Fan control on the D-Link DNS-323

<p>

The kernel in Debian doesn't have support for the fan control chip on
the D-Link DNS-323.  Since some people said that their device runs quite
hot after installing Debian, I've prepared a 2.6.29 based kernel that
includes the fan driver.

</p>

<p>

If you want to install this kernel, edit the file
<tt>/etc/apt/sources.list</tt> and add the following line:

</p>

<div class="code">
<pre>
deb http://people.debian.org/~tbm/orion lenny main
</pre>
</div>

<p>

Load the key used to sign this repository so that apt can verify it:

</p>

<div class="code">
<pre>
gpg --keyserver pgp.earth.li --recv-keys 68FD549F
gpg --export -a 68FD549F | apt-key add -
</pre>
</div>

<p>

Now you can install the new kernel:

</p>

<div class="code">
<pre>
apt-get update
apt-get install linux-image-orion5x
</pre>
</div>

<p>

After a reboot, you can control the fan this way:

</p>

<div class="code">
<pre>
echo   0 &gt; /sys/class/hwmon/hwmon?/device/pwm1  # turn it off
echo 255 &gt; /sys/class/hwmon/hwmon?/device/pwm1  # turn it to full speed
</pre>
</div>

<p>

Any values between 0 and 255 will work.

</p>

<p>

According to Anselmo Luginbuhl, you should also be able to use the
<tt>lm-sensors</tt> package to automatically control the fan:

</p>

<p>

"Execute pwmconfig, it will make some tests and generate the fancontrol
config file.  At the end of the procedure it will ask you to "Select fan
output to configure, or other action:", just be sure to pass through
choice "1" or it would not fill in the configuration file, save the
configuration and start the daemon /etc/init.d/fancontrol.

</p>

<p>

Probably the only thing that needs some attention to get an optimal
result is to choose the right parameters for max and min temperature at
which the fan should start or stop to minimize the °C and the noise."

</p>

<p>

Finally, this kernel also includes some performance patches from
Marvell, so you might see some performance increases too.

</p>

<!-- time: 2009-06-06 14:52:14 +0200 -->