Samsung P560 brightness keys block keyboard and produce all-or-nothing effect

[brotherquintus]

This bug seems to be a duplicate of https://bugs.launchpad.net/linux/+bug/295251 except that I have a different Model.

The following FN keys produce these messages in dmesg:

atkbd.c: Unknown key pressed (translated set 2, code 0xb3 on isa0060/serio0).
atkbd.c: Use 'setkeycodes e033 <keycode>' to make it known.

Battery, Videomode, Toggle Backlight, Fn+F7,Fn+F8, Toggle Wlan, Brightness up, Brightness down

If I set them to the corresponding function using setkeycodes (as proposed by atkbd.c) the keys work but the keyboard gets stuck, it seems to think that the Fn key is still pressed. Restarting X lets me type again.

The patch from http://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=12021 works if I modify it to suit my keycodes. I have attached my modified patch. The original patch is only for the NC10.

[buzz (buzz2)]

Just to send a notice that it works on my P560 and i filled a hal bug report in order to support the function keys out-of-the-box.

Bug #355542 - Samsung P560 function keys fix

[Michael Stein (der-stein)]

That fix works. Thanks.
But toggle Backlight and Brightness has still no effect.
echo -n 40 > /proc/acpi/video/NVID/LCD/brightness
has no effect, too.

[buzz (buzz2)]

Try smartdimmer, works fine here

[Michael Stein (der-stein)]

cool, works from commandline.
How can I connect it to acpi-events?

[buzz (buzz2)]

I'm attaching a new cleaner patch against the current karmic kernel 2.6.31-10. It adds the necessary quirks for the Samsung P560 and P210 notebook.

Submitted upstream patch has been rejected as the next kernel .32 will add a external bitmap table which allows applying quirks via sysfs. In favour of a out-of-the-box experience with karmic please add this patch to the karmic kernel.

[buzz (buzz2)]

Affects linux kernel, not a hal-info. Hal related fixes are already integrated.

[HerrMeLin (hluedecke)]

FYI

There is a hidden menu in the "Phoenix BIOS" for Samsung P560 which allows ACPI-Settings for ALS (Ambient Light Sensor) from "Disabled" to "Legacy" to "ACPI" and some other interesting settings for CPU, PEG, PCI, memory and temperature...

Try following: Enter BIOS. When in BIOS, press "Fn+F10" (release keys) and then "Fn+12" (release keys). Move menu cursor...a hidden "Intel" menu appears (the BIOS version string appends). Please try other Samsung notebooks like NC10 or R560 too.

I changed ALS to ACPI and Legacy, but my kernel (2.6.30) does not detect it anyway...perhaps a newer kernel does.

I hope, this information and the possible settings help to get the notebook completely running with the function keys. ;)

[buzz (buzz2)]

Thanks for the information. ALS support has been recently integrated to the kernel and will be there in one of the next releases.

Anyway, all stuff that needs to be done is to integrate this key-up-fake-event into the kernel. Everything else works fine.

[Michael Stein (der-stein)]

the Problem remains in karmic.
brigthness doesn't work,
Fn+battery, Fn+Brightness doesn't get released.
Fn+wlan doesn't work

[buzz (buzz2)]

Solution: Install 2.6.32rcX kernel from ppa and add the following line

echo 130-132,134,136-137,179,247,249 > /sys/devices/platform/i8042/serio0/force_release

to /etc/rc.local

[brotherquintus (gkoefner)]

buzz, which rc kernel did you install?
I installed 2.6.32-020632rc7-generic and added the line you mentioned to rc.local but it doesnt change the behaviour.

[buzz (buzz2)]

At the moment i'm using rc4 and rc7, doesn't matter at all. This is a new feature that will remain in the kernel.

Please check
 * for the file /sys/devices/platform/i8042/serio0/force_release
 * that you entered the line as complete line, without linebreak.
 * that you entered the line before the exit 0, otherwise it will not be executed
 * that the file is executable

[brotherquintus (gkoefner)]

ah just a small formatting error :) keys release now.

But:
Wlan toggle (FN+F9) doesn't work, brightness (FN+Up/Down) doesn't change (even though the bar is shown), backlight toggle (FN+F5) also doesn't work, FN+F3 doesn't do anything. but at least the keyboard doesn't get stuck on any of those key-combos :)

Dmesg is silent.

do any of those things work on your laptop buzz?

[buzz (buzz2)]

I have written some scripts which make the brightness works with osd notifications for nvidia cards, just send me a email :)

[Michael Stein (der-stein)]

are there some changes on 10.10?

[brotherquintus (gkoefner)]

I have not yet tried 10.10 on the laptop, in 10.04 it is still an issue. I will try to test asap.

[buzz (buzz2)]

In 10.10 its ok, osd comes up but there is no change to the display brightness. As you can still adjust the brightness via nvclock i've adjusted gnome-power-backlight-helper to support nvclock.

[Michael Stein (der-stein)]

@buzz: how can I adjust gnome-power-backlight-helper?

[Andy Whitcroft (apw)]

If this is occuring with Maverick and later and you are seeing the keycodes reported in dmesg as per the original reporter then this can be adjusted in userspace via udev. Passing over there for review.

[Andy Whitcroft (apw)]

To clarify comment #24, the latest kernels now have generic support for setting keycodes and for indicating which keys need automatic key up events generating. This is all configurable from userspace and udev now has a special component to handle loading such configurations when the machine is detected.

[papukaija (papukaija)]

Just to clarify, is this bug is fixed in Maverick or newer?

[papukaija (papukaija)]

I re-read the above comments and consider this bug as not fixed.

[brotherquintus (gkoefner)]

While the keycode bug has been fixed in previous releases of ubuntu, I still cannot set the brightness with my p560 plavos (intel gma)
as noted previously, the osd comes up but there is no change to brightness.

[Martin Pitt (pitti)]

The blocking keys have been fixed a while ago (since at least Ubuntu 11.04) for all Samsung models.