T440s under linux

I have tried your configuration for the past day and am quite liking it. I find that Hysteresis set to 50 is more to my liking than 30. Can you explain how the buttons should be working?

Also, regarding the trackpoint, these bug has popped up on launchpad https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-input-evdev/+bug/1246683?comments=all.

 

Hmm.. I still prefer the lower hysteresis. Personal taste

Buttons:

Tap with one finger -> left click
Two fingers -> right click
Three fingers -> middle click

Click touchpad upper left corner (where red "button" is drawn) -> Left click
Click middle upper part (the "bubbly", you can feel it) -> Middle click
Click right upper part -> Right click

Touch is ignored on top 1 cm of touchpad (buttons).

I'll add this to the post ...

 

Has anyone managed to get the fingerprint reader working?

frpintd:

Code:

$sudo fprintd
Launching FprintObject
** Message: D-Bus service launched with name: net.reactivated.Fprint
** Message: entering main loop
** Message: No devices in use, exit

lsusb:

Code:

$ lsusb
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 058f:9540 Alcor Micro Corp. 
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 8087:8000 Intel Corp. 
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 005: ID 04f2:b39a Chicony Electronics Co., Ltd 
Bus 002 Device 013: ID 8087:07dc Intel Corp. 
[B]Bus 002 Device 003: ID 138a:0017 Validity Sensors, Inc. [/B]
Bus 002 Device 010: ID 0bdb:193e Ericsson Business Mobile Networks BV 
Bus 002 Device 006: ID 045e:0040 Microsoft Corp. Wheel Mouse Optical
Bus 002 Device 012: ID 04e8:685c Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd GT-I9250 Phone [Galaxy Nexus]
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

The Validity Sensors thingy is set to be unsupported: Unsupported devices

When running fprint-demo, it tells me no devices are found.

Thank you

 

Finally took the time to tweak things a bit, thanks a lot jeso for your touchpad settings. I couldn't use syndaemon because it would disable "ctrl + click" (which I use a lot when browsing), so your solution is good for me. Thanks!

For those interested: Smart Card reader works like a charm after installing pcscd, pcsc-tools, opensc and libpcse1*. pcsc_scan recognizes my ID card, which is nice.

I still haven't found a way to configure the fingerprint reader (see previous post).
Another thing that's bugging me is the brightness control (on Mint 16, using Cinnamon as DE): there seems to only be 4 levels of brightness adjustments (fn + f5 or f6), which is sad. If anyone has a solution, I'd be glad to use it.
Last thing: I sometimes don't have sound on resume. Playing something (youtube or music player) and doing a sudo alsa force-reload does the trick, but that sucks. Doing the sudo alsa force-reload without having something play on background does not work.

Cheerios

*edit: the correct package name is "lib pcsc lite 1" (remove spaces), for unknown reasons the forum edits the full name...

 

Just a quick question: where is the sysreq key, or how is it implemented?

thanks

 

Concerning the levels of brightness: reddit user ltmon gives us a good fix on how to add more levels: link. It works on Linux Mint 16 with Cinnamon 2.0. I have added it to startup programs, I hope it'll work when I reboot.

 

Hi all,
Anyone experienced kernel hangs(blank screen) with EFI boot? Arch Linux's vanilla kernel(12.1) seems to brick the computer upon UEFI boot.

 

Hi all,

My t440s arrives Monday. My x220t still works perfectly (and it has 16GB RAM) but I want a larger/higher res screen since I don't use a secondary monitor and do a lot of browser + shell programming.

Anyway I exclusively use the Trackpoint and don't see this changing. Though it will take some adaptation, I'm ok using tap to click. But I'm concerned about the middle button function, which I use extensively one-handed (index finger + thumb) with the Trackpoint for scrolling. I've tried to simulate it with the upper middle surface of the trackpad, but it seems like it will be awkward. Can anyone in a similar use case comment? Do the configurations posted here support this well?

Thanks!

 

Has anyone else seen this serious problem:

using gentoo linux; laptop-mode enables sata power link management on battery

When I plug in the ac adapter, I get errors such as

ata1.00: failed to get NCQ Send/Recv Log Emask 0x1

and disk goes read-only ... and I must reboot via power button
(where ARE the sysreq key combos on this new keyboard by the way)

this does NOT happen if I leave sata power management OFF

I wonder how much battery hit this will cause

 

I seem to remember having to install firmware package for realtek wifi card on one of my earlier ThinkPads, you might wanna search you distro's repos for one. For example, in Debian:

Code:

