Linux on T61 vs Linux on T400...

[Petar Milin-3]

Hello ALL!
I wonder if anyone can tell me which one of the two laptops: T61 or
T400, is more Linux friendly, or Linux supported?

Thanks,
PM
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[Yves-Alexis Perez-2]

On ven, 2009-08-21 at 11:15 +0200, Petar Milin wrote:
> Hello ALL!
> I wonder if anyone can tell me which one of the two laptops: T61 or
> T400, is more Linux friendly, or Linux supported?

Can't say for the T400 but T61 is definitely linux friendly (at least
the intel card one).h

For the T400, the switchable graphics won't work on Linux.

--
Yves-Alexis

[Mikhail Gusarov-3]

Twas brillig at 11:15:31 21.08.2009 UTC+02 when pmilin@... did gyre and gimble:

 PM> I wonder if anyone can tell me which one of the two laptops: T61 or
 PM> T400, is more Linux friendly, or Linux supported?

T400 works fine for me (Debian testing, kernel from experimental), with
the following caveats:

* Switchable graphics does not work, and additionally Intel video card
  is not attached to DVI output, so you can only get a DVI (through dock
  station) from the Radeon. It's better get a Intel-only variant if you
  don't use graphics-intensive applications. When enabled, Radeon eats
  ~11W, which doubles power consumption.

* There is small bug related to serial port while docking/undocking the
  devic.

* MMC cards are not reliable in internal card reader. SD/SDHC work fine.

* Beware: there is no CardBus anymore, but ExpressCard slot.

Beside those small glitches (exotic ones, I admit), everything is nice,
so I would recommend T400.

--
  http://fossarchy.blogspot.com/

[Daniel Castro-4]

2009/8/21 Yves-Alexis Perez <corsac@...>

On ven, 2009-08-21 at 11:15 +0200, Petar Milin wrote:
> Hello ALL!
> I wonder if anyone can tell me which one of the two laptops: T61 or
> T400, is more Linux friendly, or Linux supported?

Can't say for the T400 but T61 is definitely linux friendly (at least
the intel card one).h

On Ubuntu 9.04 there is a big regression for the T61 with Intel video card.
Should be fixed on 9.10
Other than that everything works.

For the T400, the switchable graphics won't work on Linux.

--
Yves-Alexis

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________________________

Daniel Castro, M.Sc.
[phone]
dancasmo@...
castromd@...
________________________

[Jens Rutschmann]

Petar Milin wrote on 21.08.2009 11:15:
> Hello ALL!
> I wonder if anyone can tell me which one of the two laptops: T61 or
> T400, is more Linux friendly, or Linux supported?

Hi,
If you're interested in buying a SSD drive for the new machine you might want to
check out this first, as Lenovo apparently capped the SATA speed in the T61:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=399772

Best regards,
Jens
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[Pablo Gallenti]

Hi.

I had not problems in my T 400 BC2 with Mepis 8, Ubuntos, etc. with Debian, not work bottons and wifi.
I also have a R 400 and tested Kubuntu, works all.

saludos

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 6:15 AM, Petar Milin <pmilin@... .rs> wrote:

Hello ALL!
I wonder if anyone can tell me which one of the two laptops: T61 or T400, is more Linux friendly, or Linux supported?

Thanks,
PM
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Atentamente
Pablo A Gallenti
------------------------------------------------------------
GNU / Linux User: 348409

[Theodore Ts'o-2]

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 04:47:07PM +0700, Mikhail Gusarov wrote:

> T400 works fine for me (Debian testing, kernel from experimental), with
> the following caveats:
>
>
> * There is small bug related to serial port while docking/undocking the
>   devic.
>
> * MMC cards are not reliable in internal card reader. SD/SDHC work fine.
>
> * Beware: there is no CardBus anymore, but ExpressCard slot.

This is an option; the T400 comes with an ExpressCard/54 slot, and an
option of either a CardBus slot, a SmartCard reader, or a 7-in-1
memory card reader.  You apparently have a T400 with the 7-in1 card
reader.  I had my T400 system with the ExpressCard and SmartCard
slots, which is nice because (a) you get a spring-loaded flap instead
of a easy-to-lose plastic blank, and (b) you can get a ExpressCard
MMC/SD/SDHC card reader, which means you can have keep the PC
Card/Cardbus slot for things like an Verizon EVDO card from your
previous laptop.

