# Acer Travelmate 4150NLCi Laptop - With i915GM Chipset

## gnufied

Hello guys , i have above laptop with following config:

1. Intel 915GM motherboard

2. Philips DVD combo ( looks like ATA , shows as dev/hdd)

3. Intel 900 Graphics Controller(Inbuilt in the motherboard)

4. Hard disk ( i dont know ,what it is.. it shows up as /dev/hdc , chances are it could be PATA)

5. 256MB of DDR2 RAM

My lspci shows

Apart from other devices, one IDE controller and other ISA controller.I dont want to jump to conclusions ,  but looks like DVD combo is 

on IDE and Hard disk is on ISA.

i am using kernel-2.6.13

So here is my problem.. i dont have DMA enabled on either Hard disk or Combo.

I tried all sort of solutions.Compiled kernel twice , hand edited "libata.h" but no luck.

As usual i dont have DRI working.. i am using VESA as graphics driver.I am not exactly happy with it, 

but that is not a big issue.My current problem is no DMA on hard disk.It makes the whole system

very slow whenever there is some hard disk activity.

And on top of it..the evil OS works coolly.[/i]Last edited by gnufied on Mon Sep 19, 2005 10:44 am; edited 1 time in total

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## chrbecke

I don't think your hard drive is connected to the ISA controller, it'll be connected to your IDE controller as is your DVD drive.

Check wether DMA is disabled for your drives by runnig (as root):

```
hdparm -i /dev/hdc

hdparm -i /dev/hdd
```

This will show you the current settings and the capabilities of both your drives.

You can set DMA by running 

```
hdparm -d1 /dev/hdX
```

 (replace X with the letter corresponding to the drive, i.e. c or d in your case)

If you want to enable DMA by default on boot, do 

```
rc-update add hdparm default
```

----------

## gnufied

thanks for the prompt reply..

yeah i have checked out "hdparm -I /dev/hdc".

When i try to do "hdparm -d1 /dev/hdc" i get a error message saying "Permission denied, using DMA off".

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## gnufied

Any ideas guys?

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## gnufied

Ok... guys here is some more info...

Here is output of my "lspci" command:

```

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/PM/GMS/910GML Express Processor to DRAM Controller (rev 03)

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics Controller (rev 03)

00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 915GM/GMS/910GML Express Graphics Controller (rev 03)

00:1d.0 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #1 (rev 04)

00:1d.1 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #2 (rev 04)

00:1d.2 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #3 (rev 04)

00:1d.3 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #4 (rev 04)

00:1d.7 USB Controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller (rev 04)

00:1e.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation 82801 Mobile PCI Bridge (rev d4)

00:1e.2 Multimedia audio controller: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) AC'97 Audio Controller (rev 04)

00:1e.3 Modem: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) AC'97 Modem Controller (rev 04)

00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation 82801FBM (ICH6M) LPC Interface Bridge (rev 04)

00:1f.2 IDE interface: Intel Corporation 82801FBM (ICH6M) SATA Controller (rev 04)

00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) SMBus Controller (rev 04)

01:00.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments TSB43AB21 IEEE-1394a-2000 Controller (PHY/Link)

01:01.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX (rev 02)

01:02.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation PRO/Wireless 2200BG (rev 05)

01:04.0 CardBus bridge: ENE Technology Inc CB-712/4 Cardbus Controller (rev 10)

01:04.1 FLASH memory: ENE Technology Inc: Unknown device 0530 (rev 01)

01:04.2 Class 0805: ENE Technology Inc: Unknown device 0550 (rev 01)

01:04.3 FLASH memory: ENE Technology Inc: Unknown device 0520 (rev 01)

01:04.4 FLASH memory: ENE Technology Inc: Unknown device 0551 (rev 01)

