# Vaio R505 w/ Slimdock

## kyefun

Hello, i've searched the forums for the string "vaio" and found a few entries. however, those results that matched r505 were mostly about pcmcia. I have a slimdock for my r505 that uses firewire for link. Inisde the dock is a dvd/cd-rw, as well as a floppy drive. The floppy drive works in ilnux without needing the firewire driver, while the cd-rom does.I really want to install gentoo using cd-rom. Is there a easy way to install gentoo?

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## plate

If you ask me, you had better forget about the CD for the installation, it's really not worth it. I don't know of any boot medium out there that supports the drive. However, I just did an installation on a R505R/GK on Monday [1], and it's not even exceedingly complicated.  Ok, there's a number of different methods, one being a netboot from a GRUB floppy. The method I used is best described in Phong's guide, except that I had significant problems with the tomsrtbt floppy[2], so I chose to boot from three Slackware 8.1 floppies instead. I'll be doing a complete write-up of the process over the weekend, so if you don't mind waiting a few more days you can start from a step-by-step guide for a R505 with the dreaded IEEE1394 CD-RW/DVD combo in the dock...

[1] after waiting for a few months, by the way, basically for a few kernel modules to mature 

[2] chroot produced "FATAL: kernel too old", check this thread

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## kyefun

looks like i'lll need to do the install using net-install

anyone know any botodisk that has firewire?

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## serial.

I have often read that the Memory Stick drive is supported out-of-the-box. What about booting from a Live CD, then grabbing all the packages and such from the Memory Stick? 

I am just beginning to attempt an install of 1.4_rc2 on an R505DS, and after I pick the keymap, I get the following output:

```

---- Mounting the CD

mount: Mounting /newroot/dev/cdroms* on /newroot/mnt/cdrom failed: No such file

 or directory

---- CD not found

umount: /newroot: Device or resource busy

Busybox v0.60.5 (2002.12.28-23:31+0000) Built-in shell (ash)

Enter 'help' for a list of built-in commands.

sh: can't access tty; job control turned off

#

```

I can't really do anything from this point, as the /lib directory does not exist (therefore no kernel modules). netboot from GRUB does not really help me, as I would need an existing Linux installation to create the GRUB disk, something that I don't possess. Plate, I'll be looking forward to that guide!

serial.

PS. - Several people have stated that with kernel 2.4.20, the DVD/CDRW drive "just works". Isn't this the same kernel that Gentoo uses? If not, would it be possible to boot from this kernel?

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## plate

No, the CD contains a 2.4.19 kernel. As I said, I don't know of any boot medium that recognises the drive long enough to be useful. Try the floppy method with Slackware and forget about the drive until you have compiled your own 2.4.20 kernel to boot from. My guide will be ready Real Soon Now (TM).   :Razz: 

By the way, which R505 do you have? They came with different chipsets, you know. Quite possible that this page is more appropriate for you.

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## kyefun

i have r505el, comes with slimdock

Device manager says it's a 

Texas intruments OHCI compiliant IEEE1394 controller

so, i am getting it uses ohci.o

i wonder of gentoo devs would release the 1.4 final w/ firewire in initrd

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## plate

My bookmark list is getting more impressive every day: Linux on the Sony Vaio R505EL Laptop  :Cool:  X will be tricky on that one, it has the dreadful i830 graphics controller chipset, good luck with that.

Just don't expect the Gentoo LiveCD to change to a 2.4.20 kernel until the final release next week...

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## serial.

But what about the memory stick idea? A 64MB stick would hold the 40MB generic CD very nicely... I experimented a little and it didn't seem to immediately work... should I keep working on this angle or just wait for the next version? Will (should) the next release work out-of-the-box? Should return the memory stick I just bought today?  :Wink: 

serial.

PS- Here are some bookmarks of interest:

Installing Linux on an R505EL

http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/~jdavin/linux-r505.html

Getting XFree86 to work with i830

http://mobilix.org/debian_xfree43.html

More about XFree86

http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~chak/linux/c400.html#xfree86

Even more about XFree

http://www.jongans.com/gateway1450.html

KWiFiManager - orinioco wi-fi utils for KDE3

http://kwifimanager.sourceforge.net

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## plate

You have no idea how cool it would be to be able to boot from a memory stick... If you pulled that one off, I think even Sony would consider putting Linux on their laptops in the future.   :Cool: 

 *serial. also wrote:*   

> Should return the memory stick I just bought today? 