One nice thing about the T400 over the T61 is that it has much better
power savings technology; using powertop, I find that with the display
off, the power usage pushes down to 6 watts, where as with the X61s
with the display off, the power usage is around 8 watts.  With the LED
backlighting, my T400 uses less power with the display on than the
X61s, even though the X61s has a smaller screen.

The bottom line is that I upgraded to the T400 from the X61s recently,
and I've been very happy with the results.

                          - Ted
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[Mikhail Gusarov-3]

Twas brillig at 12:31:01 21.08.2009 UTC-04 when tytso@... did gyre and gimble:

 TT> This is an option; the T400 comes with an ExpressCard/54 slot, and
 TT> an option of either a CardBus slot, a SmartCard reader, or a 7-in-1
 TT> memory card reader.

Nice. CardBus+ExpressCard is interesting option, I still have CardBus TV
card.

(looks for FRU part number)

--
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[Theodore Ts'o-2]

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 11:38:41PM +0700, Mikhail Gusarov wrote:

>
> Twas brillig at 12:31:01 21.08.2009 UTC-04 when tytso@... did gyre and gimble:
>
>  TT> This is an option; the T400 comes with an ExpressCard/54 slot, and
>  TT> an option of either a CardBus slot, a SmartCard reader, or a 7-in-1
>  TT> memory card reader.
>
> Nice. CardBus+ExpressCard is interesting option, I still have CardBus TV
> card.
>
> (looks for FRU part number)

You can get it if you do a customize-to-order CTO T400.  I don't know
if they are shipped that way through retail channels.  Goto

BTW, if you are a Linux Foundation member, you can get access to the
IBM/Lenovo employee discount pricing --- which is really, really good...

                              - Ted
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[Mikhail Gusarov-3]

Twas brillig at 14:47:55 21.08.2009 UTC-04 when tytso@... did gyre and gimble:

 >> Nice. CardBus+ExpressCard is interesting option, I still have
 >> CardBus TV card. (looks for FRU part number)

 TT> You can get it if you do a customize-to-order CTO T400.  I don't
 TT> know if they are shipped that way through retail channels.

Last time I checked it was not available in Russia :-| I was lucky to
find more-or-less adequately configured laptop during visit to Moscow.

--
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[Frank Myhr]

Theodore Tso wrote:
> BTW, if you are a Linux Foundation member, you can get access to the
> IBM/Lenovo employee discount pricing --- which is really, really good...
>
>                     - Ted


Thanks for the tip!
Is this true for individual as well as corporate members? I don't see
that benefit listed at:
http://www.linuxfoundation.org/about/join/individual

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[Theodore Ts'o-2]

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 02:56:39PM -0400, Frank Myhr wrote:
>
> Thanks for the tip!
> Is this true for individual as well as corporate members? I don't see
> that benefit listed at:
> http://www.linuxfoundation.org/about/join/individual

Oops, I just checked, and it's scheduled to be announced in two weeks.
I thought it had already been announced, but not quite yet.

In any case, if someone wants to purchase a Lenovo laptop, contact me
(or any IBM or Lenovo employee), and I or they can tell you how to get
the employee pricing through the "friends and family program".

                      - Ted
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[John Jason Jordan-2]

On Fri, 21 Aug 2009 18:23:33 -0400
Theodore Tso <tytso@...> dijo:

> On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 02:56:39PM -0400, Frank Myhr wrote:
> >
> > Thanks for the tip!
> > Is this true for individual as well as corporate members? I don't see
> > that benefit listed at:
> > http://www.linuxfoundation.org/about/join/individual
>
> Oops, I just checked, and it's scheduled to be announced in two weeks.
> I thought it had already been announced, but not quite yet.
>
> In any case, if someone wants to purchase a Lenovo laptop, contact me
> (or any IBM or Lenovo employee), and I or they can tell you how to get
> the employee pricing through the "friends and family program".

I am not in the market right now anyway, but can I count on someone to
post here when it does become available?
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[Yves-Alexis Perez-2]

On ven, 2009-08-21 at 18:23 -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
> In any case, if someone wants to purchase a Lenovo laptop, contact me
> (or any IBM or Lenovo employee), and I or they can tell you how to get
> the employee pricing through the "friends and family program".

Wow, thanks for that. What's the order of price for “employee pricing”
Thinkpads? (my T61 is still in perfect shape but I have to admit that
T400s look really nice, despite the price).