```

And here is the output of my "hdparm -I /dev/hdc".Where HDC is my PATA hard disk.

```

ATA device, with non-removable media

        Model Number:       IC25N060ATMR04-0

        Serial Number:      MRA301KEKZ977H

        Firmware Revision:  MO3OAD4A

Standards:

        Used: ATA/ATAPI-6 T13 1410D revision 3a

        Supported: 6 5 4 3

Configuration:

        Logical         max     current

        cylinders       16383   65535

        heads           16      1

        sectors/track   63      63

        --

        CHS current addressable sectors:    4128705

        LBA    user addressable sectors:  117210240

        LBA48  user addressable sectors:  117210240

        device size with M = 1024*1024:       57231 MBytes

        device size with M = 1000*1000:       60011 MBytes (60 GB)

Capabilities:

        LBA, IORDY(can be disabled)

        bytes avail on r/w long: 4      Queue depth: 1

        Standby timer values: spec'd by Vendor, no device specific minimum

        R/W multiple sector transfer: Max = 16  Current = 16

        Advanced power management level: 128 (0x80)

        Recommended acoustic management value: 128, current value: 254

        DMA: mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 udma2 udma3 udma4 *udma5

             Cycle time: min=120ns recommended=120ns

        PIO: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4

             Cycle time: no flow control=240ns  IORDY flow control=120ns

Commands/features:

        Enabled Supported:

           *    NOP cmd

           *    READ BUFFER cmd

           *    WRITE BUFFER cmd

           *    Host Protected Area feature set

           *    Look-ahead

           *    Write cache

           *    Power Management feature set

                Security Mode feature set

                SMART feature set

           *    FLUSH CACHE EXT command

           *    Mandatory FLUSH CACHE command

           *    Device Configuration Overlay feature set

           *    48-bit Address feature set

                Automatic Acoustic Management feature set

                SET MAX security extension

                Address Offset Reserved Area Boot

           *    SET FEATURES subcommand required to spinup after power up

                Power-Up In Standby feature set

           *    Advanced Power Management feature set

           *    General Purpose Logging feature set

           *    SMART self-test

           *    SMART error logging

Security:

        Master password revision code = 65534

                supported

        not     enabled

        not     locked

        not     frozen

        not     expired: security count

        not     supported: enhanced erase

        50min for SECURITY ERASE UNIT.

HW reset results:

        CBLID- above Vih

        Device num = 0 determined by the jumper

Checksum: correct

```

And here is output for "hdparm -I /dev/hdd".Where hdd is my DVD combo..

```

/dev/hdd:

ATAPI CD-ROM, with removable media

        Model Number:       PHILIPS CD-RW/DVD-ROM SCB5265

        Serial Number:

        Firmware Revision:  TX07

Standards:

        Likely used CD-ROM ATAPI-1

Configuration:

        DRQ response: 50us.

        Packet size: 12 bytes

Capabilities:

        LBA, IORDY(can be disabled)

        DMA: sdma0 sdma1 sdma2 mdma0 mdma1 mdma2 udma0 udma1 *udma2

             Cycle time: min=120ns recommended=120ns

        PIO: pio0 pio1 pio2 pio3 pio4

             Cycle time: no flow control=120ns  IORDY flow control=120ns

```

Can anyone tell me what is the function of ISA controller? I have searched around the NET and found that it is yet another controller

that can be used to interface hard disks or cd-drives.But they say it is kind of outdated.

By any chance... do you guys think my Hard disk is on ISA bus. Moreover now i am 100% sure my hard disk is PATA only.

----------

## gnufied

ANy ideas?

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## chrbecke

DMA is enabled for both drives, your hard disk runs in udma5 mode, your DVD combo in udma2 mode. So this can't be the reason for low disk performance. Maybe your drives are getting full? Try 

```
df -h
```

----------

## gnufied

This is fresh install.And my root partition is of 11GB. I will post the output of "df -h" after i reach home.But that shouldnt be

the case.

if DMA is enabled why i am getting this error:

```

#hdparm -d1 /dev/hdc

/dev/hdc

Setting DMA = 1 (on)

Permission not allowed

using DMA off

```

Are you sure , DMA is enabled?

----------

## gnufied

And... i am not alone. Many guys had this problem. Few managed to fix.

Check out this link http://scrabbers.blogspot.com/2005/06/installing-linux-on-acer-travelmate.html

He wont tell me what exactly he did!! He puts up a diff output, that is hardly helpful.

This guy claims that he has fixed that problem.But he is using Ubuntu.

----------

## gnufied

One guy on LinuxQuestions.org claims that he just upgraded the version of hdparm package and that fixed the problem.

