7801/7805u/7811 Linux Fan Control

I don't know how useful this will be to anyone here, but I decided to write a kernel module to set the fan speeds manually because the bios control program was annoying me. This was pretty easy using the existing Wistron laptop button control module as a base.

The fans can be controlled through /sys/devices/platform/wistron_fan/pwm1 and pwm2.
IMPORTANT: Once you have set the speed of one of the fans, the BIOS releases fan speed control and you must control them MANUALLY.
You can check the status of this through /sys/devices/platform/wistron_fan/fan_override and set it to 0 if you want to release control back to the BIOS.

Temperatures are viewable through /sys/devices/platform/wistron_fan/temps. Right now it justs lists them all in order:

Code:

/sys/devices/platform/wistron_fan# cat temps
41 41 41 36 55 0 0 24
/sys/devices/platform/wistron_fan#


	0 - original (?? usually the same as cpu button)
	1 - cpu button
	2 - cpu die
	3 - northbridge (video)
	4 - hard drive
	5 - lcd   (not available)
	6 - battery  (not available)
	7 - memory

It might work on other Wistron laptops (Acer Aspire, Fujitsu, etc) but I don't know. You can try loading it on other hardware using force=1 as a module option.

A kernel fan control thread can be started by passing start_control=1 as a param to the module or setting /sys/devices/platform/wistron_fan/kernel_control to 1. Parameters to control when the thread turn the fans on and off can be set in /sys/module/wistron_fan/parameters.

Just run make to build wistron_fan.ko which you can load with insmod wistron_fan.ko or copy to /lib/modules/`uname -r`/kernel/drivers/misc/ and modprobe it (after running depmod)

 

cool, is that possible that we can find a windows version of the controller?

 

That's great that you did this and made it available.

I've been trying to get info on the 7805 for a few days now. I know that it's a BB exclusive, so I'll make the trip to buy it, but my concern is Linux. Your post is the first I've found that doesn't indicate some trouble with running Linux. Googling and searching mailing lists brings up a handful of posts about boot problems after first install, other issues, etc. I can't find anything about successfully running Linux on this laptop.

What distro are you running? Version? Does everything work? Any issues?

If Linux works successfully on it, I'm going to run Debian Lenny or if absolutely necessary testing/unstable (but I could do without the constant updates of these two versions, and would also like to avoid the occasional breakage of unstable). I see through googling that some others have gotten ubuntu to run on them, but all but one iirc have issues with booting or other issues.

The other major concern is bios updates. Looking in these forums I see that there are bios updates for the 7805 & 7811. I haven't found a procedure alternate to using Windows for bios updates, nor have I found any procedure at all on Gateway's support site. In the forums here I see that there is an alternate method of using a bootable usb drive to update the bios. I think it's here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=303626 . But the thread also says that the bios was created by a company (phoenix?) for Gateway. Is this a one-off, is it possible that future bios updates will come directly from Gateway and will be Windows only (maybe this has happened already, I read some of the posts of that thread and they say that the ftp site for the usb bios version was taken down and no longer accessible?)?

Since there (hopefully) is a non-Windows method of updating the bios, should I just run Windows initially to see if everything checks out (and to have a working Windows system if I need to call Gateway tech support or warranty the unit), then pull the drive and insert a new drive and install my distro on the whole drive so I can use the whole drive and also don't have to worry about damaging the windows partions, and can ship the unit back to Gateway in case of warrranty issues with the windows drive not even containing any trace of Linux? Gateway tech support via email has convulsions and refuses to answer the alternate-bios update method (dos, bootable usd/dvd/cd) if it exists when Linux is anywhere in the email (I supplied that as the reason for the alternate method, but made it clear that I wasn't asking them about Linux in any way, just an alternate bios update method).

Thanks for any info you can provide. And making an entry in the linuxlaptops site, even if it is just a link to here with usability info would be great. Or a detailed usability post in your distro's user mailing list so Google can pick it up. If you do, please include info on bios updates if you have the info.

 

I am running Ubuntu 9.04 Alpha 6 with kernel version 2.6.28. Installed with 0 problems. (although I'm not suggesting you install an alpha release, I'm sure it works with older distributions. It ran fine from what I could tell when I booted it with my old hard drive that had 8.04)
Everything I have used works with the default configuration: audio, ethernet, 802.11abgn, NVIDIA drivers, webcam, media keys, ACPI functions, suspend, USB, firewire.

The BIOS updates work fine with a DOS disk image boot through grub. If they really did release Windows only updates, someone with Windows could extract the new BIOS image from their system with plash utility. I don't think it's worth worrying about anyway, there's nothing wrong with the BIOS in its current state.

Re Phoenix: There are only a few major BIOS manufacturers: Phoenix, AWARD, AMI. OEMs license these and they have the source code and compile them themselves. The BIOS for this system is actually released by Wistron, which manufactures the platform.

You can create recovery DVDs in Windows first which will restore the drive to its original state if you want so you don't really need a second hard drive. Of course, you would need a second drive to copy your data to if you actually used the recovery discs.

 

I have a 7801u running FC10 with no issues so far. I initially installed Jaunty Alpha 6 but abandoned it after running into 2 issues (which possibly are just problems for me) that were not related to the hardware itself. The only device that I know isn't supported at this time is the Memory Stick reader (SD cards work, though I don't have an SDHC card to try so I don't know if the 4GB+ ones do), and that's just a lack of proper driver. Lenny should work fine, unless something driver-wise needs the 2.6.27+ kernel...

I used the bootable USB method of updating the bios to the 9c.10 version since the DOS .12 seems to be unavailable (the FTP link doesn't accept the password), and have had no problems with it. I'm used to doing the floppy image thing from my old laptop using memdisk from the syslinux package, so that's what I expect to do if there are future updates available.

Not much to it really, it mostly just works

 

Well, the module builds and loads properly on FC10. However, I'm rather unclear about the fan control thread (namely what it does, and what its parameters represent). Can you document the module in more detail so that those of us using Linux on these systems can make use of this nice feature?

Thanks!