toshiba satellite 2140 cds NOW SOLVED read on for the saga..

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Minstrel
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Joined: Mon 24 Mar 2008, 11:25

toshiba satellite 2140 cds NOW SOLVED read on for the saga..

#1 Post by Minstrel »

Can anyone help with the above?
This has to be the suckiest laptop I`ve installed puppy on to date.
I`ve been into bios where I find that irq11 cannot be changed for another,
as i`m not familiar with linux speak,I`m assuming there might be a config script that can remedy this.

Puppy runs fine on on My ibm tp600,in fact it can run tmxxine prism or shard,with 228meg of ram to an acceptable level of speed.

The toshiba currently has 96meg and a faster cpu,not that it shows.I installed win98se on it last night and now have a wireless connection.
I`ve just downloaded pupwin98,onto it so that I can find out whether puppy bites a chunk out of irq11 when I run it.I`m guessing that it will,I tried two different pcmcia wireless cards with the toshiba,one of which contained the atheros b/g+ chipset.It is now non functonial.I read a spec of it yesterday,and apparently it uses cmos,I think that maybe some naff code has been written to it by the toshiba,as the other card(rt2500) is fine.

Any ideas?

Someone out there must have more brain cells than Me........
Last edited by Minstrel on Sat 29 Mar 2008, 17:22, edited 1 time in total.

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Aitch
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Location: Chatham, Kent, UK

#2 Post by Aitch »

Hi Minstrel

Cards on the table, never used pupwin98
Don't understand the concern wth irq11

but have got puppy working on several desktops/laptops including an old IBM 560 you seem to be having a problem with wifi
So I take it you got puppy running - sort of

If the problem is only the wifi you say
as the other card(rt2500) is fine.
presumably with win98, yes?

It should be OK with puppy too
I have 214, 217, & 214R all mount my wifi Ok & I use RT2500 drivers for an asus wifi card

So try to be clearer about your problem

How far have you got, what have you tried, and where are you stuck?

What symptoms exactly, are you getting

Does the driver load?

if you run network wizard, are you getting a connection, i.e. is the network up, but a wep/wpa problem?
If so, try turning security off
Are you trying DHCP?
Try recording your AP's IP address and manually point your adapter to it in network wizard - static IP, at the bottom

Try searching here

http://www.wellminded.com/puppy/pupsearch.html

Aitch

Minstrel
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon 24 Mar 2008, 11:25

toshiba satellite 2140 cds

#3 Post by Minstrel »

Hi Aitch,
no matter what I do to the bios of the above machine,puppy boot cd automatically turns off irq11,which just happens to be the one needed to address My wifi card.

As for pupwin98,I installed and ran it,the same thing happened only this time I did get feedback.This told Me that attempts to assign pins a & b of My wifi card failed,& that I should try pci=biosirq,then it hung up.

I tried a boot from puppy 2.17final,& gave that instruction,to no avail.
This issue is machine specific,ie the toshiba only,the tp600 is fine.
All drivers load ok with puppy,but the fact that it has turned off the irq to My card makes that a non starter.Using win98 all is ok,this only happens with puppy,ARRGGHH!

Hope this clarifies the problem I am having.

Kind regards,

Minstrel.

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Aitch
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Location: Chatham, Kent, UK

#4 Post by Aitch »

Hi Minstrel
Yep clear as
I think the problem is 2 fold
1 Age; early bioses were lousy
2 settings - default being the usual settings
somewhere in the bios you should see a section which says 'pnp os' and you should be able to toggle it on or off with space bar or up/down arrows
turn it OFF
- remember to save settings when closing the bios settings/reboot
this then allows the user control of the IRQs instead of the default bios, which assumes windows/dos requirement for stupidity
You may find after doing this you will have to manually set up your various PCI devices, including possibly hard drives/Cd & ports, but most likely things like network cards, modem, sound, and a few others which you may or may not have
Go into bios first before changing anything and write down all your settings
Also, in windows go to hardware settings, [right click my computer] and see what default settings each card/device is assigned by windows, especially if you have no 'yellow flags' which means all the right drivers, & everything functioning
Write it all down, its a pain but you won't sort it unless you do
failing all that see if you can get a bios update, that may be your only hope as it may just be one of those B's that won't respond to anything else

for bios info

http://www.sysopt.com/features/mboard/a ... hp/3549966

for hardware info, download in win98

http://www.lavalys.com/

I didn't think puppy/linux took too much notice of the bios, but as I said, I haven't used pupwin98

