targa-laptop: traveller 826 - cpu freq fix

Hi all,

I'm the owner of a nice Targa Traveller 826 (BIOS Vendor: American Megatrends Inc. - Version: A1029ATE V2.81. More info in attachment: "BIOS-targa_traveller_826.dmidecode"). For a long time I experienced kernel panic with my gentoo and after with my ubuntu.

First I thought it was a USB related bug in the kernel because, while the computer was running on battery, each time my mouse was not connected to the laptop, I always experienced a kernel panic. Then not getting much better results with newer kernels, I tried another way. I read some documentations on power management, ACPI, etc. I also heard about computers's BIOS frequently buggy, especially concerning ACPI management. And then I bumped on an article on lesswatts.org, explaining how to debug and override a DSDT and therefore fix BIOS buggy ACPI management. I thought it was something to try... And tried and it worked very well.

After extracting, disassembling and rebuilding a first ime my DSDT, it appears that there was an error in the extracted/disassembled code. So I tried to fix the error as you can see in second attachment: "DSDT-targa_traveller_826.patch". Then I retried to build my DSDT and this time it worked. Finally, it seemed to be a CPU freq table erroneously declared, if I'm right, that was the cause of my kernel panics. A table with the 4 available CPU freq declared at the same "index ?" and a table uselessly filled with null entries. So I removed the indexes, "to force automatic indexing ?" and I removed the useless empty entries in the table.

@@ -1242,7 +1242,7 @@ DefinitionBlock ("DSDT.aml", "DSDT", 1,
                        })
                        Name (_PSS, Package (0x04)
                        {
-                            Package (0x06)
+                            Package ()
                            {
                                0x000007D0,
                                0x000088B8,

@@ -1252,7 +1252,7 @@ DefinitionBlock ("DSDT.aml", "DSDT", 1,
                                0x0000010C
                            },
 
-                            Package (0x06)
+                            Package ()
                            {
                                0x00000708,
                                0x00006590,

@@ -1262,7 +1262,7 @@ DefinitionBlock ("DSDT.aml", "DSDT", 1,
                                0x0000020A
                            },
 
-                            Package (0x06)
+                            Package ()
                            {
                                0x00000640,
                                0x00005208,

@@ -1272,7 +1272,7 @@ DefinitionBlock ("DSDT.aml", "DSDT", 1,
                                0x00000288
                            },
 
-                            Package (0x06)
+                            Package ()
                            {
                                0x00000320,
                                0x00002328,

@@ -1281,139 +1281,6 @@ DefinitionBlock ("DSDT.aml", "DSDT", 1,
                                0xE0202CC0,
                                0x000004C0
                            },
-
-                            Zero,
-                            Zero,

[...]

For now 6 months, I'm running my ubuntu with my own fixed DSDT, as the following kernel logs can attest:

Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.120805] ACPI: Core revision 20080926
Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.121973] ACPI: Checking initramfs for custom DSDT
Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.407812] ACPI: Found DSDT in DSDT.aml.
Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.407816] ACPI: Override [DSDT-    1029], this is unsafe: tainting kernel
Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.407821] ACPI: Table DSDT replaced by host OS
Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.407825] ACPI: DSDT 00000000, 2BAD (r1    MSI     1029  4192006 INTL 20061109)
Aug 10 20:01:40 * kernel: [    0.407829] ACPI: DSDT override uses original SSDTs unless "acpi_no_auto_ssdt"

And since I'm using my own fixed DSDT, I never experienced anymore kernel panic on my laptop, in any configuration (on or not on battery, with or without mouse, usb audio, usb disk, etc.).

So I consider that my little DSDT patch is working as expected. I think that now it is time for more people to test it, if possible. And then try to consider implementing a workaround, of this AMI buggy BIOS, into the GNU/Linux kernel. But for this, I'm totally lost and don't have much time to explore this way much. That's why I give everybody, the results of my peregrinations, and first of all, the solution I found and tested.

I hope this will help people use ACPI again on targa traveller 826 (especially with ubuntu, where it is automatically disabled for this laptop) and allow people to use safely CPU freq with this laptop. I also hope that this solution will be taken into account in the next versions of the GNU/Linux kernel. For that last expectation, if can help in any way, please let me now. Also if anybody can help me create a ACPI patch from my DSDT.dsl patch, I'm OK to try, do it and propose an ACPI kernel patch.

Kind Regards.

Alexandre Beaugy

# dmidecode 2.9
SMBIOS 2.3 present.
15 structures occupying 789 bytes.
Table at 0x000FAB60.

Handle 0x0000, DMI type 0, 20 bytes
BIOS Information
Vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
Version: A1029ATE V2.81
Release Date: 04/19/2006
Address: 0xF0000
Runtime Size: 64 kB
ROM Size: 512 kB
Characteristics:
ISA is supported
EISA is supported
PCI is supported
PC Card (PCMCIA) is supported
PNP is supported
BIOS is upgradeable
BIOS shadowing is allowed
ESCD support is available
Boot from CD is supported
Selectable boot is supported
EDD is supported
Print screen service is supported (int 5h) 8042 keyboard services are supported (int 9h) Serial services are supported (int 14h) CGA/mono video services are supported (int 10h) ACPI is supported
USB legacy is supported
AGP is supported
Smart battery is supported
BIOS boot specification is supported

Handle 0x0001, DMI type 1, 25 bytes System Information

	Manufacturer: MICRO-STAR INT'L CO.,LTD
	Product Name: MS-1029
	Version: 0291
	Serial Number: FFFFFFFF
	UUID: 00020003-0004-0005-0006-000700080009
	Wake-up Type: Power Switch

