This is a summary of recent additions to this page. Updates earlier than 19 Jan 98 are not mentioned.
Please note that I have no longer access to a Toshiba laptop and therefore can´t test the recommendations and settings herein. If you find any error, omission, or inaccuracy, please contact me.
This page should cover some of the most common issues, but as usual with software, hardware, and more so with documentation about them, there is always struggle to stay up-to-date. If you have any additions, comments (including style and language), or questions, please direct them to me via e-mail. I speak German (native language), English, and French, so take your choice.
If you wondered about the naming conventions for the laptops, here is my guess: The number is just some number without further meaning, preferably incremented by 10 when a new model comes out. The "C" which comes after the number denotes "color", the "D" stands for an integrated CD-ROM drive, an "S" for a DSTN display and a "T" for a TFT display. The "DVD" suffix does not fit into this scheme and stands for a DVD-ROM drive (in addition to a TFT display). The additional names like "Tecra" and "Satellite" etc. originate in the marketing department and have no further significance. When referring to specific laptop models, this page omits the "marketing" part, thus a "Toshiba Tecra 710CDT" becomes a "710CDT".
Color on computer displays is generated by overlaying separate red, green, and blue (RGB) colored light rays. On standard cathode-ray tubes (CRTs) this is done by beams of electrons hitting red, green, and blue phosphorescent dots on the screen. On the other hand, on liquid crystal displays (LCDs) used in laptops, a liquid crystal area is used to control reflection of external light or penetration of background light to the viewer.
The older and cheaper dual supertwisted nematics (DSTN) technology uses a matrix of wires to control the state of the LCD pixels. The matrix intersections are charged more or less, and thus more or less external light is reflected to the viewer. Therefore, you cannot see anything on a DSTN display when there is no external light source. For example, the 500CS has a DSTN display. When the control for one of the wires of the matrix is broken, a whole half row or column of the display will always be lit or always stay dark. Note that this often only affects one of the three RGB colors, so not a white line is shown, but a red, green, or blue one. The reverse effect is also possible, i.e. one of the three RGB colors is always missing in a row or column.
With thin film transistor (TFT) displays, each pixel has three separate transistors controlling the state of the liquid crystal at this point. One transistor can make the appropriately colored liquid crystal pass the background light or make it completely block the light, with many gradual steps in between. One broken transistor thus leads to a red, green, or blue dot on the screen or a pixel where there is one of the three colors always missing. A 1024x768 TFT display has more than 2.3 million transistors, so it is not improbable that one or more pixels are broken.
If you need to get into the BIOS setup screens and don't want
to boot some Microsoft product just to run TSETUP.EXE,
press the Esc key while turning on or resetting your
laptop. After the BIOS' system initialization is done,
it displays the message "Check system. Press [F1] to continue.".
Pressing the F1 key will get you to the BIOS setup
screens. Note that local keyboard mappings are not yet in effect.
One method how to do this is to use the standard "dd" command of Linux
to read the contents of the entire hard drive and store it somewhere
else. Thus, you need to install the laptop's hard drive in some
computer where you have either physical or network access to another
storage media with enough free space to hold its contents. Boot Linux
and read the boot messages to find out what device Linux associated
with the laptop's hard drive. This is probably "hda" or "hdc" and
henceforth referred to as hd?. Don't mount any
partition of the laptop's hard drive, but use "dd" to copy the entire
hard drive to some temporary storage space.
dd if=/dev/hd? of=/tmp/toshiba_image.ddThen, re-install the hard drive in the laptop and install your preferred operating system. If you ever wish to change, you must put the complete old contents of the hard drive back using
dd if=/tmp/toshiba_image.dd of=/dev/hd?Note that this erases the complete contents of the hard drive, so better make a backup copy of your valuable data. (Thanks to A. White for the instructions.)
If you wish to install Linux after using your whole disk for Windows, you can use "fips" to shrink an existing Windows partition to make room for Linux. Another option is to employ the "umsdos" filesystem which emulates a Unix-style filesystem using storage space on an existing FAT partition.
The Linux installation disks created from the Suse Linux 4.2 CD-ROM (Slackware-descendant) or the Debian 1.2 distribution won't boot due to their use of the new "bzImage" format for kernels. With this format, you can have larger kernel images, because they are loaded into memory > 1MB. (See the LILO documentation for details.) Unfortunately, this results in an immediate hard reset just after loading the kernel and before printing "Uncompressing".
Under certain circumstances, unpatched bzImage type kernels do seem to work, though, probably if you never ran Windows 95 on that laptop before. The new BIOS version 5.80 (dated 96-12-06) does not seem to help reliably. If you have any clue exactly when bzImages won't boot, please mail me.
I created a detailed description of the problem and a verbose patch with debugging hooks, which Hans Lermen <lermen@elserv.ffm.fgan.de> streamlined and submitted to Linus Torvalds, the kernel maintainer. As of kernel version 2.0.30 / 2.1.42, this patch has not yet been integrated into the official kernel sources, but a precompiled kernel is available.
