dell Latitude D505
• Linux on Dell Latitude D505

Characteristics of this machine

The characteristics of this machine are available on Dell’s website.

The machine came without any installed OS.

There is a 2G partition already on the disk and a CD of FreeDOS comes along the machine (as well as a copy of the GNU GPL ). I the installed FreeDOS on this partition by booting off the CD. FreeDOS will be useful in case of need of upgrading the BIOS.

Debian Sarge (3.1) stable installation

I’ve installed it using the 2.6 kernel. At the boot prompt of the installer, choose 2.6 kernel :

boot: linux26

After the standard install of the stable core, additional steps are necessary, mainly concerning the display which is not well detected by default :

• upgrade it to testing
• Install of kernel 2.6.11-686
• Ading apt sources “contrib” and “non-free”

Note that nowadays a ‘testing’ beta install CD may be available allowing direct install of testing instead of installation of stable and later upgrade to testing.

Hardware support

Now, the specificities of the hardware of this machine require :

• Install 855resolution (or 915resolution in testing) :
  • Used to setup the 1400×1050 mode : 855resolution 3c 1400 1050 (apply these changes to the /etc/default/915resolution file)
  • After having installed and run it, read-edid is able to detect the correct modelines for X (see bellow).
  • You may then reconfigure XF86Config-4 (or xorg.conf in testing) (see bellow)

• Installation of the ipw2200 module for the Wifi card :
  • Install ipw2200-source package
  • If necessary, compile it and install the associate binary package (from kernel 2.6.12 (?) up, the driver is included in the stock kernel image, no need of the following steps, then) :

# module-assistant prepare
# module-assistant a-i ipw2200

Note : since the time when I’ve succeeded doing that, the module has been updated in testing, and now, I get problems with it (compiled with GCC 4 whereas kernel was compiled with GCC 3, but all that can be overcome).

• • Install the firmware : follow instructions in /usr/share/doc/ipw2200-modules-2.6.11-1-686/README.firmware
  • Install of wireless-tools

• Install powernowd to handle the Centrino/Pentium M processor speed control :
  • Add to /etc/modules :

speedstep_centrino
cpufreq_userspace

• • Install powernowd

• Setup the order of the ethX interfaces :
  • Installation of ifrename
  • Configuration of /etc/iftab and /etc/network/interfaces for ifrename. On my setup : eth0 is not used, eth1 for the wired ethernet adapter, eth2 for the wifi one
  • blacklist eth1394 in hotplug for it not to use eth0

Configuration of the display.

You can configure xfree86 up to 1400×1050 on the “Intel Corp. 82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Device” video card, provided that you installed 855resolution*/*915resolution (see above).

See bellow the configuration of xfree86/xorg.

Note : 3D acceleration support in video card may not be perfect : I’ve experienced locked screensaver and need to hard-reboot the unresponsive machine… So I suggest you don’t enable DRI. That may be related to the fact that the machine has been suspended (< https://www.redhat.com/archives/fedora-list/2005-June/msg05058.html) ?

Configuration of /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 (/etc/X11/xorg.conf)

Here is an excerpt of the XF86Config-4 file for my Dell D505, which gives proper modelines for the best resolution.

Excerpt :

  Section "Device"
          Identifier      "Generic card"
          Driver          "i810"
          VideoRam        64000
  EndSection

  Section "Monitor"

          Identifier "SEC:5047"
          VendorName "SEC"
          ModelName "SEC:5047"

          Mode    "1400x1050"
     # vfreq 60.020Hz, hfreq 63.981kHz
                  DotClock        108.000000
                  HTimings        1400 1448 1560 1688
                  VTimings        1050 1051 1055 1066
                  Flags   "-HSync" "-VSync"

          EndMode
  EndSection

Touchpad support : You may install the xfree86-driver-synaptics to be able to use the touchpad. Attention to the settings, since it is an ALPS touchpad (see in the attached XF86Config-4 file).

Suspend to RAM

Note that this is no longer needed as hibernate is more or less working in etch on this model.

I somehow can suspend the system to RAM, which is usefull when running on battery. This would need to be written in more details, but something like a mix between those two setups should work :

• http://alpha.uhasselt.be/Research/Algebra/Members/D505.html
• http://www.celifornia.com/documents/dell700m.html

Here is the /usr/local/sbin/suspend suspend to RAM script that I use. Note that in this script, the video_post invocation may no longer be necessary with recent Xorg i815 display driver.

Update 2005.10.06 : More details :

• The hotswap tool can be used to switch between the CD/DVD drive and the battery in the modular bay.
• Under Gnome, the volume Fn keys can be mapped to the shortcuts. Thanks to http://skaya.enix.org/wiki/DellLatitudeD610 :

The special keys to set the volume work ; the simplest way to enable them is to go to gnome Desktop Preferences -> Keyboard, and pretend that you have a inspiron8k keyboard. Then you can go to Desktop Preferences -> Keyboard Shortcuts, and in the sound section, set the Volume Up/Down/Mute shortcuts. The Shortcut column will display XF86Audio(something) when you press the special keys.

Update 2006/11/26 : I’ve updated the BIOS to A11, and suddenly the X display has become broken. I’ve managed to restore some usable config, but it’s not that good… so I’m not advising to update it.