 

Absolutely not. At the very minimum, keep it for your GnuPG keychain.  :Laughing: 

Glad to see Stefan Winter continued Korinoco under a different name for KDE3. I remember spending almost three weeks trying to get the predecessor to work in Mandrake, but when it finally did, it was a very nice piece of software.

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## revresxunil

http://vorlon.ces.cwru.edu/~ames/r505gl/

i found this quite helpful.  I am installing gentoo on my r505gl right now using the cdrom and its working just fine.  just use the 1.2 iso  :Wink: 

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## plate

Second that. I've always found the 1.2 iso to be the real rescue disk. Keep one around at all times. If you can live with the fact that it dies on you right after you've got a shell prompt, you can even use it with that combo drive.

That said, nothing will boot from  my CD drive anymore. DVDs aren't affected, but CDs are not bootable or even readable in most cases. Sometimes when I get really angry and shake the whole base station, it does occasionally start to work. People I've asked suspect laser drift...   :Crying or Very sad: 

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## revresxunil

I have been working on linux on my sony vaio r505gl for about 8 hours now, yeah im slow at getting it going  :Wink:  .  But as far as procedure, it was pretty simple.  Just use the 1.2 iso with the docking station cdrom drive, pull the stage3 (my preference) get the kernel installed, and thats it, everything else is good to go because network will be up (unless you coudlnt get your kernel compiled.

I had as exceptionally easy time getting my wpc11 card working as well.  As all the other posts in this forum state, dont install anything pcmcia based in the kernel.  If you dont install anything pcmcia kernel based, then emerge pcmcia-cs.  

Modules I found useful to get everything going, including the cdrom and wireless wpc11 card were:

sbp2, sg, sr_mod, pcmcia_core, i82365 (for pcmcia), and prism2_cs (must emerge linux-wlan-ng, and configure /etc/conf.d/wlan.conf and /etc/conf.d/wlancfg-Default)

WPC11:

first, recognise that you must copy the wlancfg-DEFAULT to wlancfg-ssidname, where ssidname is the name of your access point.  wlan.conf must be updated to reflect the ssid name.

if you have wep enabled on the AP, make sure you set the encryption options in wlancfg-ssidname to true, thats where i got lost for about 3 hours trying to get wireless working.

Then what i did was just copied net.eth0 to net.wlan0...... not exactly the best thing to do since i get a shitload of errors when shutting down, but hey, im not a linux genious (if anyone can think of a better way to make an /etc/init.d script for wlan0 please post!!!)

for the cdrom drive, i set fstab to reflect this for /mnt/cdrom: /dev/scsi/host1/bus0/target0/lun0/cd /mnt/cdrom .......

Now, heres MY question that i just thought of.. how the heck do I specify in the boot loader hdx=ide-scsi so i can use my cdrom drive as a burner, especially when its a firewire drive and doesnt have a hdx name at all???

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## plate

I don't think it'll ever work with ide-scsi, there's no trace of anything IDE in there. I can't test it myself (see above for reasons   :Sad:  ), but you should have a device sr0 or scd0 in your /dev, and then you just go 

```
scsi add-single-device 0 0 0 0
```

and it should get recognised instantly. That's the theory, at least.

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## sa

theres also a sony viao mailing list, with lots of discussion of the r505:

http://returntonature.com/pipermail/linux-sony/

hth,

sa

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## revresxunil

for the scsi add-single-device 0 0 0 0, where should i add that?

Also, if anybody has questions relating to toshiba satellite 5005 (s504 specifically) or even the sony vaio r505 (like i have now) just let me know.  I have done gentoo now on both, although limited on the vaio so far.  I havent tried getting X to work yet.

Again, if anyone knows a better way of making an /etc/init.d/net.wlan0 script, post up!

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## revresxunil

Another update as I get X to work.

