Adjusting brightness in Pre-OS environment on a T410, is it possible?

[bluesteel649]

Hi all, my question is pretty much what the title states. I was hoping to see if someone who owns one of these could chime in

As a bit of background, I'm looking for a new daily driver for my OS/2 environment and there really isn't support for adjusting the brightness at an OS level (The only issue I'm really facing with the T450S). I've found the T410 to be a great candidate so far, as the WiFi Whitelist is quite easy to remove and the i5 540m is pretty good for daily use.

[dr_st]

Yes, it is. I don' have the T410 anymore, but pre-OS brightness adjustment is possible all the way up to **30 series at least (just reconfirmed).

[bluesteel649]

Fantastic. Thanks a whole bunch

[atagunov]

daily driver for my OS/2 environment

Hi there! Glad to see another mention for OS/2. Since your main question on this topic seems to have been answered.. Would you mind sharing with us some of your love for OS/2? What flavour are you using? What for? How well does it work for you? Thx!

[bluesteel649]

Heya! Always glad to share the love . I can't really put my finger on one definite thing that makes me really enjoy OS/2 in general but I've always been fascinated with it since I first tried Warp 4 back in 2008 on a Virtual Machine.
If I had to pick a favorite feature I'd say it's the Workplace Shell, it's a very unique UI which really doesn't have anything similar to it. I personally run it as a daily on my Thinkpad T450S while I'm on the move and despite the oddities here and there (32 bit memory limitations can be a pain when playing anything above 1080p video for instance), it's really a stable and breezy workhorse which does everything I need it to.

The flavor I'm currently using is ArcaOS; as far as installing on modern hardware goes it's the easiest and most practical solution, being mostly pre-configured and ready to go (Also, Ecomstation is all but dead at this point so it's probably the best option out there at present ).
There's a very large library of ports which has new additions fairly often, so you can pretty much perfectly run anything ranging from Dosbox to OpenOffice, all with very little initial setup. Not to mention, the default web browser of Firefox 45 is being replaced with a brand new browser which promises to make the overall usability way better.

I do hope that answers your questions, apologies if not but it's all that comes to mind at the minute ^_^;;

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

Yes, it is. I don' have the T410 anymore, but pre-OS brightness adjustment is possible all the way up to **30 series at least (just reconfirmed).

I'm not able to adjust brightness on my T420s pre-OS and if I boot Linux using "--nomodeset" to disable kernel-based detection of the graphics modes then I can't adjust brightness at the Linux desktop or in a text mode terminal either. I also have no brightness control in FreeDOS.

It's possible that I fiddled with something in the Advanced bios menu that broke this at some point, but I just looked through and can't find anything that looks like it would be responsible.

[dr_st]

I'm not able to adjust brightness on my T420s pre-OS and if I boot Linux using "--nomodeset" to disable kernel-based detection of the graphics modes then I can't adjust brightness at the Linux desktop or in a text mode terminal either. I also have no brightness control in FreeDOS.

I don't have a T420s, but my T430s and my X220 definitely allow me to use Fn+Home/End to adjust the brightness during BIOS or even while the laptop is waiting for the HD power-on on password. Naturally, it only works on the internal LCD, not external screen.

It's possible that I fiddled with something in the Advanced bios menu that broke this at some point, but I just looked through and can't find anything that looks like it would be responsible.

Does your laptop have any custom BIOS/EC?

[atagunov]

Interesting. I just pulled my X220 out to try and unfortunately Fn+Home or Fn+End had no effect until Ubuntu 18.04 booted far enough. To be precise:

- I switch it on, I press Fn+Home and Fn+End intermittently and persistently during boot, they have no effect
- the screen goes magenta (Ubuntu), they still have no effect
- the screen goes black for a short while and then magenta again
- at this moment the brightness gets dimmer (probably to the level I had previously set in Ubuntu)
- from this moment on Fn+Home and Fn+End start working to control the brightness
- interestingly as I press them I also get some kind of graphics in the middle of the screen, a kind of a progress bar showing what brightness % is currently active; I always wondered if it was painted by EC/BIOS or by Ubuntu; seems likely it is painted by Ubuntu.

As another test I switch my X220 off, switch on and go to boot menu - choosing boot device - via F12, Fn+Home and Fn+End have no effect. I switch off, switch on and go to BIOS via ThinkVantage + F1. In BIOS I press Fn+Home and Fn+End and they have no effect. Interestingly I can switch Thinklight on and off in BIOS.

I've tried this both on battery and plugged in - same behaviour

[dr_st]

Wow, that's interesting indeed! Which BIOS/EC version do you have on your X220? I wonder if they broke (or fixed?) it at some point.