Damn Small Linux - Not!

Juanito · Joined: 11 Sep 2006 Posts: 88 Location: Dubai, U.A.E.

There is a Debian package called laptop-mode-tools that will monitor your battery status and HD use and spin down the HD if it is not needed. This being said, since I am booting DSL-N from USB "hdparm -y /dev/hda" or "hdparm -Y /dev/hda" would also get the job done...

The Debian Stable package of laptop-mode-tools does not have a great deal of functionality but later versions will interact with acpid and cpufreqd to maximise power savings. The extension cpufreq_combo.dsl in the "testing" area will load and start acpid and cpufreqd for you.

The required packages are:

1. lsb-base_3.1-15_all.deb at
2. laptop-mode-tools_1.32-1_all.deb at

Once you have the packages, issue the following commands:

root@dslbox:~# dpkg -i /path/lsb-base_3.1-15_all.deb
root@dslbox:~# dpkg -i /path/laptop-mode-tools_1.32-1_all.deb

The behaviour of laptop-mode-tools is controlled by settings in the file /etc/laptop-mode/laptop-mode.conf - there is a reasonable explanation for the settings contained in the file.

You can check if laptop-mode-tools is running by "cat /proc/sys/vm/laptop_mode" - a non zero value means that laptop-mode-tools is enabled. As far as I can tell, laptop-mode-tools should start-up on its own, but for some reason I have to force it:

root@dslbox:~# cat /proc/sys/vm/laptop_mode
0
root@dslbox:~# /etc/init.d/laptop-mode start
Enabling laptop mode...done (enabled, active.).
root@dslbox:~# cat /proc/sys/vm/laptop_mode
2
root@dslbox:~# /etc/init.d/laptop-mode status
Laptop mode status:

Mounts:
/dev/root on / type ext2 (rw)
/ramdisk on /ramdisk type tmpfs (rw,size=806592k)
/UNIONFS on /UNIONFS type unionfs (rw,dirs=/ramdisk=rw:/KNOPPIX=ro,delete=whiteout)
/dev/sda1 on /cdrom type vfat (ro,nodiratime,fmask=0022,dmask=0022,codepage=cp437,iocharset=iso8859-1)
/dev/cloop on /KNOPPIX type iso9660 (ro)
/UNIONFS/dev/pts on /UNIONFS/dev/pts type devpts (rw)
/proc/bus/usb on /proc/bus/usb type usbfs (rw,devmode=0666)
/UNIONFS/dev/sda2 on /mnt/sda2 type vfat (rw,nosuid,nodev,umask=000,uid=1000,gid=1000)
/dev/sdb1 on /mnt/sdb1 type vfat (rw,nosuid,nodev,umask=000,uid=1000,gid=1000)
/dev/hda5 on /mnt/hda5 type ntfs (ro,nosuid,nodev,umask=000,uid=1000,gid=1000)

Drive power status:

/dev/hda:
drive state is: standby

(NOTE: drive settings affected by Laptop Mode cannot be retrieved.)

Readahead states:
/dev/sda1: 3072 kB
/dev/cloop: 128 kB
/UNIONFS/dev/sda2: 3072 kB
/dev/sdb1: 128 kB
/dev/hda5: 128 kB

Laptop Mode is allowed to run: /var/run/laptop-mode-enabled exists.

/proc/sys/vm/laptop_mode:
2

/proc/sys/vm/dirty_ratio:
60

/proc/sys/vm/dirty_background_ratio:
1

/proc/sys/vm/dirty_expire_centisecs:
60000

/proc/sys/vm/dirty_writeback_centisecs:
60000

/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/cpuinfo_cur_freq:
1400000

/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/cpuinfo_max_freq:
1600000

/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/cpuinfo_min_freq:
600000

/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_governor:
performance

/proc/acpi/button/lid/LID/state:
state: open

/proc/acpi/ac_adapter/AC/state:
state: off-line

/proc/acpi/battery/BAT0/state:
present: yes
capacity state: ok
charging state: discharging
present rate: 15848 mW
remaining capacity: 42000 mWh
present voltage: 12043 mV

root@dslbox:~#