Lenovo Thinkpad W530

The Lenovo Thinkpad W530 and its associated hardware components can (potentially) be difficult to configure properly in Gentoo. This article has been written as configuration guide to help users work out some of the gritty details needed to get this notebook working as it should while using Gentoo.

Preparation
Adequate preparation should be established for the case something should go wrong in the middle of installing Gentoo. The following list does not only apply to the current hardware list in this article; it generally applies to whenever attempting to install Linux on any machine:


 * Backups
 * If the computer owner finds any value in being able to restore the existing factory operating system, make sure appropriate measures are taken to create a full system restoration before starting to install Linux. This is a nice fall back option in the case something goes terribly and unexpectedly wrong.


 * Time
 * Allot enough time for installing Gentoo. The length of the install process varies. Experienced Gentoo users are mostly limited by the speed of their current hardware setups, beginners are limited by the Gentoo learning curve (which can be a steep climb).


 * Diligence
 * Sometimes diligence is required in order to configure all parts of the hardware to properly. Unfortunately most manufacturers do not deliver open source drivers for their hardware. Linux users can go through great lengths in order to build or find open drivers that are compatible with the on their particular machine hardware. Depending on the machine, configuration could take the majority of the time. Thankfully Linux has become much more capable and, with the right knowledge, can actually be installed on more processor architectures than any other operating system. In this case user knowledge is the limiting factor.

Kernel
For users new to Gentoo configuring the kernel for a certain hardware platform can be among the trickiest tasks. Do not despair! There are many articles on the Wiki available to help with all kernel related things. The sections below provide information on the two main methods of kernel configuration. Currently no tool exists to automatically detect and configure hardware for all platforms, especially if experimental or new kernel features will be used.

Manual
Use the make menuconfig command to manually configure kernel features:

After configuration run the following commands in this to build and install the system's kernel and modules:

genkernel
The genkernel tool can also be used to help build the kernel and the initramfs.

After downloading a kernel sources packages, start the build process by running the following command:

Additional help with kernel configuration
For additional help with kernel configuration see the configuration help section in the kernel article.

X11
More information on configuring X11 can be found in the Xorg guide.

Intel graphics
Want to configure the integrated graphics card (Intel GPU)? This is the section!

This can make the integrated Intel GPU work properly:

Nouveau & Intel graphics
Still to come...

NVidia proprietary graphics
Still to come...

USB
The Wiki's USB guide can be helpful for configuring anything USB related on the system.

Power management
If the default USB power saving features are bothersome they can disabled by adding a configuration file to

For more information visit Kernel.org's USB Power Management page.

Helpful tools
When used properly, these tools will help diagnose problems. They are included on the Gentoo-based SystemRescueCD, which is a good distribution when installing or troubleshooting Gentoo systems. Be sure to emerge them on the system after the install is complete. This will help with future troubleshooting.

Hardware detection
For more hardware detection tools see the hardware detection article.

Caching Portage in tmpfs
When using a SSD or HHD with a lot of RAM (16GB is more than enough) it is possible to both expand the life of the drive and speed up build time by caching the Portage directory entirely in RAM. Be sure to adjust to the amount of allocated memory. The example below allows Portage to use maximum of 10GBs of RAM (tmpfs) during compiles. Read more about caching Portage in tmpfs by traveling over to this article.

After has been modified, Portage's temp directory will be mounted in RAM on every boot. To mount Portage temp directory now simply run this command:

External resources

 * Lenovo Thinkpad W530 at ThinkWiki.org.
 * SystemRescueCD - A Gentoo-based rescue CD that includes many helpful troubleshooting tools.