Cheers,

--
Yves-Alexis

[Theodore Ts'o-2]

On Sat, Aug 22, 2009 at 11:37:53AM +0200, Yves-Alexis Perez wrote:
> On ven, 2009-08-21 at 18:23 -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
> > In any case, if someone wants to purchase a Lenovo laptop, contact me
> > (or any IBM or Lenovo employee), and I or they can tell you how to get
> > the employee pricing through the "friends and family program".
>
> Wow, thanks for that. What's the order of price for “employee pricing”
> Thinkpads? (my T61 is still in perfect shape but I have to admit that
> T400s look really nice, despite the price).

Currently, the public base price for the T400 on the Lenovo web site
is $749 (it's come down in price a lot; they're clearly trying to
clear out inventory) and the public price for the T400s is $1,599.
With the Linux Foundation (or IBM/Lenovo employee) discount the base
price of the T400 is $674 and the for the T400s is $1439.  The prices
and discount levels change a lot.  At this point it looks like the
T400 and T400s have a 10% discount.  Earlier, the discount on the T400
was 20% if memory serves correctly, while the T400s only had the 10%
discount.  So if you're not in a hurry to upgrade, I suggest that you
be patient, and wait for the discount on the T400s to improve; I'm
sure it will, although you might have to wait until after the
Christmas gift-giving season is over.

Personally, I chose the T400 (as an upgrade from an X61s) because I
wanted to use 2.5" primary HDD/SDD slot (since I already had a 2.5"
Intel SSD that I was going to transfer over to the T400), and the T400
is compatible with the older dockstation with the extra ultrabay slot,
and which I had already had when I was using a T60p laptop.  So the
combination of being much cheaper than T400s and being able to
repurpose accessories I had been using with previous Thinkpads made
the decision an easy one.


          - Ted
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[Bibek Paudel]

I hope I am replying to the correct thread. i didn't want to start a
new thread for something similar.

I am facing a few problems with my T400 using Ubuntu 9.04. I
accidentally damaged the Windows partition (and that somehow rendered
the ThinkVantage button useless, more on that here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=405381), so I am yet
to recover the machine to its original state and then install
Debian+Ubuntu+Vista.

Specs: 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 6MB L2 Cache, 2 GB DDR3 RAM, 256 MB
AMD HYBRID GPU, 11B/G WLAN, 9-cell Battery

My problems:
1. Earlier, the battery power indicator used to show more than 4 hours
remaining for a 100% charged battery. Recently, I've noticed that it
shows about 2.4 hours. There's no difference even after I switch off
wireless, bluetooth etc. and reduce screen brightness. Is this a
problem with the indicator, and if it is, what is a better tool to
estimate battery power? If not, what might be the problem?

2. Not that I need to use it all the time, but when I enable Compiz
Desktop effects, the computer reaction time seems to slow down. When a
minimized application is selected, it pauses a while before coming to
focus. When a song is playing, the song pauses too for a while, while
Compiz is enabled and another window is brought to focus. I don't
understand why this is happening. Also, while I play movies in VLC,
after about every 15 minutes, the video freezes for a few seconds
(like 5) and then continues afterwhile. This happens with every video.

Is it some problem with the video driver or something else?

3. How do I use the HDAPS module for hard-disk protection?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Bibek



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[Karsten König]

> My problems:
> 1. Earlier, the battery power indicator used to show more than 4 hours
> remaining for a 100% charged battery. Recently, I've noticed that it
> shows about 2.4 hours. There's no difference even after I switch off
> wireless, bluetooth etc. and reduce screen brightness. Is this a
> problem with the indicator, and if it is, what is a better tool to
> estimate battery power? If not, what might be the problem?

Powertop works good, also gives a rough power draw estimation etc pp., you
should get the system with everything turned down/off (screen still on) to 12W
easily. Also using tp_smapi will give alot of information about the battery,
similar to the windows lenovo power manager, not that pretty though, but also
not drawing that much power...

> 2. Not that I need to use it all the time, but when I enable Compiz
> Desktop effects, the computer reaction time seems to slow down. When a
> minimized application is selected, it pauses a while before coming to
> focus. When a song is playing, the song pauses too for a while, while
> Compiz is enabled and another window is brought to focus. I don't
> understand why this is happening. Also, while I play movies in VLC,
> after about every 15 minutes, the video freezes for a few seconds
> (like 5) and then continues afterwhile. This happens with every video.
>
> Is it some problem with the video driver or something else?

The intel driver ubuntu 9.04 is using isn't the best as far as I heard
(transition phase between two different driver "architectures" (switch to GEM
and KMS, dropping of old rendering paths etc), if turning off compiz makes it
behave just switch it off, you can propably live without it until intel fixed
it.


> 3. How do I use the HDAPS module for hard-disk protection?

