This is a compatibility guide to running Linux with the HP EliteBook 8740w laptop.

This page is just for discussing using Linux on the HP EliteBook 8740w. For a general discussion about this laptop you can visit the HP EliteBook 8740w page on LapWik.

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For full specifications see the HP EliteBook 8740w specifications page.

You can enter any specific notes with running Linux on the HP EliteBook 8740w here.
Panel brightness - not working (It works out of the box on Ubuntu 10.10 and gentoo)
HW Virtualization with BusyBox needed to be enabled in Bios.

To prevent kacpid consuming 100% CPU on one thread, had to upgrade to kernel 2.6.35-020635rc6-generic and add the following to /etc/rc.local:

echo disable > /sys/firmware/acpi/interrupts/gpe01  

See this link and search for kacpid: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/577702

If this alone does not help, you can also try to add

pcie_ports=compat

to your kernel's parameters.

(This is not necessary on Ubuntu 10.10, 60Hz works out of the box with proprietary Nvidia drivers)

It goes without saying you are using Nvidia's drivers, right?

By default you will not be able to raise the refresh rate above 50hz. This is not an issue with the harware, but is a design feature of the Nvidia drivers. See here:

http://linuxtidbits.wordpress.com/2009/09/19/fix-nvidia-50-hz-display-rate/

As per the link above, make sure you have run sudo nvidia-xconfig, then turn off TwinView and DynamicTwinView in your xorg.conf in the Device section for your nvidia driver:

Section        "Device"
Identifier     "Device0"
Driver         "nvidia"
VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
Option         "TwinView" "0"
Option         "DynamicTwinView" "0"
EndSection

Stop/start the x-server, and you should now be able to set the screen to 60hz at full resolution.

This section is obsolete since kernel-2.6.37 (gentoo).

If you don't manage to get suspend to ram working, you can try to unload the
xhci_hcd module before suspending. It seems, the usb3 driver doesn't want to
go to suspend.

$ rmmod xhci_hcd
$ s2ram -f
$ modprobe xhci_hcd

works fine for me (gentoo), when also disabling the acpi interrupts. But you should not use this while a disk is mounted via USB3, as this does not unmount it safely! Hopefully the USB3 driver is going to support suspend soon, so this section can be removed.

Suspend and Hibernate does not work on Ubuntu 10.10, but there is a very easy fix available:
http://ohioloco.ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=10164552&postcount=3

Apperently ALSA does not initialize the soundcard correctly. But there is a temporary fix for this:

$ echo "0x1e 0x01452050" > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/user_pin_configs
$ echo 1 > /sys/class/sound/hwC0D0/reconfig

This has to be done, while the soundcard is not in use. So best is to put in a init script. A better soluten were to use the “early patching” machanism of ALSA, but I somehow can't figure out how this works.

Okay; if you're anything like me you've already Ebayed the Windows licence that came with this thing and donated the profits to the Free Software Foundation. Which makes upgrading the BIOS somewhat tricky, since HP only provide a Windows executable for doing this.

So, having just done just this a few moments ago, here's what I did. (Disclaimer: you do this ENTIRELY AT YOUR OWN RISK.)

1) Download the latest BIOS ugrade from the HP site. It will be a Windows executable.

2) Install the software you are about to need, using your favourite package manager. I did this:

sudo apt-get install wine
sudo apt-get install gparted
sudo apt-get install unetbootin

3) Run the BIOS upgrade (in my case sp52278.exe) under wine:

wine ./sp52278.exe

I let it put its files here:

c:\SWSetup\sp52278

You can try to get it to create a USB bootable key for you, but it will most probably bomb-out at this stage. Hence the remaining steps…

4) Format the USB stick as FAT32. (I used gparted.)
PARANOIA: Do “sync” a few times in a command window:

sync
sync
sync

5) Pull the stick out, ram it back in and mount it (I used Dolphin to do this)

6) Make your stick bootable:

unetbootin

Choose the “Distribution” radio button,
select FreeDOS in the “Select Distribution” dropdown,
make sure it is pointing at the correct device (/dev/sdb1 in my case),
Go!

7) Copy the files that you will use to flash your BIOS:

cp -Rp ~/.wine/drive_c/SWSetup/sp52278/Rompaq/* /media/drive

Where /media/drive is wherever Dolphin mounted your USB stick. You want everything in that Rompaq directory.

PARANOIA: Do “sync” compulsively a bit more:

sync
sync
sync

8) Shut down the laptop.
Made DAMN SURE all lights are off!
Unplug the power and pull out the battery if you have to: I've had my machine seemingly turned off before, but the power light stayed on and every time I restarted it, the fan stayed on FULL POWER nonstop!
Eventually I had to pull out the battery whilst it was “shut down”.
(By “shut down” I mean silent, seemingly off except for that blue power light, alone in the darkness, judging me…)

9) Now plug in the power (and the USB stick) and start up again.
(You HAVE configured the BIOS to boot from USB, yes?)

10) Fanny about until you get the A: command prompt. Then switch to the C: drive:

C:
dir

You should see all the files you copied from Rompaq/ before.

11) Now is the Moment of Truth:

eRompaq.exe

A menu will appear, offering you the option to upgrade your BIOS!
Select the upgrade option, let it do it's thing, then select the exit option.

12) Now turn off the PC again… how?
(I pressed the power button… is there a way to do this from the command line in FreeDOS?)

Pull out the USB stick and shove it to the back of the drawer where you found it.

13) Turn the PC on again.
(It whirrs and blinks, shuts itself down: you've just BRICKED several thousand pounds of hardware!)

There is a good reason this is step number thirteen.

14) It should automatically turn itself on again… phew! This time it should boot properly.
(If you like, go into BIOS setup to check the new version has taken hold.)

You can enter a summary of how well the HP EliteBook 8740w works with Linux here.
Quite fast with 4GB ram. (Even sweeter with 8! Has anyone splashed out on the full 16?)