- Kernel Configuration
Here is the /usr/src/linux/.config file I created with make menuconfig for a KTX 1000 notebook running Linux kernel 2.0.38. Support is included for a Linksys EtherFast 10/100 network card and an Actiontec DataLink 56k
modem card, both of which I recommend. To get these cards to work you must compile the PCMCIA Card Services package after compiling the Linux kernel.
Later on I upgraded to Linux kernel 2.2.17 which includes built in support for VESA framebuffer and the Iomega Zip 250 Drive.
Here is my /usr/src/linux/.config file for this kernel.
- Upgrading the Hard Drive
My KTX 1000 notebook came with a HITACHI DK225A-14 hard disk drive.
After approximately 14 months it broke down so I replaced it with a TOSHIBA MK6411MAT.
Any ATA hard drive that is 2.5" in width and no taller than 12.7mm should be compatible with the KTX 1000 notebook.
Before I could install the drive I had to download the file K1KBIOS.EXE from the KTX Notebook Utilitites product support page and perform a BIOS upgrade.
Then I inserted my new hard drive and configured it in the BIOS settings by letting the BIOS autodetect it.
Before proceeding with the installation process I took the following precautions: I booted into DOS using the System Utilities Disk that came with my KTX 1000 notebook, deleted all existing partitions with the DOS fdisk program after enabling large disk support and created one big FAT32 partition, rebooted into DOS with the System Utilities Disk, formatted the whole hard drive with format c: and deleted all information from the MBR with fdisk /mbr.
Then I deleted the newly created partiton and created a 420MB FAT16 DOS partiton at the beginning of the hard drive (with large disk support disabled). I rebooted into DOS with the System Utilities Disk once more, fromatted the FAT16 partition with format c: and made it bootable with sys c:.
Then I inserted my Red Hat Linux 5.2 CD ROM and rebooted to install Linux on the rest of the hard drive.
When creating my Linux partitions with Disk Druid or the Linux fdisk program I made sure I left 300MB of free unpartitioned space at the end of my hard drive for future use as well as for the creation of a Save-to-Disk partition with the PHDISK.EXE DOS utility.
In retrospective I realize that I should have created the Save-to-Disk partition
before installing Linux. Other than that everything else works fine.
- Upgrading the BIOS
If your KTX 1000 notebook came with Phoenix NoteBIOS version 4.05 00R and you want to install a hard drive that is larger than 2GB then you will need to perform a BIOS upgrade.
The K1KBIOS.EXE utility allows you to upgrade your BIOS to Phoenix NoteBIOS version 4.05 02R which includes support for large disks.
To perform the BIOS upgrade you may boot DOS from a floppy and run the KIKBIOS.EXE program from the A: drive. This extracts the files FLASH.EXE and OEM.BIN.
Rename the file OEM.BIN to BIOS.BIN and run FLASH /S to save your BIOS image as BIOS.OLD and then FLASH /U to update your BIOS. Proceed by following the instructions on the screen.
- Creating a Save-to-Disk Partition
To create a Save-to-Disk partition boot from the System Utilities disk that came with your KTX 1000 notebook and run PHDISK.EXE.
In order to get your Save-to-Disk partition to function properly I recommend
installing it before installing any operating systems.
- Upgrading the RAM
My system came with 16MB of EDO RAM.
Applications ran a lot smoother and faster after I upgraded to 48MB by adding
32MB of EDO RAM which I aquired from Southland Micro Systems. Upgrading the RAM is as simple as inserting the memory module of the right type into the right slot at the back of the notebook.
Once this was done I had to recreate a new larger Save-to-Disk partition with PHDISK.EXE to take the added RAM into account.
- Getting the X Window System to Work
My KTX 1000 notebook came with a 12.1" TFT screen supporting a maximum resolution of 800x600 pixels. The video card is a Cirrus Logic CL-GD7556 LCD controller.