Check the thinkwiki about this, the documentation is good and extensive.
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[Bibek Paudel]

Thanks for the reply. I will reply if I still have problems.

2009/9/20 Karsten König <remur@...>:
>
> Powertop works good, also gives a rough power draw estimation etc pp., you
> should get the system with everything turned down/off (screen still on) to 12W
> easily. Also using tp_smapi will give alot of information about the battery,
> similar to the windows lenovo power manager, not that pretty though, but also
> not drawing that much power...

Btw, I wanted to ask how one could turn off just the screen. And if
you use T400 with a 9-cell battery and Ubuntu 9.04 (or some other
Debian derivative), what's the battery performance in your machines?
Would be nice if you'd be able to share.

>
> The intel driver ubuntu 9.04 is using isn't the best as far as I heard
> (transition phase between two different driver "architectures" (switch to GEM
> and KMS, dropping of old rendering paths etc), if turning off compiz makes it
> behave just switch it off, you can propably live without it until intel fixed
> it.
>

Yes, I've switched it off for now. I'm not very fond of Compiz but
sometimes one needs it and it doesn't feel good when 'one of the best
machines around' doesn't work well when it's turned on ;) Btw, is no
other (better) driver (other than Intel) available for the ATI GPU I'm
using? And would I be able to use the integrated Intel graphics card.
I hope that would increase the performance of my battery too.

>
>> 3. How do I use the HDAPS module for hard-disk protection?
>
> Check the thinkwiki about this, the documentation is good and extensive.

Thanks. I heard that HDAPS module is still under development. Does
that mean that it wouldn't be able to provide a reliable hard-drive
protection (from movement-damage)? Please let me know or provide some
pointers.

Thanks a lot again,
Bibek


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  3. This overrides any disclaimer or statement of confidentiality
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[hollunder]

On Sat, 22 Aug 2009 10:18:50 -0400
Theodore Tso <tytso@...> wrote:

> On Sat, Aug 22, 2009 at 11:37:53AM +0200, Yves-Alexis Perez wrote:
> > On ven, 2009-08-21 at 18:23 -0400, Theodore Tso wrote:
> > > In any case, if someone wants to purchase a Lenovo laptop,
> > > contact me (or any IBM or Lenovo employee), and I or they can
> > > tell you how to get the employee pricing through the "friends and
> > > family program".
> >
> > Wow, thanks for that. What's the order of price for “employee
> > pricing” Thinkpads? (my T61 is still in perfect shape but I have to
> > admit that T400s look really nice, despite the price).
>
> Currently, the public base price for the T400 on the Lenovo web site
> is $749 (it's come down in price a lot; they're clearly trying to
> clear out inventory) and the public price for the T400s is $1,599.
> With the Linux Foundation (or IBM/Lenovo employee) discount the base
> price of the T400 is $674 and the for the T400s is $1439.  The prices
> and discount levels change a lot.  At this point it looks like the
> T400 and T400s have a 10% discount.  Earlier, the discount on the T400
> was 20% if memory serves correctly, while the T400s only had the 10%
> discount.  So if you're not in a hurry to upgrade, I suggest that you
> be patient, and wait for the discount on the T400s to improve; I'm
> sure it will, although you might have to wait until after the
> Christmas gift-giving season is over.
>
> Personally, I chose the T400 (as an upgrade from an X61s) because I
> wanted to use 2.5" primary HDD/SDD slot (since I already had a 2.5"
> Intel SSD that I was going to transfer over to the T400), and the T400
> is compatible with the older dockstation with the extra ultrabay slot,
> and which I had already had when I was using a T60p laptop.  So the
> combination of being much cheaper than T400s and being able to
> repurpose accessories I had been using with previous Thinkpads made
> the decision an easy one.
>
>
>           - Ted

The new perks for linux foundation members now got announced two days
ago:
http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-media/announcements/2009/10/linux-foundation-announces-new-exclusive-perks-individual-members

I do have one or two problems tough:
1) The sign-up form for the nice new students membership is US-centric
2) My Lenovo dealer said that according to Lenovo Austria this
discount isn't available in Austria

So is all of this US-only?

Regards,
Philipp
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[Yves-Alexis Perez-2]

On jeu, 2009-10-15 at 10:42 +0200, hollunder@... wrote:
> 2) My Lenovo dealer said that according to Lenovo Austria this
> discount isn't available in Austria

Yup, I think the discount will only be available for shop.lenovo.com us
store.
>
> So is all of this US-only?

I'm affraid so. If someone has more info though…
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