Which Hardware does work with Linux and which does not. All setup was done on a Debian system linux running a 2.4 series Kernel. I recently switched to a 2.6 series Kernel all 2.6 configuration info will be put on it's own page: lifebook-2.6.

The onboard sound device is identified as followed in /proc/pci:

Bus  0, device   0, function  1:
   Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corp. 82440MX AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 0).
     IRQ 9.
     I/O at 0x1000 [0x10ff].
     I/O at 0x1400 [0x143f].

The 2.4 series kernel comes with “Intel ICH (i8xx) audio support” (i810_audio.o) but this driver does only support 44kHz files and I wasn't able to use it with sox's play or with mpg123. The better choice is the alsa driver. Enable the sound support in the kernelconfig and get the alsa-driver package from http://www.alsa-project.org - Unpack it and run

./configure
./snddevices
make
make install

Then add the following three modules to your /etc/modules

snd-intel8x0
snd-pcm-oss
snd-mixer-oss

The alsa modules do set all mixer settings to zero so it makes sense to set them to a useful state on bootup. Just install setmixer:

apt-get install setmixer

Note the Laptop disables the internal speakers when a headphone is plugged in - I like that.

The Lifebook comes with an ATI Rage Mobility with 8 MB RAM:

 Bus  0, device  20, function  0:
   VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Rage Mobility P/M (rev 100).
     IRQ 9.
     Master Capable.  Latency=66.  Min Gnt=8.
     Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfd000000 [0xfdffffff].
     I/O at 0x2000 [0x20ff].
     Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfc005000 [0xfc005fff].

This chipset is supported in the actual XFree86 package by the ati server.

Section "Device"
        Identifier      "ATI Rage Mobility"
        Driver          "ati"
EndSection

I wasn't able to enable any accelerated framebuffer (atyfb or aty128fb) but I get no errormessages so maybe I did something wrong - Any help is appreciated. However the VESA framebuffer works fine. Only fbi (a tool to view images on the framebuffer device) freaked me out. On displaying a jpeg file it faded the screen to white and freezed everything - I had to do an hardreset.

The onboardchip identifies itself as:

 Bus  0, device  18, function  0:
   Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139 (rev 16).
     IRQ 9.
     Master Capable.  Latency=64.  Min Gnt=32.Max Lat=64.
     I/O at 0x8000 [0x80ff].
     Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfc004800 [0xfc0048ff].

It is suppored by the “RealTek RTL-8139 PCI Fast Ethernet Adapter” kernel driver (8139too.o).

The driver supports the “Media Independent Interface” (MMI) mode. So it's able to detect plugging in an ethernet cable by using ifplugd.

#> apt-get install ifplugd

Edit /etc/default/ifplugd like this:

INTERFACES="eth0"
HOTPLUG_INTERFACES=""
ARGS="-q -d5 -w -I"
SUSPEND_ACTION="stop"

It will execute ifup or ifdown when a cable is plugged in or out.

Lately the machine behaves strangely. It only initializes the network card when connected to AC or when the battery is 100% full. This is the same for Linux and Windows. There is no way to access the card then - even lspci is unable to find it. If anyone knows how to fix this please contact me or write it here!

 Bus  0, device   7, function  2:
   USB Controller: Intel Corp. 82440MX USB Universal Host Controller (rev 0).
     IRQ 15.
     Master Capable.  Latency=64.
     I/O at 0x1460 [0x147f].

The USB controller works fine with the standard UHCI kernel driver (usb-uhci.o). Be sure to install the usb-manager:

#> apt-get install usbmgr

 Bus  0, device  17, function  0:
   FireWire (IEEE 1394): PCI device 104c:8026 (Texas Instruments) (rev 0).
     IRQ 9.
     Master Capable.  Latency=64.  Min Gnt=2.Max Lat=4.
     Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfc004000 [0xfc0047ff].
     Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0xfc000000 [0xfc003fff].

I don't own a firewire device so I could not test it, but the “OHCI-1394” kernel driver (ohci1394.o) loads without errors so I suppose it's working. However it prevents the machine from going to Suspend-to-RAM mode so leave it out if you don't need it.

/proc/pci says:

Bus  0, device  19, function  0:
  CardBus bridge: O2 Micro, Inc. OZ6933 Cardbus Controller (rev 2).
    IRQ 9.
    Master Capable.  Latency=168.  Min Gnt=128.Max Lat=4.
    Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0x10000000 [0x10000fff].
Bus  0, device  19, function  1:
  CardBus bridge: O2 Micro, Inc. OZ6933 Cardbus Controller (#2) (rev 2).
    IRQ 9.
    Master Capable.  Latency=168.  Min Gnt=128.Max Lat=4.
    Non-prefetchable 32 bit memory at 0x10001000 [0x10001fff].