If you wish to use the Debian 1.2 distribution, please refer to Kirk Hilliard's page at http://www.math.virginia.edu/~kdh5j/debian/tecra730/ for specific notes on using Debian with the Toshiba laptops and a working Debian rescue/installation disk.
Booting with normal "zImage" bootdisks works, as does using "loadlin". For Windows 95, you have the choice of not starting the GUI at all (press F8 during the textual one-line boot message or change "BootGUI" to 0 in MSDOS.SYS), shutting down to the command line ("Start"/"Terminate" button in the lower left corner), or configuring loadlin as a "DOS exclusive" application.
This exact same problem reportedly also exists on Fujitsu 555T (report from Andrea Caltroni) laptop and Compudyne Pentium 60 (report from David Kerr) desktop computers.
Unfortunately, Philip Hands reports that the above patch makes some people with other non-laptop computers unable to boot.
When you want to use the SelectBay feature or the docking station to plug in a second hard drive and you get the error message
hdb: non-IDE drive, CHS=525/128/63 hdb: INVALID GEOMETRY: 128 PHYSICAL HEADS?or something similar and an undetected hard drive during boot-up, the controller is probably located at a different I/O port and/or IRQ as Linux expects. To remedy this, the preferable solution is to use the kernel command line option "ide1=0x190,0x396,10" (see the lilo.conf(5) "append" statement), which indicates to the kernel to use I/O port 0x190 and IRQ 10 (compare these values with your BIOS settings). Alternatively, you could change the configuration in the BIOS setup to I/O port 0x170 and IRQ 15.
For the first method, use any of the audio CD playing tools, e.g. "WorkBone" (text-mode) or "WorkMan" (X11), to be found on sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/Linux/apps/sound/cds or mirrors thereof. This works when the CD-ROM drive is in the laptop main unit or the docking station. (Thanks to James Kingdon <J.B.Kingdon@pac.soton.ac.uk> for pointing out that this works in the docking station.) The quality is quite good.
For the second method, you need cdda2wav, available from sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/Linux/apps/sound/cds or mirrors thereof. Adapt the Makefile to use the "nonscsi" audio read method and correct the CD-ROM device node to /dev/hdc or create a symbolic link from /dev/cdrom to /dev/hdc.
cdda2wav -qeNd0will read the CD sound and play it on your /dev/dsp device. Unfortunately, the quality is quite bad and the CD-ROM often looses synchronization. This should be investigated further.
#define in AM53C794.h. With this
configuration, I was able to detect an externally attached Hitachi
hard drive, but the spin-up timed out and consequently, the hard drive
was subsequently not usable.
This could possibly be the hard disk's fault.
Accessing a Sun (alias Toshiba) SCSI CD-ROM drive works.
There are also PCMCIA cards like the Adaptec APA-1460A which work with Linux and provide a SCSI interface without using the docking station.
So far, Linux only supports the standard PCMCIA interface and none of the more advanced features. Newer laptops have the BIOS setting default to "CardBus", which will render the PCMCIA ports useless under Linux unless the user changes the setting. (Thanks to Peter Teuben who confirmed that for a 740CDT.) When the "PCIC" BIOS setting is active, the laptop features an Intel i82365sl-B compatible PCMCIA controller.
In the usual configuration, there is an interrupt conflict with the PS/2 mouse at IRQ 12 when using the PCMCIA card services version 2.8.23 or earlier. Version 2.9.0 and newer has the problem fixed by never using IRQ 12 for monitoring card status changes. I have not yet tested version 2.9.x personally.
To make the i82365 driver use IRQ 11 for status change interrupts:
cs_irq=11 to
insmod i82365 in the PCMCIA startup files
(potentially in /sbin/init.d, /etc/rc.d/init.d, or /etc/init.d, depending on
your distribution) to use IRQ 11. This is
probably a variable like PCIC_OPTS or something like this.
You can't
change this setting in the cardmgr's configuration files
in /etc/pcmcia.
extra_sockets=1 in the same place if you
would like to use the sockets in the docking station.
3Com's 3C589 Ethernet card is reportedly working with pcmcia-cs-2.9.0 onwards only. There might be problems activating the 10Base2 port of said card.
Most of the notebooks feature a Chips & Technologies (C&T) CT65550 graphics controller, newer ones have a CT65554 or even a CT65555. The Tecra 540CDT and 750CDT have a S3 ViRGE/MX chipset, which is completely different from the C&T chipsets. Please see the specifications section for details on hardware equipment.
The commercial X server from MetroX, version 3.1.5, is reported to support the ct65550 graphics chip.
Freeware support for the C&T graphics chips is available in XFree86 3.2
and newer. XFree86 3.2A has major speed improvements, especially for
16 and 24 bpp color depths. More bugfixes and a few more speed
improvements are in XFree 3.3. The most current version is XFree
3.3.1, where a few bugs are fixed. You can find out about your X
server's version using X -version. Use the "XF86_SVGA"
server.
