Tag Archives: laptop

HP laptop keyboard won’t type on Linux

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Here’s another story from my “WTF, computer?!” files (and also my “oh I’m dumb” files).

As I regularly do, I recently updated my Fedora machines. This includes the crappy HP 2000-2b30DX Notebook PC that I bought as a refurb in 2013. After dnf finished, I rebooted the laptop and put it away. Then while I was at a conference last week, my wife sent me a text telling me that she couldn’t type on it.

When I got home I took a look. Sure enough, they keyboard didn’t key. But it was weirder than that. I could type in the decryption password for the hard drive at the beginning of the boot process. And when I attached a wireless keyboard, I could type. Knowing the hardware worked, I dropped to runlevel 3. The built-in keyboard worked then.

I tried applying the latest updates, but that didn’t help. Some internet searching lead me to Freedesktop.org bug 103561. Running dnf downgrade libinput and rebooting gave me a working keyboard again. The bug is closed as NOTABUG, since the maintainers say it’s an issue in the kernel, which is fixed in the 4.13 kernel release. So I checked to see if Fedora 27, which was released last week, includes the 4.13 kernel. It does, and so does Fedora 26.

That’s when I realized I still had the kernel package excluded from dnf updates on that machine because of a previous issue where a kernel update caused the boot process to hang while/after loading the initrd. I removed the exclusion, updated the kernel, and re-updated libinput. After a reboot, the keyboard still worked. But if you’re using a kernel version from 4.9 to 4.12, libinput 1.9, and an HP device, your keyboard may not work. Update to kernel 4.13 or downgrade libinput (or replace your hardware. I would not recommend the HP 2000 Notebook. It is not good.)

Using the ASUS ZenBook for Fedora

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I recently decided that I’d had enough of the refurbished laptop I bought four years ago. It’s big and heavy and slow and sometimes the fan doesn’t work. I wanted something more portable and powerful enough that I could smoothly scroll the web browser. After looking around for good Linux laptops, I settled on the ASUS ZenBook.

Installation

The laptop came with Windows 10 installed, but that’s not really my jam. I decided to boot off a Fedora 26 KDE live image first just to make sure everything worked before committing to installing. Desktop Linux has made a lot of progress over the years, but you never know which hardware might not be supported. As it turns out, that wasn’t a problem. WiFi, Bluetooth, webcam, speakers, etc all worked out of the box.

It’s almost disappointing in a sense. There used to be some challenge in getting things working, but now it’s just install and go. This is great overall, of course, because it means Linux is more accessible to new users and it’s less crap I have to deal with when I just want my damn computer to work. But there’s still a little bit of the nostalgia for the days when configuring X11 by hand was something you had to do.

Use

I’ve had the laptop for a little over a month now. I haven’t put it through quite the workout I’d hoped to, but I feel like I’ve used it enough to have an opinion at this point. Overall, I really like it. The main problem I have is that the trackpad has a middle-click, which is actually pretty nice except for when I accidentally use it. I’ve closed many a browser tab because I didn’t move my thumb far enough over. That’s probably something I can disable in the settings, but I’d rather learn my way around it.

The Bluetooth has been flaky transferring files to and from my phone. but audio is…well I’ve never found Bluetooth audio to be particularly great, but it works as well as anything else.

One other bit of trouble I’ve had is with my home WiFI. I bought a range extender so that I can use WiFi on the back deck and it to use the same SSID as the main router. The directions said you can do this, but it might cause problems. With this laptop, the WiFi connection becomes unusable after a short period of time. Turning off the range extender fixes it, and I’ve had no other problems on other networks, so I guess I know what I have to do.

One thing that really stood out to me is carrying it around in a backpack. This thing is light. I had a few brief moments of panic thinking I had left it behind. I’ve held lighter laptops, but this is a good weight. But don’t worry about the lightness, it still has plenty of electrons to have a good battery life.

Around the same time I bought this, I got a new MacBook Pro for work. When it comes to typing, I like the keyboard on the ZenBook way better than the new MacBook keyboards.

Recommendation

If you’re looking for a lightweight Linux laptop that can handle general development and desktop applications, the ASUS ZenBook is a great choice. Shameless commercialism: If you’re going to buy one, maybe use this here affiliate link? Or don’t. I won’t judge you.