[ltp] What to take care of when buying a Lenovo?

[Ashok Leyland]

On Sat, Mar 08, 2008 at 05:00:43PM -0500, Michael B Allen wrote:
> On 3/8/08, Tobi <listaccount@e-tobi.net> wrote:
> > Hello!
> >
> >  While searching for a new notebook with the following basic parameters:
> >
> >   - CPU > 2 GHz, at least 4 MB L2 Cache
> >   - 2 x 2 GB RAM
> >   - SATA > 250GB, 8MB Cache
> >   - 15,4" display (non-glossy)
> >
> >  ...I was recommended to take a look at the Lenovo T60 / T61.
> >
> >  I would like to run Linux on the notebook and keep Windows XP or 2008
> >  (for doing some VisualStudio development) jailed in a VirtualBox.
> >
> >  Is there anything I should take care of, when buying a Lenovo notebook
> >  for Linux? Any trouble with specific hardware components, unsupported
> >  features or missing drivers? Any trouble running a 64-bit Linux?
> 
> Hi Tobias,
> 
> I just got a new T61 and the Intel 4965AGN wireless doesn't work. The
> driver isn't even in any distro Kernel I know of. But, Intel has a
> driver so it seems like it's mostly just a matter of time for it to
> make into the stock kernels (I'm hoping CentOS 5.2 will have it). So
> if you want to use wireless, you'll have to compile your own kernel
> and then block the kernel from updating or symbol versioning is going
> to break your wireless every time you update (unless the updated
> kernel includes the new driver of course).

you can build the iwlwifi module out of the kernel treel on debian, the
linux-headers-$(uname -r) package is enough, you don't  need the full
source, never mind building your own kernel. You may need to patch
mac802.11 - IIRC intellinuxwireless.org and/or the READMEs have info on
this.

The driver is in 2.6.24

This is on an X61s, running debian testing

[snip]