XFree86 since version 3.3.2 supports the S3 ViRGE/MX chipset found in the 540CDT and 750CDT.
| Chip | Dotclock (DClk) | Memory clock (MClk) |
|---|---|---|
| ct65550 rev. A1-A5 | 80 MHz (3.3V), 100 MHz (5V) | 38 MHz |
| ct65550 rev B | 95 MHz (3.3V) | 50 MHz |
| ct65554 | 94.5 MHz | 55 MHz |
| ct65555 | 110 MHz | 55 MHz |
The memory clock limits the graphics modes which the chip can display. Computation according to Chips & Technologies' documentation is as follows: The video engine needs to read the video data from the display memory. This is 1, 2, or 3 bytes for each pixel, depending on the color depth of 8, 16, and 24 bpp, respectively. Using a DSTN display requires one additional byte per pixel, independent of the color depth, for the double-buffering. The required memory bandwidth is the product of the number of bytes accessed per pixel times the dotclock. On the other hand, every MClk cycle accesses 4 bytes. About 70% of the thus computed memory bandwidth is available for consumption by the video engine. The bandwidth provided by the memory subsystem must always exceed the bandwidth required by the video engine.
For example, the popular 1024x768 mode at 65 MHz (see below) with 16 bpp requires a memory bandwidth of 130 Mbyte/sec, while on an old ct65550, there is only about 4 byte/Hz * 38 MHz * 70% = 106 Mbyte/sec available.
ModeLine "800x600" 50.5 800 856 976 1040 600 637 643 666Qingchun Guo reports that the following settings work on his 500CDT instead:
Modeline "800x600" 40.2 800 840 968 1056 600 601 605 628Paul Healy reports that these settings work fine in 16bpp with his 720CDT:
ModeLine "1024x768" 58.5 1024 1032 1176 1344 768 771 777 806Samuel Tardieu reports a limit of 46.9 MHz for 16bpp, so he used this modeline with his 720CDT:
ModeLine "1024x768" 46.0 1024 1032 1176 1344 768 771 777 806
The following sections detail some information useful for creating your own XF86Config file. This is not intended to be a replacement for the documentation accompanying XFree86.
XF86Config's
ModeLine slightly, e.g. use 65.2 MHz instead of 65.1 MHz for a
resolution of 1024x768 pixel. David Bateman even recommends a
dotclock of around 50 MHz for the 1024x768 mode. Robert Nicholson
solved his flickering problems by using a dotclock of 62.5 MHz.
Note that the documentation for the graphics chip says that using 16
bpp at 1024x768 is only possible with a DotClock of 56 MHz or less due
to video memory bandwidth limitations.
Some of these problems are probably due to interference of the internal analog circuits, which is explained further in the README.chips file.
Option "fast_dram" |
Re-program the memory clock to 38 MHz (instead of the text-mode default of 33 MHz with some machines). Note that the ct65554 seems to have programmed its clock to 40 MHz per default, so that this option actually slows down the graphics. |
Option "no_accel" |
Disable hardware acceleration. If you suspect a bug with hardware
acceleration, try again with no_accel |
Option "no_stretch" |
At lower resolutions, use only a part of the TFT display; if omitted: stretches smaller resultion screens over the whole screen |
Option "lcd_center" |
Place images at lower resolutions in the center of the screen;
if omitted: place them in the upper left corner. (Only relevant with
no_stretch) |
Alternatively, you can use any serial mouse by plugging it into the rear 9-pin serial connector of your laptop and changing your XF86Config file appropriately. If you wish to use both the AccuPoint and an external serial mouse without adjusting your XF86Config file all the time, you could use the gpm daemon like this:
You should adjust the "-t ms" option in case your serial mouse is not MouseSystems compatible. The "-R" switch makes gpm act as a repeater, multiplexing both mice's movements into a simulated MouseSystems compatible mouse available at /dev/gpmdata. This device should be specified in the "Pointer" section of your XF86Config file (thanks to Roland Rieke)./usr/sbin/gpm -m /dev/psaux -t ps2 -B132 -M -t ms -m /dev/ttyS0 -R
check the following:> ./XF86_SVGA -probeonly ./XF86_SVGA: No such file or directory
If not, get a recent ELF libc from sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/Linux/GCC/ or a mirror thereof and read the release notes before installing.libm.so.5 => /lib/libm.so.5.0.6 libdl.so.1 => /lib/libdl.so.1.7.14 libc.so.5 => /lib/libc.so.5.3.12
check the following:Fatal server error: Cannot open mouse (Device or resource busy)
cat /proc/interrupts that no other device
has allocated IRQ 12. Read the PCMCIA section above
if it is the PCMCIA controller driver ("i82365").
/dev/psaux exist with the correct major/minor
device number? Use MAKEDEV if in doubt.
into the "Pointer" section of yourProtocol "PS/2" Device "/dev/psaux"
XF86Config file, and
no other Protocol/Device specification?
For further information about the C&T graphics chipsets, refer to Ken Raeburn's Chips & Technologies 655xx video chips page. There's also a low-volume mailing list, see Ken Raeburn's page for subscription info.
The most recent development drivers are available at
ftp://ftp.rp.csiro.au/pub/people/dbateman/ct65550, with a mirror (accessible only via HTTP)
at this site. You need to get the
file "ct65550_elf_YYMMDD.tgz" only, YYMMDD being the latest date
available. Replace your /usr/X11R6/bin/XF86_SVGA with the new
one contained in the archive, but make a backup of your old file
first.