Although not officially supported by XFree86 this chipset works fine with X except for once X is started it may be impossible to view the characters on the text based Linux virtual consoles. To overcome this difficuly you
must either use the
SVGATextMode utility or recompile the kernel with the
VESA framebuffer option.
You must choose the XFree86-SVGA server as your X server when installing XFree86 on the laptop. Should you forget to specify the SVGA server as your default X server during installation of your Linux distribution then you must ensure that XF86_SVGA is installed under /usr/X11R6/bin and that the following symlink is in place:
/etc/X11/X -> /usr/X11R6/bin/XF86_SVGA
The following /etc/X11/XF86Config file for the KTX 1000 notebook with 12.1" TFT screen can be used to get the SVGA server to run full screen at a resolution of 15bpp. For the 13.3" version of the notebook an alternate XF86Config file from Andrew McMillan is available.
- Enabling Console Switching with VESA Framebuffer
To enable virtual console switching on the KTX 1000 notebook it is necessary
to configure the following options into the 2.2.x kernel when doing a
make menuconfig before compiling:
Code maturity level options --->
[*] Prompt for development and/or incomplete code/drivers
Console drivers --->
[*] VGA text console
[*] Video mode selection support
[*] Support for frame buffer devices (EXPERIMENTAL)
[*] VESA VGA graphics console
[*] Select compiled-in fonts
[*] VGA 8x8 font
[*] VGA 8x16 font
The VESA framebuffer option is not included in 2.0.x kernels. Here is a sample
/usr/src/linux/.config file for Linux kernel 2.2.13.
After building and installing the kernel and its modules I had to add the
following lines to my /etc/lilo.conf
image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.2.13
label=linux-2.2.13
root=/dev/hda5
read-only
vga=771 # 0x303
and rerun /sbin/lilo. Read the file /usr/src/linux-2.2.13/Documentation/fb/vesafb.txt for information on how to set the vga lilo
option. If your lilo version is less than 0.21 then you will have to convert
the hexadecimal numbers in vesafb.txt to decimal numbers before
attempting to use them in /etc/lilo.conf.
- PCMCIA Configuration
The KTX 1000 comes with two Texas Instruments PCI 1131 PCMCIA controllers.
Unfortunately these are unsupported by kernel 2.4.2 which ships with
with Red Hat Linux 7.1. To get PCMCIA to work on this system you must downgrade
to kernel 2.2.19 and rebuild the pcmcia-cs package on top of it. Here is my
/usr/src/linux/.config
file for this build. You must also change the file
/etc/sysconfig/pcmcia so that it looks
as follows:
PCMCIA=yes
#PCIC=yenta_socket
PCIC=i82365
PCIC_OPTS=
CORE_OPTS=
Once this is done PCMCIA will work.
- Sound Configuration
I have not bothered too much with sound configuration. Here are the relvant
lines I had to insert in my /etc/rc.d/rc.local to get things to work
(prior to kernel 2.2.17):
/sbin/modprobe sound
/sbin/insmod ad1848
/sbin/insmod uart401
/sbin/insmod cs4232 dma=1 dma2=0 io=0x220 irq=7
You may also find the following links useful:
- Power Adapter
After approximately 28 months my KTX 1000 power adapter died. I ended up
replacing it with the RadioShack
Universal Notebook Power Adapter (Cat.#: 273-1685) which has a 19V
setting and a compatible laptop plug.
- Power off on Shutdown
To get the power off on shutdown feature to work you must compile the
appropriate options into the kernel. With earlier 2.2.x kernels it was
also necessary to change the last line of the script
/etc/rc.d/init.d/halt to
#eval $command -d
$command -d -p
but for later kernels this seems to be no longer the case.
- Keyboard Configuration
While the X Window System is running you may use the XKeyCaps program to configure your keyboard for use with a KTX 1000 notebook with a 12" screen (I was not able to test this program on a KTX 1000 notebook with a larger screen but I am told that the 13" screen version of the KTX 1000 notebook has a different keyboard layout). Select KTX 1000 IBM 104 Key Compatible (XFree86; US) as your keyboard if you have a 12" screen.