What happens on a straight live cd run, assuming you have bootable CD?
any messages?
Try acpi=off or pfix=ram or something

Good luck

Aitch

Minstrel
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon 24 Mar 2008, 11:25

toshiba satellite 2140 cds

#5 Post by Minstrel »

Hi aitch,
no luck so far,I did note however,that on windoze 98 irq11 is shared by no less than 9 devices.
The bios is listed as toshiba bios,and I have the `companion diskette`
that allegedly allows bios adjustments.All it actually does is to allow access to normal bios from dos,Humpff....

At no time will bios allow Me to poke irq11 with a stick or, more appropriately,a searingly red hot poker!

What is so annoying,is that here We have an example of a function that can be performed by windoze,but not apparently,by puppy.
I feel sure therefore,that this could be rectified by a puppian with the coding skills under his/her belt.

Thanks for the help,

minstrel.

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Aitch
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Location: Chatham, Kent, UK

#6 Post by Aitch »

@minstrel

I'm still not clear exactly what your problem is, since you don't exactly say

1. How are you accessing your bios?
2. What CAN you see/do when entering the bios? IF you actually enter it!
3. It is perfectly normal for there to be multiple devices use irq11 in windows
if the Lappy has Intel chipset you will have all sorts of multiple devices INCLUDING the H/D & controller & irq controller

4. What makes you want puppy to 'do something with it'?

5. What version of puppy?
6. What happens when you run live CD?
i.e. how far does it get, & what is on screen?

If you don't give at least this fundamental info, I can't help any further, as I'm not telepathic at this distance

Try this:-
http://uk.computers.toshiba-europe.com/ ... service=UK

Aitch :)

Minstrel
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon 24 Mar 2008, 11:25

toshiba satellite 2140 cds

#7 Post by Minstrel »

Hi Aitch,

1]bios is accessed by holding down the escape key whilst powering up.

2]most of the more common functions can be changed,but not irq11.

4]the something I want to do,is have My pcmcia wifi card working.

5]as in My original post,versions 2.14,2.15,2.16,2.17 have all been tried
cd versions is what I am talking about,they all respond the same way.

6]boot up is perfectly normal,but for the message,"disabling irq11"
I am able to run all the relevant software,as needed,only wifi is affected.

I now have the bios update,& will try it out once I have time,most likely friday.

I hope this clarifies the situation.

Thanks for trying to help,

Minstrel.

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Aitch
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Location: Chatham, Kent, UK

#8 Post by Aitch »

@minstrel

OK

Final suggestion for me

Try a different wifi card that has a different irq

Should see something here

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 1b5eb2e631

Aitch

muggins
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#9 Post by muggins »

4]the something I want to do,is have My pcmcia wifi card working.
http://newsletter.toshiba-tro.de/main/index.html

This site has some info on linux on a 2140, (under the section Machine Installation Help).
PCMCIA packets must be included during installation or afterwards to be able to use the PCMCIA slots.
Don't use the PC-BUS option in BIOS setup.
Please choose the i82365 chip while installing.
If you have problems acquiring enough free interrupt resources try using the IRQ 10 for PCMCIA (This IRQ is usually free in most Toshiba machines).The attached syntax can be used with the loading of the module: irq_list=10.
In this directory /etc/pcmcia you will be able to find all the config files for your PCMCIA devices.
Attached, find a example configuration
Unfortunately there isn't any attachment! Maybe upgrading your Bios is the best option.

Minstrel
Posts: 6
Joined: Mon 24 Mar 2008, 11:25

toshiba satellite 2140 cds

#10 Post by Minstrel »

Hi Aitch&Muggins,

I used the bios update to-night,no visible difference,but I was able to access a setting that I could`nt before.This was pc card & was in autoselect mode.Once changed to cardbus 16bit every thing worked!!

So problem solved,Thanks for all Your kind efforts,I hope the info generated maybe useful to someone else at some point.

Thanks again,

minstrel.
Last edited by Minstrel on Sat 29 Mar 2008, 17:19, edited 1 time in total.

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Aitch
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Location: Chatham, Kent, UK

#11 Post by Aitch »

@minstrel

Yes, I'm sure it was the bios update

Can you mark this as 'solved' in the listing, thanks

happy to have helped

Aitch

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