The "dRegs" and "mRegs" programs included in the archive are for
dumping and manipulating internal registers of the chipset.
Non-developers can ignore them.
You may want to check out ftp://ftp.opensound.com/ossfree for updated sound drivers.
| Setting | BIOS setting (possible values) |
|---|---|
| CONFIG_AUDIO=y | |
| CONFIG_MIDI=y | |
| CONFIG_YM3812=y | |
| CS4232_BASE=534 | WSS I/O Address (534/608/e84/f44) |
| CS4232_IRQ=5 | WSS & SBPro IRQ Level (5/7/9/11/15) |
| CS4232_DMA=1 | WSS & SBPro DMA Playback Channel (0/1/3) |
| CS4232_DMA2=0 | WSS & SBPro DMA Record Channel (0/1/3) |
| CS4232_MPU_BASE=330 | Note: linux/drivers/sound/Readme.cards says that the MPU401 synthesizer emulation does not yet work on the CS4232 |
| CS4232_MPU_IRQ=5 | |
| DSP_BUFFSIZE=65536 |
I have very little experience with the Linux sound system, therefore
I maintain the following table of sound software working on the
laptop until I have full confidence that all aspects of sound
work on the laptop, including but not limited to playback,
recording, full-duplex operation, MIDI, /dev/dsp, and /dev/audio
interfaces.
| xfreq | sunsite.unc.edu /pub/linux/apps/sound/freq51.tar.gz |
spectrum analyzer, not working with 24 bpp graphics |
| cat flintstones.au > /dev/audio | - | no comment |
| cdda2wav | ftp.gwdg.de /pub/linux/misc/cdda2wav/cdda2wav0.3beta.src.tar.gz |
reads audio data from CD |
When playing sound files with, e.g., wavplay, the sound quality gets much worse when the CD-ROM drive is spinning; there is a relatively loudly audible background hiss. Even just after the initialization of the sound system, and nothing playing or spinning, there is a noticeable background noise. For specific problems when playing audio CD-ROMs, see the section on the CD-ROM drive. When using the SoundBlaster and OPL-3 emulations of the CS4232 chip (see next section), the sound quality is generally quite bad, but there is no extra noise depending on the CD-ROM drive spinning. This needs further investigation.
Some people have reported the need to boot Windows 95 before booting Linux in order to get the sound chip working. This is reasonable for the SoundBlaster setup (see next section), but the CS4232 driver is said to have special plug & play (PnP) support built-in. Things might improve when PnP support is integrated in Linux.
| Setting | BIOS setting |
|---|---|
| CONFIG_SOUND=y | Please report which BIOS settings change these values |
| CONFIG_ADLIB=y | |
| CONFIG_MPU401=y | |
| CONFIG_MSS=y | |
| CONFIG_YM3812=y | |
| MPU_BASE=330 | |
| MPU_IRQ=9 | |
| MSS_BASE=530 | |
| MSS_IRQ=7 | |
| MSS_DMA=1 | |
| MSS_DMA2=0 |
For drivers, please refer to the Linux/IR project at http://www.cs.uit.no/~dagb/irda/irda.html
Note that the IrDA device is independent of the optional built-in modem.
Depending on the exact laptop model, a modem chip is built-in. In the 750CDT, there's a Lucent Technologies DSP1645 "Mars" chip built-in. This is a digital signal processor (DSP) directly attached to the PCI bus and the analog telephone line. It is unable to interpret standard "AT" commands and requires a host driver to setup the DSP configuration data and/or download the DSP firmware. The Windows VxD driver for the device is said to be of a size of about 0.5 MB. No Linux support for the device will be available anytime soon, and none is in development as far as I know.
You can disable the internal modem in the BIOS setup. Additionally, the modem card may be physically removed by removing a few screws from a lid at the bottom of the laptop.
While the 660CDT is said to have a simpler ISA-based "Apollo" chip built-in following the same concept as the "Mars" chip, this modem reportedly works fine with Linux (probably missing the voice functions). (Thanks to Taketoshi Sano.)
Depending on the country and time of sale, the 710CDT and 720CDT either have a V.34 modem built-in or delivered seperately as a PCMCIA card. In Germany, a V.34 faxmodem card was formerly supplied with it, now the internal modem seems to be BZT (German telecommunications device authority) approved and no external PCMCIA card is provided. Note that the internal modem (at least that supplied in Germany) is only able to do Class 1 fax, while the popular mgetty+sendfax package requires Class 2. The Hylafax software supports Class 1 fax, though.
I have PPP working with the German PCMCIA card. Others reported success with the internal modem, which is accessible as COM2 under DOS and /dev/ttyS1 under Linux. There is also a /dev/cua1 which refers to the same device but is supposed to be used for outgoing connections. Read the Serial-HOWTO, section 12.4, for a detailed explanation.