I will try his suggestion today. But i have tried rest all(actually, few of rest all) solutions given on various forums and Wikis.

----------

## chrbecke

 *gnufied wrote:*   

> 
> 
> ```
> 
> #hdparm -d1 /dev/hdc
> ...

 

Well, I'm not any more...  :Sad:  But "hdparm -I" told that DMA was enabled, didn't it?

You could check without using hdparm with 

```
cat /proc/hdX/settings
```

----------

## gnufied

thanks chrbecke .. i will do that , but right now i am in office , so will put up the output when i reach back home.

In the meanwhile... outputs apart.. i have this gut feeling that DMA is not enabled.

I mean , i tried quite a few distros till now "Ubuntu","Fedora Core 4","Gentoo","Mandrake","Suse","Xandros".

in the above list.. Ubuntu and Mandrake wont boot from the cdrom itself.They will boot initially , but when it comes to real installation they will say "No cdrom" detected.I know,perhaps this can be easily solved by passing some boot flags.

But this guy.. doesnt want to stick with a distro.. that creats tons of problems while installing itself. Gentoo got installed without(?) a glitch(yeah.. at least installed). But then because of DMA problem.. its hardly usable.

The computer freezes whenever..some small(yeah small) hard disk activity takes place.Mouse cursor will move in Binary co-ordinates(not exactly, but what i mean is.. from X1(10,20) if you move your mouse to X2(150,600).. then wait for some 2 to 3 seconds. And you cursor will disappear from X1 and reappear at X2. No path tracing.. you can do)

On top of it.. the laptop is quite capable.256MB of DDR2 Ram(533Mhz) , 1.6Ghz(2mB cache) , 60GB hard disk , PCI express(4 times faster than normal PCI... huh). The less popular OS runs without a glitch. I often run "Eclipse" and "Visual Studio .NET 2003" simultaneously in it without problems. I even tried VMWARE with Damn Small Linux.

Guys... i am ready to move mountains for this all i need is little help.

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## gnufied

Bumped to keep the thread live....

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## gnufied

Here we go..the output of "cat /proc/ide/hdc" and "cat /proc/ide/hdd" says DMA is not being used.

Something like this... "DMA min 0 max 1 used 0".

----------

## chrbecke

So DMA is not used. Which version of sys-apps/hdparm are you using?

Please post the output of 

```
sed -n -e '/^[^#]/p' /usr/src/linux/.config
```

 and the output of 

```
lsmod
```

----------

## gnufied

I will post the output of 'lsmod' and output of sed command , when i reach home.

But i am using 5.9 version of hdparm.I will upgrade that to 6.1 and see.. what happens.

But does versions of hdparm affects...all this DMA.

As i posted earlier...one guy in linuxquestions.org had same kind of problem...and he claimed that

upgrading version of 'hdparm' solved the problem.

I would like to point..one more thing.How .. my problem is little bit different , perhaps

because.. my hard disk is seen as '/dev/hdc' not as '/dev/sda'... in case of many i915GM

chipsets.

----------

## Mos

Did you try the 4-line kernelpatch in next link? It adds support for Intel chipsets of the ICH6 family to the piix kernel driver.

It didn't make it into the mainstream kernel because of the ICH6 is _suppposed_ to be supported by the libata driver _somewhere_ in the future. But for this moment, it does not, and in the meanwhile, you and I are standing in the cold with a lazy slow laptop.

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-356400.html

Helped for me!

Direct link to the patch: http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-ide&m=112032992832526&w=2

update: direct link

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## gnufied

Looks like...i have exactly the same problem.

But..which four lines GAMMA is talking about?

You tried applying the patch or adding lines manually?

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## Mos

Nope, patch failed but you can do it manually by adding the lines that start with a "+".

Regards

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## gnufied

I will try that one and let you know.

In the meanwhile , yesterday night. I tried 2.6.14-rc1 patch. yeah.. i have been a bit too cautious..

that post also said.. dont apply that patch , because latest piix.c already incorporates that.

So thought , giving 2.6.14 a try.. might solve the problem. But no man, the problem still remains.

Now.. tonight , i am gonna apply that patch(the one pointed by you) and see what happens!!

Thanks for the help man.

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## gnufied

Problem solved...

applying the patch solved the problem.

Thanks a lot...

----------

