Lenovo 3000 Y410
Created by: JH,Last modification on Sun 09 of Mar, 2008 [17:37 UTC]
This guide is intended to provide you details on how well this laptop works with Linux and which drivers you need to configure. For details on how to actually install and configure the required drivers have a look at our guides section for distribution specific instructions.
If you are looking to purchase this laptop you can visit Lenovo's 3000 series notebooks page.
Authors
JH (triviawiz425 at yahoo dot com)Introduction
This is a guide to running Debian Linux (Testing "Lenny" AMD64) with the Lenovo 3000 Y410 laptop.This page is under construction.
Specifications
| Name | Lenovo 3000 Y410 | |
| Processor | Intel Core 2 Duo T5250@ 1.5GHz | |
| Screen | 14.1" WXGA | |
| RAM | 2GB | |
| HDD | 160GB | |
| Optical Drive | DVD+-RW,2Layer | |
| Graphics | Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X3100 | |
| Network | Broadcom BCM5906M Fast Ethernet, Intel 3945ABG Wireless, Bluetooth | |
| Other | 3 x USB2.0, 1 x Firewire (800/4-pin) | |
Linux Compatibility
| Device | Compatibility | Comments |
| Processor | Yes | |
| Screen | Yes | |
| Optical Drive | Yes | |
| Graphics | Yes | Use the i810 driver |
| Sound | Yes | Use the snd-hda-intel driver with model=sony-assamd (note that the microphone and headphone jacks won't work) |
| Touchpad | yes | Dont forget to apt-get the synaptics driver for xorg (and GNOME or KDE) |
| Ethernet | Yes | |
| Wireless | Yes | Use the ipw3945 driver in the apt repos |
| Bluetooth | Yes | |
| 56K Modem | Not Tested | |
| USB | Yes | ICH8 |
| Firewire | Not Tested | |
| SD Card Reader | Yes | |
| PCMCIA | Not Tested | |
Related Resources
Preparing your laptop for LinuxIncreasing battery life
Summary
There are a few things that don't yet work well in Linux with this model, but for the most part, you'll find that these things won't seriously hinder your performance, and this is still a good laptop for running Linux on.Have you installed Linux on this laptop? If so how about leaving a comment about your success in the comments section below.
Comments
Problem with sound and wireless
With openSUSE, Compiz won't run properly until I upgraded to kernel 2.6.22.17 and Xorg 7.3.
With Ubuntu, just can't get the desktop effect to work, even with the restricted drivers.
Mandriva 2008.1 works like a charm, well almost... with a problem common to all the distros I tried except MS Windows.
The common problems are two: Sound and Wireless.
It seems that the sound won't work. I managed to make it work with openSUSE by updating to ALSA xx16 (don't remember the xx part) and setting model to Auto. Still, the subwoofer doesn't work. If I set model to acer (i think), subwoofer works as a mono speaker, but front speaker won't work. In almost all model options tried, none is perfect but Auto is not so bad. And yet, once rebooted, I may or may not get the sound. Same in Ubuntu.
As for the wireless, lspci shows it is detected and properly too but can't be used because all the linux distro says that the hardware RF kill is on (which is not). I tried overiding the rf_kill value but that is for software kill switch and won't work - especially in Ubuntu with that kernel bug (still not solved as of today) where you can't even write to the rf_kill file... confusing. And in Mandriva, it works at first, or sometimes and I think I know why now.
Here's what I discovered that is the ONLY workaround available in all the linux I tried - I couldn't find it ANYWHERE on the Internet after searching like crazy for a whole week (sleepless... 20 hours a day on this).
For anyone having the same model, here's the workaround to get Wireless and Sound to work and it's actually easy. Actually, two ways but the second one is more reliable if your distro suspends properly.
Method 1: During boot up, at Grub (or in BIOS boot), press Ctrl-Alt-Del for warm reboot. If during the warm reboot the wireless light turns red, you have a chance that the RF kill switch is now off. If not, Ctrl-Alt-Del again. Still, it's just a chance. To increase your chance, try also to increase the sleep time between modprobe of the ipw driver and the loading of the ipw daemon (in /etc/modprobe.d/ipw3945 — there's the sleep 0.5 parameter, change to sleep 2 or more).
Method 2: This is more reliable if your distro suspends reliably. Simple actually and I have tested in Mandriva and Ubuntu. Just press Fn-F1 to go to sleep mode and then wake it up. Now, the Fn-F5 (Wifi) and Fn-F6 (Bluetooth) just works! At the same time, so is the sound! (not the subwoofer, though)
So now, here's my idea which I don't know how to do: make the same script that run on wake-up also run during boot. So, does anyone know how?
If only I've tried suspending it earlier, I would have more sleep. I never tried Fn-F1 (suspend) before as I read that it might have trouble waking up. Instead, it actually repairs the keyboard map for the Fn key.
Please, if anyone know how to put the wake-up script also into boot, then I think the bug can be fixed in ALL distro.
All in all, Mandriva 2008.1 works out of the box (even the webcam and desktop effects) - you just have to press Fn-F1 to enable wifi RF Kill key and sound (same in Ubuntu). openSUSE is still the best for it but I am yet to try the workaround there. I suspect it will work.
I will continue to investigate and maybe I'll post the findings at http://blog.syafril.com if I have the time. I'll put this up there too so anyone can contribute. FYI, mine is the Lenovo IdeaPad Y410 Model 7757 (IdeaPad and 3000 is the same - only marketing).