If you have trouble getting your internal modem to work, check that
there are no interrupt conflicts. Compare the BIOS settings with the
values autodetected during the Linux kernel boot and the output of
"cat /proc/interrupts", and take note that some devices (for example
serial ports and PCMCIA cards) get registered in /proc/interrupts only
when in use. Check that the PCMCIA card manager does not use the
modem IRQ for PCMCIA cards. For example, when you have your modem
interrupt configured at IRQ 3, you could put a line "exclude irq 3"
into /etc/pcmcia/config.opts to prevent the card manager
from using IRQ 3 as well.
(First report of the German PCMCIA card working from Ralf Windecker, Bjoern Kriews told me about the internal modem, Randy Thompson added that the internal US modem works as well.)
shutdown -h.
See the section on graphics troubleshooting for
possible interactions of CONFIG_APM_DISPLAY_BLANK with the X server.
For hard disk spin-down, see "man hdparm", but cron, syslogd and/or lpd might access your hard drive very frequently so that it is unable to spin down.
If your laptop is unable to transition from a power-saving state to full operations (for example, after having blanked the screen), this could be due to too many interrupts happening. A timer seems to be employed to check whether some external event has occurred which should lead to leaving the power-saving state. However, that timer is restarted at every interrupt. Thus, if interrupts happen at a frequency faster than every 10 msec, the power-saving state will never be left. AVM ISDN cards using drivers older than from the early February CVS tree are likely such an interrupt source. (Thanks to Bernd Mielke for the explanation.)
If the latter does not help, you could use "cardctl eject" to shut down the PCMCIA socket before the suspend to solve the problem. Use "cardctl insert" to revive the PCMCIA cards. If the "cardctl eject" returns "device busy", you need to stop applications currently accessing the device, in the case of an Ethernet card, that could be for example the nameserver "named". Björn Kriews <bkr@cut.de> modified apmd (updated as of 28 Mar 1997) so that it automatically shuts down the PCMCIA socket before a suspend and revives it after the resume.
| Abbreviation | D | RH | Su | Sl |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Distribution | Debian | RedHat | Suse | Slackware |
Help others, add your own entry for new combinations of distribution/laptop/feature by sending me email and be prepared to get an occasional e-mail asking for help.
Note: All entries in the following list have working mainboard (CPU, cache, memory, PCI), internal hard drive, internal floppy, Toshiba IDE CD-ROM (see specifications section whether provided with the model), AccuPoint.
| Graphics | Sound (CS4232) | APM | PPP (internal modem, where provided) | external PS/2 mouse | Network (PCMCIA) | parallel ZIP | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| internal LCD | external monitor | ||||||||
| 500CS | RH4.1, Sl3.1, D1.2.?, RH4.2 | RH4.1, Sl96 | RH4.1, D1.2.?, RH4.2 | RH4.1, Sl3.1, D1.2.?, RH4.2 | RH4.1, Sl3.1, RH4.2 | D1.2.?, !RH4.1 | Megahertz XJ10: RH4.1, !RH4.2 | - | |
| 500CDT | RH4.0, RH4.1, RH4.2, Sl3.1 | - | RH4.1, RH4.2, Sl3.1 | RH4.1, RH4.2, Sl3.1 | !RH4.0, RH4.1, RH4.2 | RH4.0 | Megahertz XJ10BC: RH4.2, Sl3.1; 3Com: RH4.0 | RH4.2 | Adaptec PCMCIA SCSI, Jaz, SCSI tape |
| 510CDT | RH4.2 | - | RH4.2, Sl3.2 | RH4.2 | RH4.2 | RH4.2, Sl3.2 | 3c589, Adaptec PCMCIA SCSI: RH4.2; NE2k clone: Sl3.2 | Sl3.2 | |
| 660CDT | RH4.1 | - | - | - | RH4.1 | RH4.1 | - | - | |
| 710CDT | Su4.2 | Su4.2 | Su4.2 | Su4.2 | - | - | - | ||
| 720CDT | Ddevel, RH4.1, Su2.0.25, Su4.4, Su5.1 | Su4.4 | Ddevel, RH4.1, Su2.0.25, Su4.4 | Ddevel, Su2.0.25 | Su2.0.25, external: Su4.4 | Su5.1 | 3Com: Ddevel, RH4.1, Su4.4 | - | |
| 730CDT | RH3.0.3, RH4.1, Sl3.0 | RH4.1, Sl3.0 | Sl3.0 | Sl3.0 | RH3.0.3, RH4.1, Sl3.0 | RH4.1, Sl3.0 | RH3.0.3, 3Com: RH4.1, Xircom 10/100: Sl3.0 | RH3.0.3, RH4.1 | SCSI with docking station, Sl3.0: cardstation |
| 730XCDT | Su5.0 | Su5.0 | - | - | - | Su5.0 | - | - | |
| 740CDT | D1.3, RH4.2, Sl3.2, Sl3.4, Su5.0 | Su5.0 | D1.3, Sl3.2, Sl3.4 | D1.3, Sl3.4 | D1.3, Sl3.4 | Su5.0 | D1.3, Sl3.2, Sl3.4 | - | |
| 750CDT | Su5.0 | - | - | - | - | - | Su5.0 | - | |
The first table shows the information for the outdated models of the Satellite, Satellite Pro and Portégé series. The next two tables present the outdated models of the Tecra series. The last two tables show the features of all current Toshiba laptops. The hyperlinks refer to Toshiba Europe's WWW site.
