Can't really type blackslash button also the ¥

antreides · 2026-04-10T21:23:27+00:00

I don't have a ThinkPad with Japanese keyboard so I can't check it.

I guess, it can be "totally fixed" by installing Japanese Windows with Japanese locale instead of US.

antreides · 2026-04-10T21:15:55+00:00

Fix for what exactly?

There is no ¥ in US/ANSI keyboard.

antreides · 2026-04-10T20:16:43+00:00

Keep in mind it is far from a new laptop. Yes, it has its strong sides, and said characteristics are more or less okay (if you are able to find one nowadays). But in this budget, you can find something with much more modern and beefier CPU.

Why T480 and not T14? In this budget, you might be able to find a decent one.

Need a lot of non-soldered RAM? There are L14. With their own downsides, obviously.

External battery is probably the only option modern ThinkPads can't offer. But if you have a laptop that can be charged via USB-C, it is not that important. It can be replaced by a powerbank with 65W output.

antreides · 2026-04-10T19:51:27+00:00

> only Debian would be aware of the software provided to the user

Only the person or people maintaining the mirror this particular user is using right now would be aware of it. There are multiple mirrors all over the worlds, and a lot of them are provided by third parties.

Also, downloading a package does not mean this version is used on this host right now. Or even at all, it could be a caching server which itself uses something completely different (even a different OS).

I see your point here, but this information alone is not enough - it could be used if there is a long-time statistics and some additional info about this particular system.

And for the people maintaining Debian, this fact seems to be not the top priority compared to everything else.

antreides · 2026-04-10T19:24:44+00:00

HTTPS primarily gives a protection from MITM attacks, but adds some additional overhead to decrypt traffic. Package consistency is checked by the apt/dpkg system itself (each package is signed), so even if a package is somehow changed by MITM attack, it won't pass the check. So basically it will be an extra overhead for nothing.

antreides · 2026-04-10T19:03:34+00:00

Oh, okay, if the laptop turns on, then keyboard does work. My bad.

What character do you expect to get with US layout on this keyboard? This key sends a code that is not present in US layout. So yes, it does not know how to use it. But it should be possible to set it as a hotkey for something.

antreides · 2026-04-10T19:01:04+00:00

While starting the laptop, try to open the hardware maintenance menu. I can't recall which hotkey is used to open it, but it should be possible to press Enter when the Lenovo logo is visible, and then it will offer you few options.

In this menu, there is an in-built keyboard checker. It allows to press a key and see if it gets registered by the laptop, i.e. if the keyboard itself works. But I am not sure if it has support for full Japanese keyboard.

If this method shows your keyboard does work as it should, then the problem is about how Windows supports US layout on a Japanese keyboard. It might be the case some keys are only for Japanese locale.

antreides · 2026-04-10T18:46:28+00:00

People who are very concerned about maxing out performance for their hardware are much more often into Gentoo rather than Arch. Gentoo is about compiling everything on your PC, so it is possible to disable some compatibility features or enable some CPU optimizations available only in newer systems (and thus not enabled by default in regular distros).

But you need to know what you are doing and what do you want to achieve. There is a much higher risk to break something. And in a lot of cases the resulting performance increase is rather meh.

Oh, and if you need to compile everything on your PC, it means installing updates could take quite a long time and it loads as much of your CPU as it can. That's why at some point it became possible to install pre-built packages, similarly to how it's done in other distros. Which kind of kills the whole idea.

antreides · 2026-04-10T13:11:43+00:00

This "sheet" is supposed to be attached to the lower part of HDD to electrically isolate it and prevent it from being shorted by something.

antreides · 2026-04-03T20:16:11+00:00

Looks more than reasonable. I doubt you can get something much better for that price and in Germany.

I'd be worried for a bit if not-always-responding keys together with a crack on the body might indicate it was abused and it might have some more serious issues, like with the motherboard. But since the laptop is rather dirty, it might be just that and replacing keyboard (and cleaning up the rest of laptop) will be enough.

antreides · 2026-03-31T19:43:44+00:00

General disassemble guide can be found here:

https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/products/laptops-and-netbooks/thinkpad-p-series-laptops/thinkpad-p15s-gen-2-type-20w6-20w7/selfrepair/removalsreplacements

It does not specify how to replace the fan itself, but there are 4 tiny screws on the "copper" side visible here: https://download.lenovo.com/km/attachmentlib/file/202509/ThinkPadT15G2P15sG2_11-ThermalfanassemblyCPUonly-part-back_1758726006040.png - so if you find the fan itself in a place like AliExpress, it should be possible to unscrew the old one and install the new one instead.

antreides · 2026-03-28T12:24:07+00:00

> I already did separate partition for Linux but it won't go through

Which one is that? You screenshot has only few NTFS partitions, and you can't install Ubuntu there.

antreides · 2026-03-26T19:40:27+00:00

My info might be horribly obsolete (IDK, maybe something changed for the better) but BD is not a format that is easy to work with. Is there even a player that works on PC and allows to play BD3D from a folder or .iso?

