Gnome power manager issue

[oliverjames]

Having watched the boot messages several times this morning due to an MBR issue, I note that Mint (XFCE Elyssa and Felicia and Gnome Elyssa) don't recognise that the laptop is plugged into the power socket. Therefore disk check is turned off. It is possibly related to Gnome Power Manager.

Any ideas about solving this. I can rectify the power supply issue by removing and replacing the charge lead but it's boring to do that everytime and if I forget the damn laptop goes into Suspend.

Last dmsg text attached.

Oliverjames

[Husse]

I think we need to know your hardware
Tell us which laptop it is and run lspci and post here
Damn, the questions are so difficult right now that I'm only slowly working my way through them...

[oliverjames]

Thanks Husse, and no hurry, I'm simply responding to a recent realization that one can do so much more with a Linux installation than with Windows.

I've done as suggested, results in attached odt file. The laptop is an ACER 4052 LMi, modified by installation of 100Gb fast Travelstar disk and 2 Gb RAM. Intel Pentium M processor 1.60GHz.

Incidentally, since a recent problem with the MBR, Mint now boots in text mode rather than the graphical display. I believe that this is because the incident has changed the partition description and hence the UUIDs no longer apply.
I wonder if it is possible to rebuild the UUID for a partition or should I just comment them out in fstab.

Best regards,

Oliverjames

[Husse]

The hardware is somewhat aging and I don't recognise it very well - 82852 is not a common chipset I think (I may be wrong - but I have not seen much of it)
If you suspect UUID problems and have a text boot I have two useful links for you
General UUID no boot
http://www.linuxmint.com/wiki/index.php ... annot_boot
Text only boot
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=18591
The power manager problem - if it is that - takes a much greater effort to figure out and I would be grateful if, as you indicate, I can skip it.

[oliverjames]

It is admittedly, an old machine but I would like to keep it working. This ACER portable has, and continues to be, an excellent workhorse while doubling as a communications and multimedia centre.

Under Elysa XFCE the following work exceptionally well:

Skype with video,
Logitech multimedia keyboard (recent fix, installed aumix)
Logitech Music-anywere - fantastic device, bluetooths the sound stream to HiFi system elsewhere in my home.
Access via WiFi or Ethernet cable to home/office network - NAS with archive store and media files, remote old screenless laptop controlling scanner, print server / printer. Access via smb4k as unable to configure fusesmb.
Even have a working Clamav and Firestarter - will surely become important as Linux gains yet more market share.

Also impressed a friend with rapid install and implementation of aMSN last night, enabling communication with children. Impeccable and great Linux argument for those with kids.

And of course the superb XFCE which is far and away the best desktop for me.

The only things that don't work are:
the Gnome power manager,
Suspend -needs reboot as restore not working
Hibernate - can't find swap. I must read up on this as I think an addition to the Grub boot string should do the trick.

But too avoid spending time on this; I remember that these last 3 issues worked well under Casandra (possibly under Daryna also but my memory's a little hazy). Could I simply downgrade part of the system(Gnome power manager plus...) to restore this functionality?

Alternatively, Am just checking from the Zenwalk XFCE distro, using XFCE power manager these 3 issues are successfully resolved. I should be able to uninstall Gnome PM and install the XFCE version...No? Possibly need to udgrade to XFCE 4.6.

Thank you for the UUID info. Given the stated bug with Grub, how about Grub2 or even switching to Lilo?

Many thanks for your help.

Oliverjames

[oliverjames]

Husse, Quick update, I followed your post - http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... 91#p111020. Embarassed to have missed this.

As you predicted Usplash repaired, suspend and hibernate now work - a little slow to resume in comparison with the ZW XFCE4.6 setup - but still the same problem with battery detection when on mains power.
I suspect that the hibernate restore slowness is due to the Mint partition being 88% full whereas the ZW partition is only 45% full. Not sure why the suspend resume is slow as the info is stored in RAM as I understand it.

Any with the remaining batterry detection problem, no disk checking and need to replug after boot. Can I downgrade Gnome power manager or install XFCE power manager (maybe by upgrade to XFCE4.6)?

Oliverjames

[Husse]

You can install any power manager you find - but to get it to work....
I suspect uninstalling the gnome one (check dependencies so you don't uninstall lots of applications you don't want to uninstall) and the installing the xfce one could work
(And yes strange as it may seem - a broken usplash and you cant suspend/hibernate)