Re: [Debconf-discuss] X60s battery issues
On Tuesday, July 26, 2011 08:29:27 AM, Csillag Tamas wrote:
> On Tue, Jul 26, 2011 at 07:26:54AM -0400, Chris Knadle wrote:
> > On Tuesday, July 26, 2011 02:53:25 AM, Jérémy Bobbio wrote:
> ...
>
> > I'd like to believe that the battery could be recovered using some kind
> > of ThinkPad battery firmware hack, but I haven't been able to find one.
> > I similarly have a failed battery that I'd like to bring to life again.
> > [If anhyone has a clue on this, please ping me via email.]
>
> Well, no real recovery, but you can get more information by trying out
> the tp_smapi kernel module, if you did not already. (afaik it is
> available as a debian package)
I'm familiar with the tp_smapi module and use it constantly; I've investigated
it and unfortunately it won't do it, not even in Debug mode AFAICT. I, too,
was hoping the tp_smapi module would have at least some write access to the
battery firmware/EEPROM.
On Tuesday, July 26, 2011 09:54:51 AM, Luca Capello wrote:
...
> > I'd like to believe that the battery could be recovered using some kind
> > of ThinkPad battery firmware hack, but I haven't been able to find one.
> > I similarly have a failed battery that I'd like to bring to life again.
> > [If anhyone has a clue on this, please ping me via email.]
>
> I clearly remember that Henrique de Moraes Holschuh (cc:ed,
> ThinkPad-ACPI upstream maintainer) told me at DebConf9 that is there
> actually a way to "bare metal" manually charge dead ThinkPad batteries
> if the EC controller is not dead (technical details may be wrong, but
> you got the idea). I have never tried looked for the necessary
> information nor tried that, but I will certainly to that. Links
> appreciated ;-)
I've been investigating and have found two software packages that are only for
Windows :-( at least so far, which may or may not work in WINE. I may try to
load these and see what I get with the dead battery I have sitting around.
First one is "Smart Mattery Workshop":
http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/System-Miscellaneous/Smart-Battery-
Workshop.shtml
Second one is "Battery EEPROM":
http://be2works.com/
I think both of these communicate to the battery firmware/EEPROM via SMBus, so
some investigation of the Linux kernel's SMBus communication and software
within Debian to do SMBus communication may yield something that can be done
natively. Even something that would allow hex editing the firmware directly
would be nice.
If I come up with something better I'll let y'all know.
-- Chris
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