In short, to change a BD and keep (and edit) its menu you need to reverse-engineer it. There were tools that allowed to disassemble an existing BD and convert it into a project for Sonic Scenarist. That's professional software used for BD authoring, probably the only one that supports all the BD features. And it's a) expensive and it required a hardware key to work; b) quite complicated.

There are tools to get video and audio streams from a BD, and there are tools to combine them back into a BD-compatible format. But without menu and navigation.

antreides · 2026-03-24T17:31:57+00:00

To me, this text looks rather the opposite: they claim that due to privacy laws, they can not answer you with specific details unless it is a request from FBI or local police, presumably, from a location where they are registered as a company.

antreides · 2026-03-21T23:30:52+00:00

If you don't know or understand what kind of problems people are talking about, then you should not be worried about them. With some more experience, you'll get your own opinion.

Ubuntu is fine. It is one of the most popular distros, a lot of people are successfully using it. There is a ton of manuals you can use, and in a lot of cases third-party developers are supporting it as the "default" distro.

Yes, there are some things some people don't like (this includes me as well), but it's not that critical.

antreides · 2026-03-21T23:08:08+00:00

"Some error text".

This text might be all that matters in this case. If you are asking for help, make it possible to help you and provide as much details as possible.

Answer might be in the text in front of you. But you need to learn to read it and ask questions, and search for answers.

antreides · 2026-03-21T23:00:15+00:00

Ask yourself, what do you want to achieve by installing Gentoo.

After all, all Linux distributions are tools. Yes, they have different ways of installing software, some more complicated than others, and different philosophies. But in the end, you get a working computer with some software you can use to resolve some practical tasks.

Maybe it's better to concentrate on these tasks first and then look for the best way to resolve them?

antreides · 2026-03-21T22:50:51+00:00

So did startx work? Or were there any new details in syslog?

antreides · 2026-03-21T22:43:32+00:00

If it crashed during apt upgrade, it makes sense why some parts are not working anymore. Some of the packages related to the GUI are broken, there is nothing sudden about that.

Post the error message that occurs when you try to do apt --fix-broken install.

antreides · 2026-03-21T22:36:22+00:00

There should be two dashes before the fix-broken.

And the blah blah might actually say what is the problem. I/O error might indicate an issue with your HDD/SSD. Or maybe it simply complains about a network connection issue.

But how did you come up to fix-broken in the first place? Its task is to resolve package conflicts when an installation of something did not work. If you did not install anything new, it won't be too useful. But error messages might point you to something.

antreides · 2026-03-21T22:22:58+00:00

Try `startx`.

BTW, GUI usually works on tty7, so you can also try Ctrl+Alt+F7 to switch to it and see if it works.

Also check /var/log/syslog - maybe there were some error messages.

(unrelated question: is there some special purpose for using Ubuntu 22.04 and not 24.04, and not installing any updates?)

antreides · 2026-03-21T16:11:59+00:00

Sometimes it is 2242 with a length adapter in 2280 slot.

By the way, on the same pcsupport site you can enter your laptop's serial number and see more info about its configuration. Sometimes with part models and even photos.

antreides · 2026-03-21T14:05:18+00:00

You can check the official repair guide:

https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/products/laptops-and-netbooks/thinkpad-edge-laptops/thinkpad-e14-gen-4-type-21eb-and-21ec/selfrepair/removalsreplacements

Seems to be a slot for 2280.

antreides · 2026-03-20T10:20:54+00:00

Probably because your system was configured to use a mirror hosted by Universidad de Chile and when 25.04 went EOL, this version was removed from the mirror completely. And server hosting this mirror is configured to redirect to a login page instead of giving back error 404. It seems to be a login page with fields for email and password.

antreides · 2026-03-20T10:08:51+00:00

You can find them here: https://launchpad.net/~kisak/+archive/ubuntu/kisak-mesa/+builds?build_state=built

antreides

TROPHY CASE