To keep the tables small, short descriptions have been used within the table, explained below them where necessary.
| Satellite | Satellite Pro | Portégé | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 220CS | 230CX | 440CDX 440CDT | 460CDX 460CDT | 300CT | 660CDT | |
| Processor | P133 | P133MMX | P133MMX | P166MMX | P133MMX | P133 |
| L2 Cache | 256 KB PB | standard | ||||
| RAM | 16 - 144 MB | 16 - 144 MB | 32 - 160 MB | 32 - 64 MB | 16 - 80 MB | |
| BIOS | 6.90 | ? | 6.90 | 6.90 | 6.40 | 6.30 |
| Hard disk | 1.26 GB | 1.26 GB | 2.0 GB | 1.5 GB | 1.26 GB | |
| CD-ROM | optional 10x | 10x | optional | 10x | ||
| Graphics | ct65555 | ct65554 | ct65555 | ct65554 | ||
| Display | 800x600 | 1024x600 | 800x600 | |||
| 12.1 inches | 10.4 inches 16:9 | 11.3 inches | ||||
| DSTN | HCA | HCA / TFT | TFT | |||
| Sound | Soundblaster Pro compatible | 16bit stereo | CS4232 | |||
| PCMCIA | either two type II or one type III. | |||||
| Infrared | - | IrDA 1.1, 4 Mbps | - | IrDA 1.1, 4 Mbps | ||
| Modem | - | (opt.) built-in 33.6 kbps V.34, V.80 | (opt.) built-in 33.6 kbps V.34, V.80 | V.34 fax voice (?) | ||
| Keyboard | standard 84 keys | Win95 | standard 84 keys (???) | Win95 | ||
| External connectors | USB, SelectBay | USB, SelectBay | USB | - | ||
| Battery | ? | 3.6 Ah | 2.4 Ah | 4.0 Ah | ||
| Battery life max | 3 h | 2-3 h | 2.5 h | 2.5-2.8 h | 2h | 3 h |
| Power supply | 100-240 V AC | 100-240 V, 50-60 Hz, 30W | ||||
| Weight | 3.1 kg | 3.1 kg | 1.7 kg | 2.5 kg | ||
| Dimensions (WxDxH) | 303.6 x 235 x 50.5 mm | 303.6 x 235 x 50.5 mm | 263 x 192 x 35 mm | 263 x 210 x 49 mm | ||
| Portégé | Tecra | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 650CT | 500CS | 500CDT | 510CDS | 510CDT | 710CDT | 720CDT | 730CDT | |
| Processor | P133 | P120 | P133 | P133 | P150 | |||
| L2 Cache | standard | |||||||
| RAM | 16 MB to 80 MB | 16 to 144 MB | ||||||
| BIOS | 6.00 | 5.70 | 6.70 | 5.80 | 6.60 | |||
| Hard disk | 1.26 GB | 2.0 GB | ||||||
| CD-ROM | none | optional | 6x | 10x | 6x | |||
| Graphics | ct65550 | |||||||
| Display | 800x600 | 1024x768 | ||||||
| 11.3 inches | 12.1 inches | |||||||
| TFT | DSTN | TFT | DSTN | TFT | ||||
| Sound | Crystal Semiconductor CS4232 | |||||||
| PCMCIA | Intel 82365 compatible, either two type II or one type III. CardBus, ZV support | |||||||
| Infrared | IrDA 1.1, 4 Mbps | IrDA 1.0, 115 Kbps | ||||||
| Modem | (opt.) built-in 28.8 Kbps V.34 fax voice | |||||||
| Keyboard | Win95 | standard 84 keys | ||||||
| External connectors | - | |||||||
| Battery | 3.4 Ah | 3.6 Ah | 4.0 Ah | 5.6 Ah | ||||
| Battery life max | 3 h | 3.5 h | 4 h | 3.5 h | 3.5 h | 3 h | ||
| Power supply | 100-240 V, 50-60Hz, 30W | |||||||
| Weight | 2.2 kg | 3.4 kg with integrated AC adaptor | 3.7 kg with integrated AC adaptor | 3.65 kg | 3.65 kg | 3.7 kg | ||
| Dimensions (WxDxH) | 261 x 208 x 46 mm | 299 x 235 x 58 mm | 299 x 235 x 58 mm | 297 x 230 x 59 mm | 297 x 230 x 59 mm | |||
| Tecra | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 520CDT | 530CDT | 730XCDT | 740CDT | |
| Processor | P166MMX | P150MMX | P166MMX | |
| L2 Cache | 256 KB PB | standard | 256 KB PB | |
| RAM | 32 - 160 MB | 16 - 144 MB | ||
| BIOS | ? | 6.30 | 6.50 | |
| Hard disk | 2.0 GB | 2.0 GB | 3.0 GB | |
| ROM | CD 10x | CD 10x | ||
| Graphics | ct65555 | ct65554 | ||
| Display | 800x600 | 1024x768 | ||
| 12.1 inches | 13.3 inches | |||
| TFT | ||||
| Sound | 16 bit stereo | CS4232 | ||
| PCMCIA | Intel 82365 compatible, either two type II or one type III. CardBus, ZV support | |||
| Infrared | IrDA 1.1, 4 Mbps | IrDA 1.0, 115 Kbps | IrDA 1.1, 4Mbps | |
| Modem | built-in 33.6 kbps | (opt.) built-in 28.8 Kbps V.34 fax voice | ||
| Keyboard | standard 84 keys | standard 84 keys | ||
| Additional Features | USB, SelectBay | - | ||
| Battery | 3.4 Ah | 5.6 Ah | ||
| Battery life max | 2.5 h | 3 h | 2.5 h | |
| Power supply | 100-240 V, 50-60Hz, 30W | 40W built-in | ||
| Weight | 2.9 kg with integrated 45W AC adaptor | 3.7 kg | ||
| Dimensions (WxDxH) | 297 x 231 x 47 mm | 297 x 229 x 60 mm | 303 x 239 x 61 mm | |
