[i815] Switching to DPMS off doesn't switch laptop's LCD backlight off

[Jussi Saarinen]

Binary package hint: xserver-xorg-video-intel

I am unable to switch my laptop's LCD backlight off. Whenever I switch my monitor to DPMS off, the screen gets black but the backlight stays on. Though I am currently running Karmic Koala daily build from 2009-08-03 with xorg-edgers ppa, this problem has been present since Ubuntu 8.04 (and possibly even before that). The difference in karmic is that now gnome-power-manager doesn't even blank the screen.

I have enabled dpms in xorg.conf, and according to Xorg.log.0, it is enabled.

Running these commands (after killing gnome-power-manager):
xset -q | grep Monitor && xset dpms force off && sleep 5 && xset -q | grep Monitor && sleep 5 && xset dpms force on && xset -q | grep Monitor

provides the following output:
  Monitor is On
  Monitor is Off
  Monitor is On

So according xset, DPMS should be working. That it not the case. The monitor does turn black but the backlight stays on.

My laptop is a Fujitsu-Siemens LifeBook C-6637 and it has an Intel 82815 graphics chip (i815).

My xserver-xorg-video-intel version is 2.8.0+git20090804.af45482a-0ubuntu0sarvatt (karmic).

$ lsb_release -rd
Description: Ubuntu karmic (development branch)
Release: 9.10

$ apt-cache policy xserver-xorg-video-intel
xserver-xorg-video-intel:
  Asennettu: 2:2.8.0+git20090804.af45482a-0ubuntu0sarvatt
  Ehdokas: 2:2.8.0+git20090804.af45482a-0ubuntu0sarvatt
  Versiotaulukko:
 *** 2:2.8.0+git20090804.af45482a-0ubuntu0sarvatt 0
        500 http://ppa.launchpad.net karmic/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2:2.8.0-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://fi.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages

[lspci]
00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation 82815 815 Chipset Host Bridge and Memory Controller Hub [8086:1130] (rev 11)
     Subsystem: Fujitsu Limited. Device [10cf:110b]
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 82815 Chipset Graphics Controller (CGC) [8086:1132] (rev 11)
     Subsystem: Fujitsu Limited. Device [10cf:110c]

[Jussi Saarinen (jussaar)]

Xorg's log.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Could we get the output of lspci -vvnn as well?

[Jussi Saarinen (jussaar)]

It's going to take a while before I have access to the laptop in question again. I'll get back with the lspci-output as soon as I can.

[Jussi Saarinen (jussaar)]

And here's the lspci-output. Sorry that it took a while to get.

[Cristian Gafton (gafton)]

same thing is happening to me too. Current kramic builds no longer turn off the LCD screen using dpms. "xset q" shows dpms enabled, but all the timeouts set to 0.
My xorg.conf settings seem to be ignored:

Section "ServerFlags"
       Option "BlankTime" "5"
       Option "StandbyTime" "10"
       Option "SuspendTime" "15"
       Option "OffTime" "20"
EndSection

[bodwick (bodwick)]

Cristian - does 'xset dpms force off' switch the backlight off?
If so try switching the gnome screensaver to 1h and in power management set turning off the screen in 5min or some other value less than 1h. On my machine the screensaver blanked the screen with backlight on and didn't allow gnome power manager turn it off.

[Jussi Saarinen (jussaar)]

I have now also tested a clean install of Karmic Koala release version, with packages updated to latest versions. The bug is still present as I described it before.

[aeromojito (aeromojito)]

Confirmed on Sony PCG-FX150 with I815 running Lucid. Hope this gets resolved.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Thanks for testing Ubuntu and that's a shame you're having some problems. Unfortunately i815 is no longer being maintained upstream, and as such we cannot provide development support for it any further. Good luck, you might try http://askubuntu.com, or try engaging with upstream via http://bugs.freedesktop.org.