Power Controls

Forum: DSL Ideas and Suggestions
Topic: Power Controls
started by: Mechcozmo

Posted by Mechcozmo on Jan. 08 2005,04:36

Does anyone else think it would be neat to see some functions that allow DSL to work nicely on a laptop? Some older laptops are just yelling to use DSL, but w/o power controls they would just run full blast and drain their battery.

Any chance of seeing some way in the future to scale back the CPU, warn of the battery charge %, etc?

Posted by bdkives on Jan. 08 2005,07:36

I agree. There should be some way to slow down the PC while on battery. Are you sure that is not already happening? My Compaq N610 goes dimmer on battery, but I'm not sure if the CPU slow down.

If you just want to monitor the battery charge, you can use the wmacpi DockApp available on MyDSL or here: < http://himi.org/wmacpi/ >.

What really worries me is that the fan stops blowing while DSL is running. Normally it runs about every ten minutes for a minute or two under Windows. Now it's just silent. I think that I need to find a DockApp to monitor CPU speed and temperature along with battery charge.

Posted by ke4nt1 on Jan. 08 2005,17:38

Quote (bdkives @ Jan. 08 2005,01:36)

What really worries me is that the fan stops blowing while DSL is running. Normally it runs about every ten minutes for a minute or two under Windows. Now it's just silent. I think that I need to find a DockApp to monitor CPU speed and temperature along with battery charge.

I see that frequently with several machines..
Temps are ok, better than normal, actually..

The fact is, my systems run cooler using DSL, rather than XP..

A fan on my laptop, which is old and noisy, cycles on and off
using M$ , but in DSL , cycles much more infrequently..

Try www.dockapps.org for many more choices for monitoring your laptop.

73
ke4nt

Posted by Max on Jan. 08 2005,20:34

I had submitted the wmacpi.dsl dockapp back at version 0.8.4.

Unfortunately, as of version 0.9.x it quit functioning. I tried to rebuild and thought maybe some new dependencies libraries would be required when we went to 0.9, but that seems not to be the case. I believe that something was pulled out of the kernal...otherwise why does it not function now??

When you try to run it, the program says ACPI is not functioning.

Posted by neo_trio on Jan. 20 2005,23:49

I am planning on using my Tobisha Laptop on Linux, but with Wine running the Tobisha Acess Panel. (to monitor vitals)

Posted by gmandual on Feb. 01 2005,08:15

Quote (Max @ Jan. 08 2005,15:34)

I have been only running DSL since 0.9.1 and have remastered mine many a time since, so I am not running anything close to standard anymore. But I know that at least in the 0.9.2 when I was playing with it for a friend it appears that the ACPI modules were not compiled into the kernel or included in the /lib/modules/2.4.26/kernel/drivers/acpi directory on the distribution.
I couldn't get any of my ACPI based apps to work, I compiled a version of the kernel ACPI modules and remasterd the DSL version with the files and it fixed the problems. Get battery state, fan state, and all of that just fine.

The modules that appear to be missing are:
fan.o thermal.o processor.o button.o battery.o ac.o

Posted by Max on Feb. 01 2005,12:49

I miss these also.... 3 of the machines I run DSL on are notebooks. I have to keep an eye out on the hardwired battery indicator light to see if it starts blinking......