Handle 0x0002, DMI type 3, 17 bytes Chassis Information
Manufacturer: MICRO-STAR INT'L CO.,LTD
Type: Notebook
Lock: Not Present
Version: To Be Filled By O.E.M. Serial Number: To Be Filled By O.E.M. Asset Tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M. Boot-up State: Safe
Power Supply State: Safe Thermal State: Safe
Security Status: None
OEM Information: 0x000004D2

Handle 0x0003, DMI type 4, 35 bytes
Processor Information
Socket Designation: CPU 1
Type: Central Processor
Family: Athlon 64
Manufacturer: AMD
ID: C0 0F 01 00 FF FB 8B 07
Signature: Family 15, Model 28, Stepping 0 Flags:
FPU (Floating-point unit on-chip) VME (Virtual mode extension)
DE (Debugging extension)
PSE (Page size extension)
TSC (Time stamp counter)
MSR (Model specific registers)
PAE (Physical address extension) MCE (Machine check exception)
CX8 (CMPXCHG8 instruction supported) APIC (On-chip APIC hardware supported) SEP (Fast system call)
MTRR (Memory type range registers) PGE (Page global enable)
MCA (Machine check architecture) CMOV (Conditional move instruction supported) PAT (Page attribute table)
PSE-36 (36-bit page size extension) CLFSH (CLFLUSH instruction supported) MMX (MMX technology supported)
FXSR (Fast floating-point save and restore) SSE (Streaming SIMD extensions) SSE2 (Streaming SIMD extensions 2)
Version: Mobile AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3000+
Voltage: 3.3 V 2.9 V
External Clock: 200 MHz
Max Speed: 2000 MHz
Current Speed: 2000 MHz
Status: Populated, Enabled
Upgrade: Socket 754
L1 Cache Handle: 0x0004
L2 Cache Handle: 0x0005
L3 Cache Handle: Not Provided
Serial Number: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
Asset Tag: To Be Filled By O.E.M.
Part Number: To Be Filled By O.E.M.

Handle 0x0004, DMI type 7, 19 bytes
Cache Information
Socket Designation: L1-Cache
Configuration: Enabled, Not Socketed, Level 1 Operational Mode: Varies With Memory Address
Location: Internal
Installed Size: 64 KB
Maximum Size: 64 KB
Supported SRAM Types:
Pipeline Burst
Installed SRAM Type: Pipeline Burst
Speed: Unknown
Error Correction Type: Single-bit ECC System Type: Data
Associativity: 4-way Set-associative

Handle 0x0005, DMI type 7, 19 bytes
Cache Information
Socket Designation: L2-Cache
Configuration: Enabled, Not Socketed, Level 2 Operational Mode: Varies With Memory Address
Location: Internal
Installed Size: 512 KB
Maximum Size: 512 KB
Supported SRAM Types:
Pipeline Burst
Installed SRAM Type: Pipeline Burst
Speed: Unknown
Error Correction Type: Single-bit ECC System Type: Unified
Associativity: 4-way Set-associative

Handle 0x0006, DMI type 9, 13 bytes System Slot Information
Designation: RC593
Type: 32-bit PC Card (PCMCIA) Current Usage: Available
Length: Short
ID: Adapter 0, Socket 0 Characteristics:
5.0 V is provided 3.3 V is provided PC Card-16 is supported Cardbus is supported

Handle 0x0007, DMI type 16, 15 bytes Physical Memory Array
Location: System Board Or Motherboard
Use: System Memory
Error Correction Type: None Maximum Capacity: 8 GB
Error Information Handle: Not Provided Number Of Devices: 2

Handle 0x0008, DMI type 19, 15 bytes Memory Array Mapped Address

	Starting Address: 0x00000000000
	Ending Address: 0x0005FFFFFFF
	Range Size: 1536 MB
	Physical Array Handle: 0x0007
	Partition Width: 0

Handle 0x0009, DMI type 17, 27 bytes Memory Device
Array Handle: 0x0007
Error Information Handle: Not Provided Total Width: 64 bits
Data Width: 72 bits
Size: 512 MB
Form Factor: DIMM
Set: None
Locator: DIMM0
Bank Locator: BANK0
Type: DDR
Type Detail: Synchronous
Speed: 266 MHz (3.8 ns)
Manufacturer: Manufacturer0 Serial Number: SerNum0
Asset Tag: AssetTagNum0
Part Number: PartNum0

Handle 0x000A, DMI type 20, 19 bytes Memory Device Mapped Address

	Starting Address: 0x00000000000
	Ending Address: 0x0001FFFFFFF
	Range Size: 512 MB
	Physical Device Handle: 0x0009
	Memory Array Mapped Address Handle: 0x0008
	Partition Row Position: 1

Handle 0x000B, DMI type 17, 27 bytes Memory Device
Array Handle: 0x0007
Error Information Handle: Not Provided Total Width: 64 bits
Data Width: 72 bits
Size: 1024 MB
Form Factor: DIMM
Set: None
Locator: DIMM1
Bank Locator: BANK1
Type: DDR
Type Detail: Synchronous
Speed: 266 MHz (3.8 ns)
Manufacturer: Manufacturer1 Serial Number: SerNum1
Asset Tag: AssetTagNum1
Part Number: PartNum1

Handle 0x000C, DMI type 20, 19 bytes Memory Device Mapped Address

	Starting Address: 0x00020000000
	Ending Address: 0x0005FFFFFFF
	Range Size: 1 GB
	Physical Device Handle: 0x000B
	Memory Array Mapped Address Handle: 0x0008
	Partition Row Position: 1

Handle 0x000D, DMI type 32, 20 bytes System Boot Information
Status: No errors detected

Handle 0x000E, DMI type 127, 4 bytes End Of Table