$ sudo aptitude show firmware-realtek
Package: firmware-realtek                
State: not installed
Multi-Arch: foreign
Version: 0.40
Priority: optional
Section: non-free/kernel
Maintainer: Debian Kernel Team <[email protected]>
Architecture: all
Uncompressed Size: 552 k
Suggests: initramfs-tools, linux-image
Provides: firmware-realtek
Description: Binary firmware for Realtek wired and wireless network adapters
 This package contains the binary firmware for some Ethernet adapters with the RTL8111/RTL8168 chips supported by the r8169 driver;
 and wireless network cards with the RTL8188, RTL8192, RTL8712 and RTL8723 chips supported by the r8192_pci, r8192s_usb, r8712u,
 rtl8192ce, rtl8192cu, rtl8192de, rtl8192se and rtl8723ae drivers. 

 Contents:
 * Realtek RTL8192E boot code (RTL8192E/boot.img)
 * Realtek RTL8192E init data (RTL8192E/data.img)
 * Realtek RTL8192E main code (RTL8192E/main.img)
 * Realtek RTL8192SU firmware, version 902B (RTL8192SU/rtl8192sfw.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8105E-1 firmware (rtl_nic/rtl8105e-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8106E-1 firmware, version 0.0.1 (rtl_nic/rtl8106e-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8106E-2 firmware, version 0.0.1 (rtl_nic/rtl8106e-2.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8111D-1/RTL8168D-1 firmware (rtl_nic/rtl8168d-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8111D-2/RTL8168D-2 firmware (rtl_nic/rtl8168d-2.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168E-1 firmware (rtl_nic/rtl8168e-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168E-2 firmware (rtl_nic/rtl8168e-2.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168E-3 firmware, version 0.0.4 (rtl_nic/rtl8168e-3.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168F-1 firmware, version 0.0.5 (rtl_nic/rtl8168f-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168F-2 firmware, version 0.0.4 (rtl_nic/rtl8168f-2.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168G-1 firmware, version 0.0.3 (rtl_nic/rtl8168g-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168G-2 firmware, version 0.0.1 (rtl_nic/rtl8168g-2.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8168G-3 firmware, version 0.0.1 (rtl_nic/rtl8168g-3.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8402-1 firmware, version 0.0.1 (rtl_nic/rtl8402-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8411-1 firmware, version 0.0.3 (rtl_nic/rtl8411-1.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8411-2 firmware, version 0.0.1 (rtl_nic/rtl8411-2.fw)
 * Realtek RTL8188EE firmware (rtlwifi/rtl8188efw.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8192CE/RTL8188CE firmware, version 4.816.2011 (rtlwifi/rtl8192cfw.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8192CE/RTL8188CE B-cut firmware, version 4.816.2011 (rtlwifi/rtl8192cfwU_B.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8188CE A-cut firmware, version 4.816.2011 (rtlwifi/rtl8192cfwU.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8192CU/RTL8188CU firmware (rtlwifi/rtl8192cufw.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8192DE firmware, version 4.816.2011 (rtlwifi/rtl8192defw.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8192SE/RTL8191SE firmware, version 4.816.2011 (rtlwifi/rtl8192sefw.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8192SU/RTL8712U firmware (rtlwifi/rtl8712u.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8723AE rev B firmware (rtlwifi/rtl8723fw_B.bin)
 * Realtek RTL8723AE rev A firmware (rtlwifi/rtl8723fw.bin)
Homepage: http://git.kernel.org/?p=linux/kernel/git/firmware/linux-firmware.git

It's not installed on my current W530 because I have latest Intel wifi card and that one requires firmware-iwlwifi package instead

 

I couldn't find it on my first attempt, but I seem to remember seeing pages out there in vast intertubes about disabling TrackPad on typing or mousing with TrackPoint/actual mouse. In my case though I simply disabled TrackPad in BIOS as I never use it, only TrackPoint or external mouse.

 

I spend a large portion of my life on a train commuting to london to work as a software developer.

Been using Sony Vaio for the last ten years - big battery (on my 3rd), linux, fingerprint reader, mobile 3G dongle, swapped in an SSD etc

But its a heavy 5 year old laptop. Been looking for a commuter/developer replacement.

Never used a thinkpad before.

T440s seems to have good features on paper - hot swap battery, light, built in WWAN, fairly rugged, up to date specs on processor and screen etc

But there are such terrible reviews about the trackpad and lots of posts some above with linux users trying to get things working sometimes by disabling the touchpad completely.

Many seem to be users of older thinkpads dealing with changes - so maybe I won't feel the same hurt.

In this thread there is all the usual reports of issues and possible solutions - evidence of the usual configuration journey people are making.

