Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

Not much unfortunately, I'm in a work -> sleep -> work loop. Anyone else done anything notable?

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

Sad for tha loop :( anyway m just a tweaky user waiting 4 ma n900 to arive:) would u let me know that can i use edge via sim on arch n can i recive a call while on arch? Also wanna know abt wats the wifi range in clear line of sight that i can operate using n900 provided a router can it go to up say 200m? Thats my requirment:):(

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

I have not tested/tried connectivity via modem, so can't really tell. Calling is probably too difficult for now, and I have had no time to make patched PulseAudio packages available yet, I'll try to do that this weekend. Wifi range is probably about the same as in Maemo, you might want to set power saving off though. All in all this is a desktop distro, not a phone os, so don't expect the same functionality you have with such.

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

Anyone tried that yet? Please report back :-)

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

Short answer: not yet :-(

I tried weston, but current build still does not include fbdev support, which I believe is required for N900.

I am experimenting with console tools (RSS reader and w3m). I had used w3m at the terminal before, but never on the console. It even shows pictures when used by root :-) but I want that as user.

I am experimenting with the X environment for touch-friendlier browsing mostly.

Other interests I have not yet pursued are:
* improving battery life
* 3G connectivity
* flashing the kernel to the device and installing on the internal mmc

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

You mean internal NAND, via ubifs? Or indeed "just" eMMC?

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

I have -Syu currently running, we'll see what happens.

That'll change.

Add your user to group video.

I have something going on in this department. Well, not browsing, but generally.

I was digging to the battery life issue earlier, it's been sitting in front of me all this time, in dmesg: Voltage scaling for mpu does not work.. So, I did some testing, and it appears that frequency scaling, according to powertop, practically has zero effect on power consumption.

Also noted, when switching cpufreq governor to userspace and setting frequency to 600, I can enable SR without the insta-crash effect. No idea if it works properly, but it looks like (powertop again) that there is slight, around 40mW saving when autocomp is enabled for both core and mpu_iva domains. This change is reproducible on my system at least, readings taken from powertop while idle.

Most notable difference in power usage is definetely the use of display, so, hacking up some sort of auto dimmer would be quite important.

Next kernel build will probably not fit on the nand. It was fun to strip the kernel to a quite minimal state, but in the end I don't see any sense actually flashing the kernel, especially since I doubt it fits in there if you combine it with u-boot. Besides, you would need to remember to flash new kernel after every single kernel update you get, and if you would forget that, chances are you wont be booting anymore.

If you do not need Maemo, the best use for nand would be some sort of minimal recovery system, maybe swap. Otherwise it's quite useless.

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

just emmc to begin with, as it is easy to repartition while still having maemo booting fine

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

I did some probing on SR on kp a while ago, and it did have a noticeable effect on battery life, at least for the workloads I tested [1]. My guess is that frequency scaling can improve the results, specially under moderate loads, but I do not have hard numbers.

I am mostly interested in lowering power consumption when idle and on low loads (such as ssh over wifi), so that the N900 can standby for 2-4 days on a single charge.

I had not considered the kernel size issue.

What I had in mind was something akin to using the emmc to host the rootfs, including the kernel, and keeping u-boot where it is now, in a setup very similar to the one you have provided, but using the internal mmc instead.

That would only require the porting of pali's u-boot to arch, so we could add/upgrade kernels by updating the bootmenu. u-boot alone would sit inside the nand.

Re: Arch Linux ARM on N900
 

trivial fix and it did the trick :-D thanks!