| Satellite | Satellite Pro | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 300CDS 300CDT | 310CDS 310CDT | 320CDS 320CDT | 470CDT | 480CDT | 490CDT | 490XCDT | |
| Processor | P166MMX | P200MMX | P233MMX | P200MMX | P233MMX | P-II 233MMX | P-II 266MMX |
| L2 Cache | 256 KB PB | 512 KB PB | 256 KB PB | 512 KB integrated | |||
| RAM | 16 - 144 MB | 32 - 160 MB | 32 - 160 MB | ||||
| BIOS | ? | 6.30 | ? | ||||
| Hard disk | 2.0 GB | 3.8 GB | |||||
| CD-ROM | 16x simultaneous | 20x simult. | 10x | 20x | |||
| Graphics | ct655?? | ct65555 | ct655?? | ct65555 | S3V/MX | ||
| Display | 800x600 | 1024x768 | |||||
| 12.1 inches | 13.1 inches | ||||||
| DSTN / TFT | TFT | ||||||
| Sound | Soundblaster Pro compatible | Yamaha OPL3 | 16bit stereo | ||||
| PCMCIA | either two type II or one type III. | ||||||
| Infrared | IrDA 1.1, 4 Mbps | ||||||
| Modem | - | (opt.) built-in 33.6 kbps V.34, V.80 | |||||
| Keyboard | Win95 86 keys | ||||||
| External connectors | USB | USB, SelectBay | |||||
| Battery | ? | 3.6 Ah | ? | ||||
| Battery life max | 2-3 h | 2.5-2.8 h | 3 h | 2-2.5 h | |||
| Power supply | 100-240 V AC | ||||||
| Weight | 3.0 kg | 3.1 kg | 3.2 kg | 3.3 kg | |||
| Dimensions (WxDxH) | 304 x 239 x 54 mm | 303.6 x 239 x 50.5 mm | 304 x 239 x 51 mm | ||||
| Portégé | Tecra | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 320CT | 540CDT | 550CDT | 750CDT | 750DVD | 780DVD | |
| Processor | P266MMX | P233MMX | P266MMX | P233MMX | P-II 266 | |
| L2 Cache | 512 KB PB | 512 KB integrated | ||||
| RAM | 32 - 64 MB | 32 - 160 MB | 32 - 160 MB | 64 - 192 MB | ||
| BIOS | ? | |||||
| Hard disk | 3.8 GB | 4.77 GB | ||||
| ROM | CD optional | CD 20x | DVD 2x | |||
| Graphics | ct6555? | S3V/MX | ||||
| Display | 1024x600 | 1024x768 | ||||
| 10.4 inches 16:9 | 12.1 inches | 13.3 inches | ||||
| TFT | ||||||
| Sound | 16 bit stereo | Yamaha 3D | 16 bit stereo | |||
| PCMCIA | Intel 82365 compatible, either two type II or one type III. CardBus, ZV support | |||||
| Infrared | IrDA 1.1, 4 Mbps | |||||
| Modem | - | (opt.) built-in 33.6 kbps V.34 fax voice | (opt.) K56flex | Lucent DSP1645 "Mars" (V.34, V.80, DSVD voice/fax) | ||
| Keyboard | Win95 86 keys | |||||
| Additional Features | - | USB, ACPI | USB, ACPI, NTSC/PAL, CCD camera | |||
| Battery | ? | ? | 3.6 Ah (???) | ? | ||
| Battery life max | 2-3 h | 2.5-3 h | 3.5 h | |||
| Power supply | 100-240 V, 50-60Hz | |||||
| Weight | 1.7 kg | 2.9 kg | 2.8 kg | 3.7 kg | 3.6 kg | |
| Dimensions (WxDxH) | 263 x 192 x 35 mm | 297 x 231 x 47 mm | 304 x 240 x 54 mm | |||
| Processor | All processors without MMX are Intel Pentium 2.9V/3.3V. MMX processors with speeds < 200 MHz are Intel Pentium MMX 2.45V, 200 and 233 MHz MMX processors are Intel Pentium MMX "Tillamook" with a 1.8V core. P-II designates Pentium II processors with a 1.7V core. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| L2 Cache | The standard cache has a size of 256 KB and is 8 nsec at 3.3V with a 32Kx8bit, 15 nsec tag RAM in write-through configuration. "PB" stands for "pipelined-burst cache", which still seems to be in write-through configuration (54.9 MB/sec into L2 cache, 34.5 MB/sec into RAM). Note that the Toshiba chipsets used seem to be able to cache 64 MB RAM only. Adding more RAM will slow down the computer. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| PCI chipset | The PCI chipset is proprietary. Toshiba does not disclose any information about it. Please send me your /proc/pci so that I can determine if the PCI chipset is all the same on the different laptops. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| BIOS | BIOS versions mentioned are those offered on Toshiba's WWW site. The BIOS is stored in a 256KB Flash EEPROM, 150nsec, 5V divided into 128 KB system BIOS, 48 KB video BIOS, and 8 KB PnP data area. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| RAM | RAM is always 60 nsec EDO RAM, 3.3V. Figures in the tables indicate the standard and maximum memory configuration. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Hard disk | Hard disk drive types are all 2.5 inch EIDE, PIO mode 4, DMA mode 2. See the separate table below for the detailed specifications. Please send me hard drive types (as autodetected during Linux boot-up) for the other models. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Graphics | The graphics chips are PCI. The chips prefixed "ct" are from Chips & Technologies: ct65550 denotes the CT F65550, ct65554 the CT F65554. All have 2 MB EDO RAM (50nsec, 5V) as video memory. S3V/MX denotes a S3 ViRGE/MX 3D chip with 4 MB SGRAM. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ROM |
