HP 1030 G3 fn-keys not working

[Marcel Munce]

Running Ubuntu 18.10 on my HP Elitebook x360 1030 G3 I noticed, that the fn key combinations are only working partially.
What works: Volume up/down/mute, Airplane mode
What doesn't work: Brigtness up/down, microphone mute, fn-Keys indicator lights

I already tried solutions regarding editing the Kernel Parameter acpi_osi in the grub config but can not get the keys to work. In case of screen brightness changing it using the desktop slider works.

But it seems, that the keypress isn't recognized at all. Neither xev nor acpi_listen are showing events for screen brightness (fn+f3/f4) or microphone muting (fn+f8).
Running showkey -k results in a keycode 465 pressed and released event for all three key combinations.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 18.10
Package: udev 239-7ubuntu10.10
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.18.0-16.17-generic 4.18.20
Uname: Linux 4.18.0-16-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.10-0ubuntu13.2
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
CustomUdevRuleFiles: 70-snap.core.rules
Date: Mon Apr 1 14:22:47 2019
InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-03-30 (1 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 18.10 "Cosmic Cuttlefish" - Release amd64 (20181017.3)
MachineType: HP HP EliteBook x360 1030 G3
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm-256color
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
 LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.18.0-16-generic root=UUID=db6a8def-2553-4696-b160-f79e8865b17e ro quiet splash vt.handoff=1
SourcePackage: systemd
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 01/04/2019
dmi.bios.vendor: HP
dmi.bios.version: Q90 Ver. 01.06.00
dmi.board.name: 8438
dmi.board.vendor: HP
dmi.board.version: KBC Version 14.38.00
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: 5CD8427YK5
dmi.chassis.type: 31
dmi.chassis.vendor: HP
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnHP:bvrQ90Ver.01.06.00:bd01/04/2019:svnHP:pnHPEliteBookx3601030G3:pvr:rvnHP:rn8438:rvrKBCVersion14.38.00:cvnHP:ct31:cvr:
dmi.product.family: 103C_5336AN HP EliteBook x360
dmi.product.name: HP EliteBook x360 1030 G3
dmi.product.sku: 4QZ13ES#ABD
dmi.sys.vendor: HP

[Ubuntu Kernel Bot (ubuntu-kernel-bot)]

This change was made by a bot.

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Running scancode -s showed, that there is no scancode passed for those combinations.

Maybe this correlates with errors produced by the hp_wmi module (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1758442)

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

Please use evtest, press hotkeys, and attach its output.

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Here is the output.
I chose the keyboard output since the hp modules didn't generate any output.
The events for VOLUME_UP, VOLUME_DOWN and MUTE are working as expected.
The last two outputs are of the BRIGHTNESS_UP and _DOWN combinations (FN+F4 and FN+F3) and seem to be exactly the same

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

Ok, please attach acpidump.

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

"hp_wmi: query 0x4 returned error 0x5" may just be red herring.
What's the output of evtest when choosing "HP WMI hotkeys" instead?

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

HP WMI does generate any output at all for the fn Keys. (Volume seems to be handled by ACPI, since acpi_listen shows those events)

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

Please attach the evtest log, thanks!

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Same. No Output for those keys.

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Any other idea?

As and additional information:
On Windows, the keys don't work either right away. A special driver is neccessary.
So I guess it's possible to modify the kernel module to generate the right events, isn't it?

[Alessandro Zucca (alessandro-zucca01)]

Hello,
I recently bought the 1030 g3 and I noticed that on kernel 5.1.16 the switch works by setting acpi_backlight=native as kernel parameter. Hope it helps

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Strange. I now tried different Kernels and I just can't get those keys to function.
They just don't create the corresponding ACPI Events...

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

Please test this kernel:
https://people.canonical.com/~khfeng/lp1822581/

[Alessandro Zucca (alessandro-zucca01)]

I am sorry, it looks like it actually works when connected to AC. I can't test the kernel right now, but I assume there wasn't any further developement ;(

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

I'm so sorry. I did not have the time to reinstall Ubuntu on my machine for testing the kernel.

