<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
</head>
<body>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier">I will try using the iGPU
when I get in to my office next, likely over the weekend. The
fan failure message comes from the BIOS after a complete
shutdown (to a cold boot). It looks to me like the fans are
spinning. If I tell it to ignore the fan message, everything
runs ... fine. Except for the date/time, which I have to
reset. Otherwise it works great until the next reboot. Maybe
it just is the CMOS after all.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier">I have two Lenovo thinkpads
which are complete workhorses, both run Arch linux, they are as
solid as concrete. One is at least eleven years old (still with
the classic keyboard!), and once I upgraded the internal RAM and
hard drive to an SSD it just runs like a top. I've been a
moderate fan of their products over the years, at least until I
tried this one.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier">Next time I'll keep a small
Windows partition as a hedge against problems. I have one on my
X1 Carbon, and it works just fine, leaving Arch Linux alone.</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier">I think I'll try switching
the CMOS battery to see what happens. Then if necessary try
fwupdate. Then if necessary try booting some version of Windows
to update the firmware. Then if necessary calling Lenovo to see
what's what. After all that I may try to salvage it by swapping
out the MB, in which case hardware repair recommendations are
still welcome!</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier"><br>
</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier">And if <i>everything</i>
fails, I'll ask Lennart what he recommends for new hardware. (I
did that for one of my computers years ago, did what he
suggested, and it still runs beautifully!)<br>
</font></p>
<p><font size="4" face="Adobe Courier"><br>
</font></p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 9/14/23 11:00, D. Hugh Redelmeier
via talk wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:b9599212-a8f7-6434-e809-5b35e42c2a4f@mimosa.com">
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">| From: Peter King via talk <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:talk@gtalug.org"><talk@gtalug.org></a>
|
| It's a Lenovo Legion T5-26AMRS, about a year and a half old; the CPU is an AMD
| Ryzen 7 5700G (8 cores) running around 3GHz, with 32GB of RAM. The graphics
| card is an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 with 12GB onboard RAM.
Quick partial response:
Does you machine expose ports for the iGPU of the 5700G? If so, you could
use the iGPU and remove the NVidia card.
Why?
- the iGPU is decent and should work for the things you do
- the AMD iGPU is supported by open-source drivers
(The nouveau drivers are not very good for modern NVidia cards.
For one thing, they cannot control the power levels (this may have
changed.))
This will reduce the complexity of your system. There is a slight chance
that it will fix your problem. Bonus: power usage will go down
| I bought a
| three-year warranty when I got it, so it's still eligible for repair.
| Ignoring the CPU Fan Failure message so far hasn't caused any hiccups, which
| makes me distrust the message. The fact that the CMOS started acting up
| exactly when the fans failed make me suspect an electrical problem on the
| motherboard.
Lenovo phone support *might* be useful. It sure is easier than shipping
your box to them.
Where is the Fan Failure message coming from? Firmware or Linux?
If it is coming from the firmware, they don't have to know you have Linux.
Where is the CMOS message coming from? Firmware or Linux?
If it is coming from the firmware, they don't have to know you have Linux.
There area also official lenovo fora. Mostly for users but some Lenovo
support people lurk there and sometimes post. On balance, not wonderful
but sometimes helpful.
| I run Arch Linux; I wiped Windows off the machine as soon as I got it.
Now you know: lack of Windows makes support more difficult. In your case,
we think that it is a hardware/firmware problem so it should not matter.
But support folks may be hard to convince.
If you actually return a box to Lenovo, they sometimes allow you to keep
the disk drive (for security/privacy reasons). They may charge a fee for
this.
That's why I sometimes buy boxes with the smallest drive, and then swap it
out to sit on a shelf as my insurance policy. That's why William puts
Linux on an added disk.
| There seems to be a CLI tool called something like fwupdate that works at
| least on some ThinkPads. It might work on the Legion tower, too, but then
| again it might not.
fwupdmgr will know if it understands your computer. It should be safe to
run it but I think that it is unlikely to work. It depends on the
manufacturer supplying fwupd.org with suitable binaries. Lenovo probably
doesn't do that for model that don't support Linux (my guess).
This appears to be the update. The readme confuses me. It doesn't seem
to say what the improvements are. It does say that there are some
challenges updating from a version older than O4MKT1CA. What firmware are
you running ("sudo dmidecode | grep 'BIOS Rev'" might tell you).
Note: there may be other kinds of firmware distributed by Lenovo via
Windows Update or Lenovo Vantage (running only on Windows). For example,
disk drive firmware. Such updates might improve behaviour under Linux.
| I bought this machine hoping for a long-lasting workhorse
| and it has given me far more trouble than my off-the-shelf computers where I
| matched the components by myself. Such is life.
Normally, this Lenovo box is called "off the shelf". Boxes were you
select the parts had have them assembled are called custom builds, but the
components themselves are "off the shelf".
I'm not sure that buying a gaming computer is the best route to stability.
It should be OK.
| But having had it once not-really-fixed by Lenovo, at some effort, I don't
| know that I want to go down that road again rather than cutting out (what
| might be) the problem at its roots...
The more you touch of the problem, the more you own of it.
My suggestion is to get Lenovo to fix it, or write it off. Anything else
is a rabbit hole of unknown depth.
First step down the rabbit hole (I would do this, but I don't really
recommend it because of the work involved): install Windows (probably on a
different disk). See if the problem goes away. Do the firmware update.
See if the problem goes away. At this point, you are in a position
where Lenovo support will not be distracted by Linux and use it as an
excuse.</pre>
<br>
<fieldset class="moz-mime-attachment-header"></fieldset>
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">---
Post to this mailing list <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:talk@gtalug.org">talk@gtalug.org</a>
Unsubscribe from this mailing list <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk">https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk</a>
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Peter King <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:peter.king@utoronto.ca">peter.king@utoronto.ca</a>
Department of Philosophy
170 St. George Street #521
The University of Toronto (416)-946-3170 ofc
Toronto, ON M5R 2M8
CANADA
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://individual.utoronto.ca/pking/">http://individual.utoronto.ca/pking/</a>
=========================================================================
GPG keyID 0x7587EC42 (2B14 A355 46BC 2A16 D0BC 36F5 1FE6 D32A 7587 EC42)
gpg --keyserver pgp.mit.edu --recv-keys 7587EC42
</pre>
</body>
</html>