PCLinuxOS2007 & Huawei(Vodafone)E220 3G-Modem on TPi1200

[mactastic]

Last year, when I tried Fedora 6 on my i1200 ThinkPad, I had to disable USB before the OS could boot up. Without USB, it was too restrictive and not much of use.

Here is the good news second time round. Yesterday I managed to get PCLinuxOS 2007 LiveCD boot up OK on the ThinkPad i1200 series.

PCLOS2007 LiveCD hung initially during boot up using default boot parameters. The trick to get PCLOS 2007 to boot OK is to augment the default boot parameters with one extra parameter irqpoll.

I have also managed to get the Huawei E220 (also branded as Vodafone) usb-3G-modem up and running. I can now surf the web using a 516k mobile broadband plan which I subscribed from a local mobile telco.

I am a Linux newbie but now tempted to explore more with the Linux OS. I might install PCLOS 2007 on hard drive so that the i1200 ThinkPad may dual boot to Linux or Win2000.

[rm]

Good to hear about your success. Did you tried the new version, PCLinuxOS MiniMe 2008? It is more up to date (sometimes this is not an advantage with old hardware) and seems to be a bit speedier. It would be a good thing to test.

[mactastic]

Did you tried the new version, PCLinuxOS MiniMe 2008?

Thanks for the heads up.

I have read a bit more about PCLOS MM 2008. It seems to be a trimmed down version compared to PCLOS 2007. Although the former uses a newer kernel, I value more the comprehensive apps that come with the latter. As a newbie, I am not yet confident enough to try one the MM version and customize it by adding more apps which suit my taste. An all-in-one 2007 version will suffice for the time being.

Nonetheless, I will watch out for the release of PCLOS 2008 full version. Thanks again!

[mactastic]

I might install PCLOS 2007 on hard drive so that the i1200 ThinkPad may dual boot to Linux or Win2000.

Done it.

The i1200 is now dual booting to Win2000Pro or PCLinuxOS2007.

The Linux installation was quite simple and uneventful.
(a) Boot up the PCLOS2007 LiveCD
(b) Log in as Root
(c) Click the Install Linux icon on desktop
(d) Choose the option to install Linux using available free space on HD.
That is all. Installed PCLOS2007 in less than 20 mins. Upon re-boot, GRUB offers Linux or Win2000 as options.

In the Grub screen, append Boot options with "irqpoll".

Once booted up, use kWrite to edit /boot/grub/menu.lst
Append "irqpoll" to the command line for Linux boot parameters so that it reads like this:

kernel (hd0,6)/boot/vmlinuz BOOT_IMAGE=linux root=/dev/hda7 acpi=on resume=/dev/hda8 splash=silent vga=788 irqpoll

This is to ensure that next time boot-up will be automatic with no need to append "irqpoll" manually.

Next Task is to make the Huawei E220 (also branded as Vodafone) 3G modem to work.

I searched the web and obtained these two scripts:
mod.sh

#internet Dialer version 1.56
#created by Cyblade
#Written for the E220 usb modem

rmmod usb-storage
modprobe usbserial vendor=0x12d1 product=0x1003
mknod /dev/ttyUSBo c 188 0
mknod /dev/ttyUSB1 c 188 1
mknod /dev/ttyUSB2 c 188 2
wvdial 3g

wvdial.conf

#internet Dialer version 1.56
#created by Cyblade
#Written for the E220 usb modem

[Dialer 3g]

Init2 = ATZ
Init3 = ATQ0 V1 E1 S0=0 &C1 &D2 +FCLASS=0
Stupid Mode = 1
Modem Type = Analog Modem
ISDN = 0
Phone = *99***1#
Modem = /dev/ttyUSB0
username = username
Password = password
Dial Command = ATDT
Baud =466600
Init4 = AT+CGDCONT=1,"IP","internet"

I put both scripts in /etc/ directory.

Reboot

In Konsole, entered "sh /etc/mod.sh"

Horay! I am now connected online.

Close Konsole to go off-line

Open Konsole and enter the above command to go online again.

Hope the above info is useful to other ThinkPad owners.