Find Power Management in Kernel 2.6 Confusing

Tuxuser

After a while working I consider my AMD64 quite satisfying but I'm confused by the power management options stuff.

I had to disable ACPI because I otherwise get these "hd* dma_timer_expiry" problems slowing down my system. In principle I'm fine with it but I'd like to power my system down automatically. Some folks in the formum spoke about APM (which actually run on my last machine smoothly in terms of power off) but I can't find it as kernel option. Can't find it in menuconfig nor editing the .config file itself.
Does anybody have a clue where APM options are hidden?

By the way what's up with that APIC stuff and dma because I assume the live CD handles APIC somehow or not and this is running perfectly? At least sometimes I'd whish to find out which kernel options are used when I boot the live cd to copy the kernel options shamelessly.

Thanks in advance!

jkt · Posted: Fri Jun 25, 2004 7:18 pm Post subject:

boot livecd and do zcat /proc/config.gz. or maybe it's under /usr/src/linux.
btw, under 2.6, you don't see Power management -> APM?

Tuxuser · Posted: Fri Jun 25, 2004 7:37 pm Post subject:

Thanks for the hint with kernel option.

APM is definatly not shown. Or I'm too stupid to see (don't wnat to exclude this option

C.W. · n00b Joined: 27 May 2004 Posts: 74

APM is not inlcude at least in >2.6.5.

What exacly is your problem with ACPI? On all am64 board ACPI should work just fine. Try searching Bugzilla for your problem like

Tuxuser · Posted: Fri Jun 25, 2004 7:53 pm Post subject:

Bugzilla report sounds very similar and there have been some posts here in the forum as well. I assume my SATA PCI card (SIL 3112) causes the problems and answer is given: Disable ACPI.

C.W. · n00b Joined: 27 May 2004 Posts: 74

Hmm. Did you try it with ACPI on and booted with

drumz · Apprentice Joined: 10 Nov 2002 Posts: 213

1. I have the same issue, not being able to power off. I inquired/filed a bug repot for the kernel and apparently it's an 'upstream' issue that it hasn't been ported/moved to the kernel. No word on when that will/won't happen.

2. For me, the issue is between ACPI and my Nvidia card. I've inquired in these forums and on the nvidia forums themselves to no avail. Nobody has been able to give me any ideas that have worked or additional tests to perform to figure out exactly what the issue is. All I know is: acpi on, no video, acpi off, everything works except for power off.

I sincerely hope you get an answer.
Drumz

C.W. · n00b Joined: 27 May 2004 Posts: 74

Please try with my above advice. It's different than acpi=off (acpi completely off). pci=noacpi should only take care of the pci IRQ routing wich is done by the BIOS then. This allows to turn off your system using acpi.

You might have to play with the PNP_OS=YES/NO option in your BIOS too.

Chris

drumz · Apprentice Joined: 10 Nov 2002 Posts: 213

As suggested, I tried it with pci=noacpi and playing with the PnP OS in the BIOS. No difference in behavior.

What I have done tonight is examine stuff in /proc and the Xorg log file. I've noted the differences below. Hopefully it will shed more light and give someone an idea for me to try.

The thing to keep in mind:

ACPI enable kernel/bios: no video
ACPI disabled in either kernel/bios: video works but can't power off.

Xorg log file (/var/log):

when ACPI is disabled I get the following lines that do NOT appear when acpi is on and the video dies:

Tuxuser · Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2004 1:02 pm Post subject:

The hint of jkt is a good starting point. I did get with zcat /proc/config.gz the kernel config file from the live CD and compiled the kernel on my hd 1:1 and indeed: power off works! Comparing the config files, I can see a lot of differencies including that live CD has ACPI included. Now I have to take the time and see which of the kernel option will bring success.

monkey89 · Guru Joined: 08 Mar 2004 Posts: 596

Huh?

I'm using APM in 2.6.7, just enable Power Management and it shows up...

Tuxuser · Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2004 2:21 pm Post subject:

No, it does not show up even in 2.6.7-r6. Any other dependencies causing it to be disabled?

Tuxuser · Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2004 4:33 pm Post subject: It shut's off!!! Solved for me!

Success!