A side note, i find http://ghost.hn.org/~clesiuk/SonyVaio/ , plates link, very very helpful.

Now, basically, i generated a config with xf86config using the defaults mostly, entering 32768 for video ram, adding Load "glx" and Load "dri", adding 

```
Section "DRI"

      Mode 0666

EndSection
```

to the end of the file, and using i810 as the video driver.  For the moniter specifically, I just used the 1024 at 60hz setting.

Make sure to use glidepointps/2 or ps/2 for the mouse driver.

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## plate

Hey, wow, I didn't know that! They've finally managed to get a decent i830 driver in Xfree! No need to run any of the commercial X servers anymore to get past 256 colours on 1024x768. That's good news for a lot of people. Thanks for making me re-read what I post here...   :Laughing: 

The SCSI device-adding happens during boot-up if you put that one-liner in a script and add itt via rc-update to your runlevel. You may want to try it on the command line first.

Never make your Vaio triple-boot like I did. With legacy W2K at the bottom of the barrel and FreeBSD and Gentoo floating on top of it, my R505R/GK is constantly busy rsyncing or cvsuping, I never get to test anything anymore...   :Confused: 

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## revresxunil

Heres a good question... how do I get sjog to change the brightness when its being done by a user and not root?  In other words, how do I change the brightness as a user without becoming root to do so?  And another good question.. processor stepping, is there a script or daemon that I can get that will moniter computer usage and automatically step down my processor?  Besides that, i think my laptop is pretty well set for linux, minus the memory stick, but who fricken buys memory sticks.

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## plate

No idea about sjog, I haven't come around to using that yet. Somebody on the Linux-Sony mailing list posted a new XInput jogdial driver for Xfree86 to make it operate as a scroll wheel, but apparently you loose all other functions.

ACPI support in Linux is patchwork at best, and stepping the CPU speed is not covered yet. Some patience and watching the 2.5 kernel development tree will eventually solve this particular problem. 

What does your dmesg say about the memory stick bay?

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## revresxunil

well the memory stick bay, i could care less about.  I was browsing this thread and someone said that it works natively, so cool, but Ive read in other places and getting it to work is a lost cause.  Ill check my dmesg sometime after im done with my classes today, got a shitty solid block of 5 classes today.  Thats what happens when you gotta get the good calc3 teacher, sacrifice lunch and an hour break in the schedule  :Very Happy:  (at least i get to sleep in later!)

Enough about my personal life.  Im seriosuly getting excited about my laptop getting linux going so easily.

Plate- can you change the brightness as a standard user? If so, what steps do you take?  Maybe its time for me to try another jog program.

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## fzylogic

My suggestion is to ditch sjog in favor of rsjog.  sjog seems to have some stupid builtin check to see if you're root (doesn't even let you change brightness if sjog is run via sudo).  rsjog works perfectly though.

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## serial.

Plate, I read your article, and the idea of FreeBSD on my r505 is very intriguing... in fact the only reason I looked to Gentoo was because I thought it impossible to install FreeBSD.  I was wondering exactly how functional FBSD 5.0 is compared with Gentoo 1.4? Does the CDRW/DVD work? 802.11b? Sound, video, jog dial, etc.? Would it be usable as my only free OS on the system? Thanks for your answers - you don't have to do a full review, just a works/doesn't work checklist would be fine.  :Smile: 

serial.

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## plate

Hey, reader feedback!   :Very Happy:  To tell you the whole truth, the FreeBSD portion of that document isn't quite finished yet. I just updated one thing I got to fix yesterday about the CardBus manager that kept moaning about unrecognised card types (without a card actually present in the system...), but I actually haven't got much time to systematically check everything. The CD/DVD drive is broken, anyway, so I can't test that before I buy a new docking station, 802.11b works fine (now it does), sound is untested, and the jog dial, well: I didn't even get that to run in Linux yet...

Some of the answers I can't give you can be found here... But of course you'll have to promise to install Gentoo, too, because otherwise this thread would glide off topic and I'd have to mod myself...   :Razz: 

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## rak3

To set the brightness in sjog, i ran (as root):

```
chmod u+s /usr/bin/setbrightness
```

Then the setbrightness program would run as a user. Note that this could be a security risk.