I wonder has anyone finished that journey and has a T440s that completely works under linux- specially that dodgy touchpad?

Would love to get some feedback before I hit the order button.

Hope someone can help.

Many thanks

Michael

 

when you disable the trackpad can you still use it for the buttons? can you successfully and comfortably do trackpoint + "middle button" scrolling? thanks!

 

Well, the linux journey is never finished but I'm very happy with the T440S even with the clickpad issues
(I *had* to disable touchpad in my X300 because of its problems; I wouldn't want to with the T440S).

The clickpad configuration I use right now includes this xorg.conf.d file:

(I'm still tweaking vaues in here). this "stripes" the clickpad so left zone is left click,
middle zone is middle click and right zone is right click (see this post:
[ubuntu] Clickpad configuration problems on T440s

And I use the ksynaptics app in kde settings to adjust other things (like 2 finger scroll,
tap to click, tap and drag, etc.)

Overall, the clickpad is useable with these changes.

 

Well, I'm disabling touchpad completely not because of issues configuring it, but because I guess I'm an old-school ThinkPad user that finds TrackPoint to be so vastly superior and more useful that I'd rather see touchpad completely gone.

I'm not sure about the new *40 machines, as my W540 is yet to be shipped, but on all older ThinkPads disabling TrackPad disables only the lower set of buttons, the upper set of three buttons is still fully functional and the middle button scroll is superb.

 

That's the issue. I have a x220t, which works fine and has the physical buttons, but I find the screen cramped and it gets very hot and noisy during my workload. I'm debating returning my unopened t440s over the usability of the button-less trackpad in Lenovo's 30 day return window.

 

So from reading that I guess in *40 series disabling touchpad is not an option anymore?

 

Would opening it void that return window? You should be able to simply boot it from your x220t drive unless you use custom initramfs that includes only modules specific to x220t instead of everything there is.

 

it probably won't void it but it arrived early and I'm just about to leave on a trip and am extremely stressed and was hoping someone could make a definitive positive or negative comment about this issue. (=

 

Hi Michael,

I am also a software developer and have had my T440s for, maybe, 2 months now. I had also never used a ThinkPad before (apart from when I was about 9 years old!). I don't find the trackpad/clickpad that bad at all. Yes, it is better on Windows but, once I configured it in X, I was happy. It does cause occasional annoyances when trying to move to specific pieces of code (as in, you click in the wrong place) but I tend to use the keyboard for a lot of movement. One good piece of advice is make sure you order one of the Intel wifi cards, that will save you some grief. Also, if you get a discrete graphics card with it, I did have some issues getting bumblebee to run. I had to downgrade my kernel to 3.11 and force apt to install the correct driver packages.

I am running (K)Ubuntu 13.10 with KDE 4.12. Everything seems to be working swimmingly! I have the big 6 six cell battery as well and don't really notice it and can get about 15 hours out of it (brightness quite low, powertop helping me out as well).

Hope this helps,

Ash

 

Sorry, wish I could. I'm myself a bit worried that TrackPoint on W540 will be a pain to use, justifying it only with sharper fonts on 212dpi display and more powerful hardware.

 

I ordered. Web site gives 4 weeks delivery time estimate (apparently because of chinese new year). It was 10 days yesterday!

Just remembered my companys discount scheme at the last minute and saved £167.

Thanks for the feedback chaps.

I'll publish my experiences with linux and the T440s once it comes.

Michael

 

I've used the settings that were posted by both jeso and zenlinux (thanks to both of you) and I can't get trackpoint scrolling to work on either of them. Does anyone know a fix for this? Using zenlinux settings has the trackpad working very well, if I could get trackpoint scrolling then Linux would be perfect.

 

I installed Ubuntu with hyper-v. Works great, except no sound.

 

I really want to know this too, it seems like the touchpad configuration might affect the trackpoint. I think I'm going to try disabling the touchpad and see if that makes it work.

 

Please report; I fear that if you disable the touchpad the trackpoint will have no buttons!

 

I'm running debian with xmonad and so far most things work very well. Two issues, hopefully somebody has been through it:
1) When waking from sleep the screen is unusable (sometimes striped, sometimes weirdly patterned) until I log out using the key command
2) The laptop doesnt suspend when the lid is closed. I think this has to do with either acpi or pm-utils

 

Actually, weird thing is that the BIOS option appears to not affect Linux at all. I can still use my touchpad for some reason. *shrug*

 

I had this same problem; I think it came bout because I closed down my computer before removing headphones. Plugging in and hten removing headphones fixed the issue. Not a fix, but a decent workaround, if it's the same issue.

 

I've been trying to install debian but I cant find the ethernet drivers.

