Setting up ThinkFan for Thinkpad T420

Recently I have formatted by laptop with Linux Mint 18.1 and i need to setup my thinkfan again. I am using Linux Mint 18.1 but any Ubuntu based distro should have no issues. So here we go.

Install thinkfan

sudo apt-get -y install tp-smapi-dkms thinkfan lm-sensors read-edid i2c-tools

check your fan

cat /proc/acpi/ibm/fan

it should show your level is on auto

find your sensor location

find /sys/devices -type f -name "temp*_input"

take note the output. this will be your hwmon location for thinkfan configuration file

now you can edit your thinkfan.conf using your preferred text editor

sudo nano /etc/thinkfan.conf

below is my setting. put your hwmon location accordingly.

tp_fan /proc/acpi/ibm/fan
hwmon /sys/devices/virtual/thermal/thermal_zone0/temp
hwmon /sys/devices/platform/coretemp.0/hwmon/hwmon1/temp1_input
(0,     0,      42)
(1,     40,     47)
(2,     45,     52)
(3,     50,     57)
(4,     55,     62)
(5,     60,     77)
(7,     73,     93)
(127,   85,     32767)

Configure thinkpad_acpi modprobe

sudo echo "options thinkpad_acpi fan_control=1" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/thinkfan.conf

sudo modprobe -rv thinkpad_acpi
sudo modprobe -v thinkpad_acpi

If you encounter “modprobe: FATAL: Module thinkpad_acpi is in use” just reboot your machine.

lets start thinkfan

sudo thinkfan -q

then try checking your fan again

cat /proc/acpi/ibm/fan

your level should be other than auto

reference:

How to set up "thinkfan" on a Lenovo Thinkpad T430? - LXLE forums

http://zmalltalker.com/zlog/thinkfan.html