The PCMCIA driver works fine with the stock Kernel Yenta compatible CardBus driver. Just install the PCMCIA utils:

#> apt-get install pcmcia-cs

Bad news. /proc/pci says:

 Bus  0, device   0, function  2:
   Modem: PCI device 8086:7196 (Intel Corp.) (rev 0).
     IRQ 9.
     I/O at 0x1800 [0x18ff].
     I/O at 0x1480 [0x14ff].

Windows installs it as “Lucent Softmodem AMR” which is not supported on linux (see http://www.linmodems.org ). I knew it when I bought the laptop but as I don't need the modem it didn't matter to me.

The scanmodem tool available at http://linmodems.technion.ac.il/ prints this information:

Providing detail for device at PCI_bus 0000:00:00.2
  with vendor-ID:device-ID
            ----:----
Class 0703: 8086:7196   Modem: Intel Corp. 82440MX AC'97 Modem Controller (prog-if 00 [Generic])
  SubSystem 10cf:10d1   Fujitsu Limited.: Unknown device 10d1
        Flags: fast devsel, IRQ 9
        I/O ports at 1400 [size=256]
        I/O ports at 1c00 [size=128]
 The soft modem Subsystem operates under a controller
     8086:7196 82440 Banister  with Subsystem chipset POSSIBLY from:
        AgereSystems
        Smartlink

My model comes with a 20 GB harddisk (FUJITSU MHN2200AT) here are some specs:

#> fdisk -l /dev/hda

Disk /dev/hda: 20.0 GB, 20003880960 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 2432 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1   *           1        1156     9285538+   c  W95 FAT32 (LBA)
/dev/hda2   *        1157        2372     9767520   83  Linux
/dev/hda3            2373        2432      481950   82  Linux swap

I added the following kernel params to my /boot/grub/menu.lst (for lilo use the append command) but with no remarkable speedincreases:

ide0=autotune hda=autotune

My Lifebook comes with a DVD/CD-RW combo drive.

/proc/ide/hdb/model
   TOSHIBA DVD-ROM SD-R2102

For burning CDs you must enable “generic SCSI support” and “SCSI emulation support” then pass the following command to the kernel on boot (via lilo or grub):

hdb=scsi

This makes the CD-Rom drive available as /dev/scd0 (adjust your /etc/fstab to reflect this)

Output of 'cdrecord -scanbus':

Cdrecord 1.10 (i686-pc-linux-gnu) Copyright (C) 1995-2001 Jörg Schilling
Linux sg driver version: 3.1.22
Using libscg version 'schily-0.5'
scsibus0:
       0,0,0     0) 'TOSHIBA ' 'DVD-ROM SD-R2102' '1G15' Removable CD-ROM

cdrdao needs the following options in /etc/cdrdao.conf:

write_device:0,0,0
write_driver:generic-mmc
write_speed:8
read_device:0,0,0
read_driver:generic-mmc

It does work with the smc-ircc driver. Simply put the following line into /etc/modutils/irda :

  alias irda0 smc-ircc

install the IRDA tools

#> apt-get install irda-tools

and edit /etc/irda.conf:

IRDADEV=smc-ircc
DONGLE=none
DISCOVERY=-s
ENABLE=no

The buildin touchpad works fine as ps2 mouse.

gpm.conf

device=/dev/psaux
responsiveness=
repeat_type=raw

type=ps2
append=""
sample_rate=150

In XF86Config use this:

Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier      "Configured Mouse"
        Driver          "mouse"
        Option          "CorePointer"
        Option          "Device"                "/dev/gpmdata"
        Option          "Protocol"              "GlidePointPS/2"
        Option          "Emulate3Buttons"       "true"
EndSection

The Lifebook comes with a Pentium III mobile processor. I didn't try any speedstep patches for the 2.4 Kernel instead I enabled autoswitching in the BIOS. This decreases the CPU speed on boot when running on battery power.

Advanced Powermanagement (APM) including Suspend-to-RAM works fine. Just enable APM support in the Kernel and install the APM daemon.

#> apt-get install apmd

Like the scrollbuttons the multimedia buttons above the keyboard do not create any scancodes with showkey so they are not usable out of the box. I didn't look for a solution because I don't really need them.

The lifebook is a small, lightweight, silent but powerful machine with hardware that ist mostly covered by the current linux drivers. It's a good replacement for my old Omnibook800. I love it!

You may want to have a look over at TuxMobil for more help on running Linux on laptops.