 

the wired interface is just good old e1000e ...

 

I tried that and it didn't work

 

running lspci on my t440s:

00:19.0 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection I218-LM (rev 04)

is yours different?

 

Looks that way.

Ethernet controller [0200]: Intel Corporation Device [8086:155a] (rev 04)

 

I get a ton more information if I use lspci -v; here's my ethernet section:

how does yours compare

 

If you are trying to install wheezy (7.3), then it looks like the e1000e driver included in the kernel is too old to handle the ethernet on the T440s. The updated kernel on on jessie (testing) at Debian -- Debian-Installer should work for the T440s. The rescue image I used to do some things on my system before I got the OS installed is based on wheezy, but with a 3.10.x kernel from jessie, and it worked fine.

Debian stable is great, and it's what I run on all of my servers, but it can be a pain to get working on brand new hardware.

 

I found running

Code:

syndaemon -i .5 -K -R -t

seems to work well. That prevents taps from registering as clicks or scrolls while typeing, and for .5 seconds after typing. Alt-click, Ctrl-click, etc. still work. I added the command to the session manager in Xfce, so it starts when I login.


I'm using the same settings file that's been posted a few times in this thread, except I also add

Code:

Option "TapButton1" "1"
Option "TapButton2" "2"
Option "TapButton3" "3"

so I can tap to click, instead of having to push the pad all the way down.

 

I am trying hard to make that work for me, but for some reaosn the TapButton settings don't seem to make any difference at all. No matter what I do, two-finger taps aren't recognized as such, and three-finger taps are smetimes seen as one-finger taps, other times register as 2-finger taps. Anyone else see this problem?

I'm running Arch, and this is my 50-synnaptics.conf:

Code:

# Example xorg.conf.d snippet that assigns the touchpad driver
# to all touchpads. See xorg.conf.d(5) for more information on
# InputClass.
# DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE, your distribution will likely overwrite
# it when updating. Copy (and rename) this file into
# /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d first.
# Additional options may be added in the form of
#   Option "OptionName" "value"
#
Section "InputClass"
        Identifier "touchpad catchall"
        Driver "synaptics"
        MatchIsTouchpad "on"
        Option "TapButton1" "1"
        Option "TapButton2" "2"
        Option "TapButton3" "3"
# This option is recommend on all Linux systems using evdev, but cannot be
# enabled by default. See the following link for details:
# http://who-t.blogspot.com/2010/11/how-to-ignore-configuration-errors.html
        MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event*"
EndSection

Section "InputClass"
        Identifier "touchpad ignore duplicates"
        MatchIsTouchpad "on"
        MatchOS "Linux"
        MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/mouse*"
        Option "Ignore" "on"
EndSection

# This option enables the bottom right corner to be a right button on
# non-synaptics clickpads.
# This option is only interpreted by clickpads.
Section "InputClass"
        Identifier "Default clickpad buttons"
# from http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/Linux-Discussion/Linux-on-ThinkPad-Helix/m-p/1201400#M5110
        MatchDriver "synaptics"
	
	# enable 2/3 button simulation 
	Option "Clickpad" "true"
	# ?
        Option "SHMConfig" "on"
	# doesn't work on clickpads?
        Option "EmulateMidButtonTime" "0"


	# Most important -- disable scrolling in 'buttons' on top of pad.
#        Option "SoftButtonAreas" "60% 0 0 70% 30% 59% 0 70%"
        Option "SoftButtonAreas" "60% 0 0 2500 30% 59% 0 2500"
	# disable scrolling on top 1 cm of clickpad
        Option "AreaTopEdge"          "2500"
	# stop palm presses with left hand by disabling clickpad there
        Option "AreaLeftEdge"          "1700"


	Option "MaxTapTime" "180"
	Option "MaxTapMove" "220"
	Option "MinSpeed" "0.6"
	Option "MaxSpeed" "1.0"
	Option "AccelFactor" "0.001"

	# should give multifinger gestures, but doesn't seem to.  
	Option "TapButton1" "1"
	Option "TapButton2" "2"
	Option "TapButton3" "3"

	#Scrolling
	Option "VertTwoFingerScroll" "1"
	Option "HorizTwoFingerScroll" "1"
	# Option "SingleTapTimeout" "60"

