HP Pavilion dv9645ed is a failure with linux

[Ozzi]

Hi, I recently purchased a HP Pavilion dv9645ed laptop and I'm having nothing but problems with it. First thing after i removed the preinstalled Vista i tried to install Ubuntu Gusty. The setup went fine but when I restarted the computer Ubuntu wouldn't start and give me this error:

ahci 0000:00:0f.0: AHCI 0001.0000 32 slots 4 ports 3 Gbps 0xf impl
SATA mode ahci 0000:00:0f.0: flags: 64bit ncq pm led clo pmp pio slum
part ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xE0804D00 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 201
ata2: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xE0804D80 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 201
ata3: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xE0804E00 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 201
ata4: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0xE0804E80 ctl 0x0 bmdma 0x0 irq 201
scsi0 : ahci
ata1: SATA link up 3.0 Gbps (SStatus 123 SControl 300)
ata1.00: ATA-7, max UDMA/133, 625142448 sectors: LBA48 NCQ (depth
0/32) ata1.00: ata1: dev 0 multi count 16
ata1.00: configured for UDMA/133
ata1: SATA link up 3.0 Gbps (SStatus 123 SControl 300)
ata1.00: ATA-7, max UDMA/133, 625142448 sectors: LBA48 NCQ (depth
0/32) ata1.00: ata1: dev 0 multi count 16
ata1.00: configured for UDMA/133
scsi1 : ahci
ata2: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)
scsi2 : ahci
ata3: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)
scsi3 : ahci
ata4: SATA link down (SStatus 0 SControl 300)
...

After a ton of internet searches I found that my error is a hardware problem:

AHCI controller does not work on AMD/ATI RS400-200 and RS480 HBA when MSI is enabled due to a hardware error. In order for AHCI to work users must provide the "pci=nomsi" kernel boot parameter. With MSI disabled in this way, the PCIe bus can only act as a faster PCI bus with hotplug capabilities. This is also true of the Nvidia nForce 560 chipset.

Of course the suggestion from Wikipedia had no effect on my system so I had to recompile the kermel to disable handling of MSI interrupts. Obviously after I started the new kernel nothing worked right anymore including sound and that nice Restricted Drivers Manager. OK so after a lot of more or less complete/useful tutorials and howtos I finaly get almost everything to work on my laptop.

So all was well until I got another weird error:
My keyboard suddenly stops responding without any particular reason. Also if I'm installing/removing packages the process freezes as well Yet my mouse is fully functional and so is the entire GUI. If I try to restart/shutdown the system then it gets to the point of "Will now halt" and then it just stops leaving the laptop running. I have to force it to shutdown keeping the power button pressed for a few seconds.

I tried googling but couldn't find anything useful regarding this particular problem. I'm not even sure of what I should be searching for.


If anyone has any suggestion it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

[Ozzi]

Well, I've installed the latest kernel (2.6.23.9) and still no result. I'm really running out of options.

[Ozzi]

Anyone ?

[oz]

Have you tried any other distros?

I've heard some say that Sabayon works out of the box on lots of laptops.

[Ozzi]

Wel, yes, l I have tried Ubuntu, Fedora, Debian, Kanotix and they all failed.

Slackware and openSUSE worked though.

Using suse now. Hasn't crashed yet.

[gruven]

FWIW, on any laptop I have ever had, I usually just find out what hardware it has, and compile my own kernel for whatever distro I use. That way, I have control over what is loaded, and I know what is in my laptop.

You just have to make sure you include the critical stuff, and then you can go from there.

Also, if I plan on running linux on a laptop, I will do a lot of homework ahead of time to make sure what I want will run. I have a HP dv2000t laptop with the Intel C2D in it, and it has an intel chipset. Everything on the laptop except for the 56k modem works on it.

Sorry I can't help you more.

[Dark_Stang]

Hm... Ozzi, wanna give my guide a shot? The only differences between our laptops should be screen size and your graphics card (which should use the same driver anyway)
Ubuntu on DV6636NR - Ubuntu Forums

Edit: I mean if you still wanna try Ubuntu. Keep going with Suse if it's workin.