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## revresxunil

I just had a friend help me with sudo to allow my user account access to the program.

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## revresxunil

rsjog is awesome, and kde is the bomb for laptops... it has an acpi power moniter.. hats off to kde!

for any user to edit the brightness, go into /etc/devfsd.conf and add:

```
REGISTER ^misc/sonypi PERMISSIONS root.root 0666
```

gnome logout would crash my laptop  :Wink: [/code]

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## serial.

Hey, I know this thread has been quiet for awhile, but I was wondering if anyone could help me get the CD drive in my docking station going. I've got a fresh Gentoo install, with kernel 2.4.22_pre2-gss (the Gentoo Stable kernel). I believe this has fairly recent ACPI patches, as my wi-fi card is properly enabled (which didn't happen with the vanilla 2.4.22). I believe I have all the relevant bits compiled directly in the kernel (SCSI emulation, SBP-2, many more), my question is really just what device I should be trying to mount. 

/dev/hda is my hard drive

/dev/sda1 is the memory stick

I see no other useful devices to mount. /dev/ieee1394 is empty. 

PS- I just got rsjog working, and it is in fact the bomb. A note for anyone having weird errors when they try to use the scroll wheel: you have to put Option  "ZAxisMapping" "4 5" in /etc/X11/XF86Config, just like a scroll mouse.

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## revresxunil

I just updated everything on my laptop, but can sadly say i havent tried my cdrom drive for a loooong time.

considering it is firewire, make sure you have firewire and all the relevant modules installed in the kernel (like storage devices and stuff).

Take a look at the links in this post, there should be a section that says where in /dev the cdrom is.

If you cant figure it out/ or find it, i will boot into linux on my laptop and take a look.

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## serial.

So I figured it out. The kernel was correctly detecting the SBP-2 device, but for some reason it didn't get assigned a SCSI device number (i.e. sdb).  I was able to get it working by using a script called rescan-scsi-bus.sh.  After running this, /dev/cdrom immediately picked up the drive. 

This is kind of a kludge, does anyone know of a more elegant way of doing it (at boot)? I've attached the relevant portion of my dmesg, note how the device is detected but SCSI doesn't do anything about it...

```
hda: host protected area => 1

hda: 78140160 sectors (40008 MB), CHS=4864/255/63, UDMA(100)

Partition check:

 /dev/ide/host0/bus0/target0/lun0: p1 p2 p3

SCSI subsystem driver Revision: 1.00

scsi0 : SCSI host adapter emulation for IDE ATAPI devices

ohci1394: $Rev: 896 $ Ben Collins <bcollins@debian.org>

ohci1394_0: OHCI-1394 1.1 (PCI): IRQ=[9]  MMIO=[e0205000-e02057ff]  Max Packet=[2048]

scsi1 : SCSI emulation for IEEE-1394 SBP-2 Devices

ieee1394: Host added: Node[00:1023]  GUID[08004603010e2ab4]  [Linux OHCI-1394]

ieee1394: NodeMgr: hotplug policy returned -2

ieee1394: Device added: Node[01:1023]  GUID[08004603011ca894]  [Sony]

ieee1394: sbp2: Logged into SBP-2 device

ieee1394: sbp2: Node[01:1023]: Max speed [S400] - Max payload [2048]

Intel 810 + AC97 Audio, version 0.24, 06:17:34 Sep 16 2003

PCI: Enabling device 00:1f.5 (0000 -> 0001)

PCI: Setting latency timer of device 00:1f.5 to 64

```

EDIT: I guess I should have just read the earlier posts in this thread... duh. I'll tinker with the scsi-add command. thanks.

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## peddie

Just a quick note, the latest Knoppix CD boots from the CD just fine. You can then install Gentoo from a knoppix shell, and browse the forums at the same time  :Wink: 

You might want to try the latest 2005.1-rc1 live-cd. It says there's support for usb-cdroms so maybe they fixed the firewire bug as well. 

If you're going the knoppix way (I recommend it) then make sure you check out the alt. install guide in the docs.

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