	# speed stuff, not so crucial for me
	Option "MaxSpeed" "4"
	Option "AccelFactor" "0.15"
	
	# doesn't seemto work for me
	Option "PalmDetect" "1"
	Option "PalmMinWidth" "5"
	Option "PalmMinZ" "1"

	# decrease sensitivity of mouse, so you can actually click effectively...
	Option "HorizHysteresis" "40"
	Option "VertHysteresis" "40"
#        Option "SoftButtonAreas" "50% 0 82% 0 0 0 0 0"
#        Option "SoftButtonAreas" "67% 100% 0 12%  33% 67% 0 12%"
#	Option "AreaTopEdge" "33%"
#       To disable the bottom edge area so the buttons only work as buttons,
#       not for movement, set the AreaBottomEdge
#       Option "AreaBottomEdge" "82%"
EndSection

# This option disables software buttons on Apple touchpads.
# This option is only interpreted by clickpads.
Section "InputClass"
        Identifier "Disable clickpad buttons on Apple touchpads"
        MatchProduct "Apple|bcm5974"
        MatchDriver "synaptics"
#        Option "SoftButtonAreas" "0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0"
EndSection

 

Mine isn't perfect. It doesn't always detect a two and three finger tap, but that is probably just that I have to get used to exactly what it expects. It works most of the time, though. Try running

Code:

synclient | grep Tap

in an xterm. It should say something like

Code:

    MaxTapTime              = 180
    MaxTapMove              = 192
    MaxDoubleTapTime        = 180
    SingleTapTimeout        = 180
    TapButton1              = 1
    TapButton2              = 2
    TapButton3              = 3
    TapAndDragGesture       = 0

If it does say that, and still isn't working, then I don't have any advice.

 

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/mutt
hmm, my setting swere very close to that, except that TapAndDragGesture was set to 1, and I had TapButtons 2 & 3 reversed. From what I can tell, though I can change the variable values from within an xsession using synclient, the TapButton values are only read by xorg on startup. so testing is a little slow.

If I carefully position my fingers so that they lie near the same Y-value, I can get the touchpad to recognize 2-finger clicks. 3-finger clicks are still not really picked up, except occasionally and seemingly at random. 2 questions for 20-20 and for the group:

1) have you set values for ClickFinger[123]? Mine are as follows:

Code:

$ synclient | grep Click                                                                                                                                                                                           
    ClickTime               = 100
    ClickFinger1            = 1
    ClickFinger2            = 3
    ClickFinger3            = 2
    ClickPad                = 1

It's not really clear to me when the ClickFinger values are important, and how htey differ from FingerTap

2) I notice that my Xorg.0.log contians the erro messages discussed here:

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.ph...bilities_.28multi-tap.2C_scrolling.2C_etc..29

Can you tell me if you see the same problem (the synaptics interface is added BOTH as /dev/input/event* and /dev/input/mouse*? If not this may be the root of my problem. Thanks!

 

With Clickpad=0 the ClickFinger{1,2,3} values work well. With Clickpad=1 they're horribly inaccurate.

 

Would you say you guys are happy with how well the T440s works with Linux (particularly Ubuntu)?

I really need a new laptop and I need a unix-based environment for work. I just want to make sure the touchpad works well, no problems with wifi, etc. Cheers.

 

This + the other posts about intel ethernet and Debian: I have had the same problems, ended up installing Mint. (boooh shame on me, I know).

Linux Mint works great. If you search for my posts in this thread you will find my experience, which is positive. Mint is based on Ubuntu, so Ubuntu should be good too. Reddit user ltmon provides a good fix for the brightness (brightness keys work, but there are initially only four levels of brightness, this fixes it: ltmon comments on Installing Linux on T440s)

 

Huh, the brightness fix just makes it impossible for me to change the brightness level, on Ubuntu 13.10. What is it supposed to do?

 

I have backlight working perfectly for me by appending to the kernel command line:

Code:

acpi_backlight=vendor

On my system (Debian) I did that by adding it to the GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX= variable in /etc/default/grub and then running update-grub. This is working for backlight on 3.12 and 3.13 kernels.

The F5 and F6 keys work to adjust the backlight with 5 steps, plus off.

 

Those having trouble with Debian and ethernet - I installed the Jessie non-free version and ethernet worked fine.

 

Huh, I'll try that. Actually my problem seems to be different than what other people are having. People are saying they only have 4 brightness levels, whereas I have more but it takes like 4 presses for it to go down a level.

 

That was the exact problem I had before applying the fix I mentioned.

 

Arch reporting in - everything worked out of the box
alsa (sound) required some modprobe.conf easy configurations to work
Synaptics required some editing to the 50-synaptics.conf to activate right/middle clicking in the right positions
screen brightness fn keys work, wifi f8 key works, mute works, volume control not yet working, i'll fix it later.

 

What did you have to do to the modprobe.conf to make it work out of the box? Currently the only way I can get my sound to work is when I use pulseaudio