openbsd on hp omnibook 5000cts

OpenBSD on HP Omnibook 5000cts

Introduce us
The Omnibook 5000cts is a pretty decent laptop, espcially considering that it was first released in 1995 and has been out of production now for 2 years. Its cute. Its speedy. It has many nice features. I have one. I'm happy.

Here are the specs of my machine:

Intel P90
48mb RAM (upgrade)
1120mb Hard Disk
10.2" TFT Screen
PCI Bus
2xPCMCIA (type 2)
IrDA InfraRed port
Trackerball (ps2)
Internal SCSI controller (external connector)
Crystal Sound Audio (Windows Sound System), stereo speakers, built in mic
TV out (composite PAL/NTSC), VGA out

What works?

OpenBSD 2.5 installs, boots, runs.
X runs in 800x600, 16 bit colour with trackerball.
Audio works well
My 3Com 589c works fine
My Toshiba modem works fine
APM works fine

What doesn't?

Infrared (untested)
Internal SCSI (untested, but would seem to be unsupported)

Installing (Kernel) - [My Kernal config]
Installing wasn't difficult, but it wasn't entirely straightforward either. OpenBSD probes for an PCMCIA/ISA bridge at 0x3e0, however the machine has a PCMCIA/PCI bridge, located at 0x3080. After numerous failed installs (while i was trying to locate the PCMCIA bridge), and as a last-ditch attempt to get things working, I also disabled pccom*. I'm not entirely sure as to whether this helped or not, but it certainly didn't hurt, and I re-enabled pccom in my kernel config as soon as I was sure I had IRQ's to spare.

My method of getting OpenBSD on to my machine was:

Boot off the 2.5 boot floppy and enter '-c' at the prompt

root on /dev/wd0a
boot> -c

Once the kernal has loaded you'll be dropped into UKC (User Kernal Config - finger licking good). Here we need to tell OpenBSD the location of the PCI->PCMCIA bridge, which isn't at the expected 0x3e0. Type 'change pcic0' and hit 'y' at the prompt. Now specify the IO address as 0x3480 if you have SCSI enabled in the BIOS, otherwise 0x3400. Hit return to accept defaults for all other options.

UKC> change pcic0
UKC> 125 pcic0 at isa0 port 0x3e0 size 0 iomem 0xd0000 iosiz 0x4000 irq -1 drq -1 drq2 -1
UKC> change (y/n) y
UKC> port? (0x3e0) : 0x3400

Disable pccom0-2 (if you feel you have to).

UKC> disable pccom0
UKC> disable pccom1
UKC> disable pccom2
Wicked. Type 'quit', and we're done

With a bit of luck, you should see something like this in your dmesg:

pcic0 at isa0 port 0x3400-0x3401 iomem 0xd0000-0xd3fff
pcic0: controller 0 (Cirrus PD672X) has sockets A and B
pcmcia0 at pcic0 controller 0 socket 0

X11R6 Overview
X was rather easy to get going - the problem, as always, is getting it tweaked to fit the exact video chipset/display. 800x600 in 16 bit came good in the end though, with a little bit of perseverence.

X11R6 Setup - [My XFree86 Config]
Using my XF86Config will give you 800x600 in 16 bit, a working mouse, and a British keymap. If, however, you want to go about tweaking things yourself, here's a few pointers:

Mouse Setup : The trackerball is PS2 type on device /dev/pms0
Video Setup : The video controller is a Chips & Technologies 65545. There are a number of options available for this controller that you can enable/disable as you please. The most important ones for me were:
- fix_panel_size - Gave me a fullscreen display. Without it the screen didn't fill the entire display
- hw_cursor - Hardware mouse pointer. Not incredibly important, but the 65545 supports it so it makes sense to use it.
- use_mode_line - Otherwise the in-chip defaults are used.
Monitor Setup : "Extended SVGA" in XF86Setup (worked for me)
Mode Lines : I just started with the default 640x480 16bpp and tweaked it from there.

APM

Contrary to my first impression, APM works fine on the Omnibook 5000cts. The key thing, however, is not to enable apmd in /etc/rc.conf, but to start the daemon manually when you log in. I have absolutely no idea why one works and not the other. If I ever get sick enough of starting apmd every time I reboot I'll look into it and let you know ;)

(one other APM note: even if apmd isn't running, hitting the on/off switch suspends/resumes the system just fine anyway.)

Resources
Useful

OpenBSD, secure yourself.
The open-mobile mailing list page @ monkey.org.
XFree86, what a lovely song.

Not

darq.net, home of hatred.
i live in it - old stuff

Written and maintained by kaneda@darq.net.
Last updated 26th August 1999.