Thanks to jkt and the hint with zcat /proc/config.gz. I copied the ACPI and CPU Frequency Scaling section into my (now kernel 2.6.7-r4) .config file got two corrective questions during make and I'm done. My machine really powers down. It has APIC enabled and no other problems seem to occur.

drumz · Apprentice Joined: 10 Nov 2002 Posts: 213

No change in behavior here. Of course if I disable X then yes I can power off with the shutdown command, but if I start X I still end up with a completely borked video display. It's also not even possible to hit Fx to switch to another session - I either have to kill the power or go to another box and ssh in.

Glad you found the solution to your problem. Hopefully I'll come across mine one of these days (preferably before I go nuts ;-)

)

Drumz

Tuxuser · Posted: Mon Jun 28, 2004 4:41 am Post subject:

Can you describe your display problems more detailed? Sometimes (and occurence depends on some kernel options) my X server does not want to start at all and the display stays black. Maybe something similar.

drumz · Apprentice Joined: 10 Nov 2002 Posts: 213

Well, log details are above.

But otherwise visually I can get one of two displays. Boot up is fine - everything displays correclty. It just seems that as soon as X kicks in it all goes haywire.

1. First visual: As soon as X kicks in, the monitor clicks like normal to switch resolutions. The NVidia log does not get displayed, but instead I get about a 1" band at the bottom of my screen where there is garbled output. White/purple in color, usually verticle lines (so it's vertically stripped).

2. Second visual (using different kernel based on someone elses suggestions): As soon as X kicks in, I get what looks like random ASCII characters in random colors all over the screen.

No matter what, I can't hit ALT-Fx to switch to an alternative console, typing blindly (like hitting ALT-S at what should be the login screen to to get the shutdown/restart dialog box) doesn't work. Have to hit the power button or ssh in from a remote box.

As long as I don't enable ACPI all works great. So I'm thinking I'll just have to live with the lack of auto power-off on shutdown. Not a big deal, but a little disappointing considering everything else is working great and others have reported not having any problems (although they may be using different video cards which explains why it works for them).

Drumz

Tuxuser · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 3:27 pm Post subject:

No, at my system it looks different. My TFT stays black. /var/log messages states:

jkt · Posted: Tue Jun 29, 2004 6:10 pm Post subject:

well, try to get rid of the nvidia display driver. AFAIK there are 2 implementations, nvidia's own and a free one, but I have Matrox, so I could be totally wrong.
or try to upgrade to latest nvidia binary drivers, etc...

drumz · Apprentice Joined: 10 Nov 2002 Posts: 213

[embarassing dancing]Yahoo yahoo yahoo.[/embarassing dancing]

I finally got it working.

1. Used the .config file provided by Corona688 here: https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=180544&highlight=

2. Used this entry in my xorg.conf file: Option "NvAGP" "1"
Note that is a '1' and NOT THE 2 AS STATED EVERYWHERE ELSE. (This was courtesy of: http://www.minion.de whose patches were applied during emerge to make the drivers work for a 2.6 kernel).

3. Turned ACPI on in the BIOS, enabled it in the kernel config.

Voila, I now have everything working - video works fine and I can now power off automatically at shutdown.

The key was in the minion.de where it said if you get 'ascii garbage for your screen display use nvagp 1'. My config file gave me a messed up display, but only shrunk down to the lower portion of the screen. Using Corona688's config file gave me the ascii garbage - a step in the right direction. Then the clue was in the minion.de web page about using 1 instead of 2. That was it.

A few other notes: Enabling the IOMMU in the kernel config AUTOMATICALLY compiles in agpgart support INTO the kernel (no modules) and disables the agpgart menu item in menuconfig. For me, I would only get /dev/agpgart when ACPI was enabled in the bios/kernel. I still need to figure out what the diffs are between my kernel and Corona688 that made the ascii garbage vs. my screwed up display (which I had previously tried with various nvagp settings in the xorg.conf file to no avail.

And of course, I get it working just a few hours before Nvidia releases new drivers that support the 2.6 kernel, better ACPI support, etc. <sigh>

Thanks to all who helped, attempted to help, etc. Now lets hope the new drivers are even better.

Drumz