It's now running on your provided 5.3.0-24 but that does not work either :-(

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Now running on 5.3.0-42 and the brightness controls are working!

(Mute and Indicator Lights still don't)

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

For some reason it now stopped working again...
Don't know why.

[Po-Hsu Lin (cypressyew)]

Hello, Marcel
Is that the same 5.3.0-42 kernel that's not working in your comment #19?

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

Do you happen to dual boot to Windows?

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Yes, I have a Dual Boot Setup with Ubuntu as primary System.

I actually don't know what happened between the time it was working and then stopped...

[Alessandro Zucca (alessandro-zucca01)]

It Turned out that the brightness key are working on my system while setting

drm.vblankoffdelay=1 acpi_backl_backlight=vendor

as suggested here:

https://forum.manjaro.org/t/howto-power-savings-setup-2020-06-02/1445

Can someone test it out too?

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Running 5.4.0-37-generic adding "drm.vblankoffdelay=1 acpi_backlight=vendor" to my grub config did not work, unfortunatelly

[David Rosenstrauch (darose)]

Interesting. I came upon this HP form post today that suggest that booting into Windows does something that disables the brightness keys in Linux:

https://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Operating-System-and-Recovery/Brightness-keys-not-working-in-Linux/m-p/7549927/highlight/true#M585533

The OP suggests that re-flashing the BIOS restores functionality. Going to test now.

[David Rosenstrauch (darose)]

Confirmed. I re-flashed the BIOS, then booted back into Linux, and now my brightness keys work again.

Nice to now there's an explanation, and a workaround to fix the issue. Would love to see if there's a Linux code change that can address the root issue though.

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Nice! I'll try this as well!
Do you have any special Kernel parameters set?

And how did you flash the bios? Using the softpaq tool?

[David Rosenstrauch (darose)]

No special kernel parms (at least that would relate to this). I re-flashed the BIOS by booting into the system utils menu and then choosing "firmware update" or some such.

BTW, on my machine (HP EliteBook x360 1030 G4) there's a newer version of the bios that came out recently: R94 Ver. 01.05.03 (04/28/2020). I just upgraded to that. We'll see if it makes any difference.

[Marcel Munce (mmunce)]

Can confirm as well!

Flashed the BIOS and now it works for me, too!

[David Rosenstrauch (darose)]

Why the status update to invalid? Several people have confirmed this issue.

[Kai-Heng Feng (kaihengfeng)]

Doesn't seem to be a software issue.

Please try power reset and see if it helps:
https://support.hp.com/us-en/document/c01684768

[David Rosenstrauch (darose)]

Shouldn't it not be necessary to do a power reset every time one boots into Windows?

[Sergey Smirnov (ssmirnoff)]

Seems to be hardware issue indeed.
Tried to upgrade to the latest BIOS — issue has remained.

Power reset did the job!

HP Probook 450 G6

[Nicholas Stommel (nstommel)]

Same issue with the brightness keys on the HP Elite Dragonfly G2, even on kernel 5.13. Seems like a firmware bug, but may have something to do with the HP WMI keycode driver. Really annoying and not at all good for such an expensive product. This needs to be fixed, it affects most of HP's new business laptops. Could someone describe how to do the power reset please?

[jeremyszu (os369510)]

@Nicholas,

Could you please help to provide:

$ sudo dmidecode -s bios-version
$ lspci -nnv -s 00:1f.4 | grep Subsystem
$ evtest # when you press brightness key

FWIK, it seems like the HP common issue if your system is preload with windows from HP factory then install the Linux distro. Since HP has a hotkey application which setting the EC to enter a special mode for this application (EC will send the different keycode). After you reinstall to other OS, the EC still in the special mode. Thus, the keycode might wrong in your system.