Most ROM drives are Toshiba EIDE/ATAPI, the combined CD-ROM/Floppy
drives in the 3xxCDS/T series are TEAC CD-220EA, however.
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Display | DSTN and HCA displays can do 64K colors, while TFTs do 16.7M colors. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sound | The Crystal Semiconductor CS4232 chipset also includes a Yamaha OPL-3 (YMF262) and a Yamaha D/A converter (YAC512), full duplex. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Modem | In some countries, the built-in modem seems to be optional, in others, it's standard. Make sure you get what you want before buying. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| External connectors | All laptops have the following external interfaces in addition to these mentioned in the tables: 9-pin serial (16550 UART), 25-pin parallel (ECP), 15-pin RGB (SVGA), PS/2 keyboard/mouse, external floppy, 3.5 mm mini audio (microphone mono; headphone, line-in, line-out stereo). Note that the floppy is built-in and combined with the CD-ROM drive in the 310CDS/CDT and 320CDS/CDT. These models do not have an internal microphone either. A SelectBay may alternatively hold a floppy, CD-ROM drive, 2nd hard drive, or an additional battery. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Battery life | Battery life figures are maximums and should be lower on real-world usage. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Toshiba | IBM | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MK2720FC | MK2101MAN | MK2103MAV | MK2104MAV | MK3003MAN | DPLA-25120 | |
| Capacity [GB/10^9] | 1.26/1.35 | 2.0/2.16 | 3.0/3.22 | 4.77/5.12 | ||
| Cache | 128 kB | 468 kB | ||||
| Access time | 13 msec | 12 msec | ||||
| Rotational speed | ? | 4800 rpm | 4852 rpm | 4900 rpm | ||
| Density (kbpi/tpi) | ? | 139/8772 | 138/8483 | 201/12500 | ||
| CHS (logical) | 589/64/63 | 525/128/63 | 746/128/63 | 623/255/63 | ||
| CHS (physical) | ? | 5160/6/ZBR | 5020/10/ZBR | 6976/8/ZBR | ||
| Model confirmation | 510CS, 710CDT, 720CDT | 730CDT | 660CDT | 310CDT | 740CDT | 750CDT |
SCSI host adapter AMD 53C974 (PCI) PCMCIA two additional type III slots Slots two PCI/ISA full length, one PCI half length External connectors 9-pin serial, 25-pin parallel, PS/2 keyboard, PS/2 mouse, 15-pin RGB SVGA, joystick/MIDI, 3.5 mm mini audio (microphone mono, headphone, line-in, line-out stereo)
The BIOS version information was obtained from running tdiags,
the toshiba diagnostics software delivered with (at least) the Windows 95
installation.
Kirk Hilliard has a special page for using the Debian distribution with these laptops.
There is a mailing list for running Linux on the Toshiba Tecra series
laptops. To subscribe, send mail to
majordomo@cse.ogi.edu,
with the body (don't bother with a subject):
subscribe tecra-linux your-email-address
(Thanks to Jeffrey R. Lewis for providing this.)
Toshiba America maintain pages with technical information about their current laptops at their WWW site. There's also a WWW site of Toshiba Europe in Germany. BIOS images, manuals, and technical information are available at http://www.toshiba.com/tais/csd/support/files/. Toshiba also offers a free BBS system at http://www.toshiba-tro.de/ (registration required).
This page is referenced by the Linux Laptop Home Page.
A Notebook Graphics and PCMCIA Chipset Survey from David Fox is available as well as the X and Notebooks pages of Darin Ernst. Last time I looked (1 Aug 1996), the latest entry of the latter was of 11 Mar 1996.
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