HP Pavillion x360 Keyboard stops working if I update system installed from DVD.

Dewleno · September 15, 2020, 12:37pm

I’ve installed Leap 15.2 on an HP Pavillion x360. Everything seems to work fine on the freshly installed system. However, as soon as I update my packages, my keyboard stops working.

I know it’s not a hardware issue as the keyboard works in a snapshot taken before the update. The problem seems to occur sometime after boot, as the keyboard works in the BIOS, as well as in the GRUB menu and in the prompt that asks me for my encryption passcode.

I had a previous installation of Linux Mint on the laptop, and there, the keyboard and the touchpad broke after I did a system upgrade from Mint 19.3 to Mint 20. It doesn’t seem to be a kernel issue, as the problem persists on a Debian 10 Live KDE environment which had a kernel version of 4.19 IIRC.


Output of inxi -Fxxxrz

System:    Kernel: 5.3.18-lp152.19-default x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 7.5.0 Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.18.5 tk: Qt 5.12.7 
           wm: kwin_x11 dm: SDDM Distro: openSUSE Leap 15.2 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: Hewlett-Packard product: HP Pavilion 11 x360 PC v: 0975100002405F00010420180 serial: <filter> 
           Chassis: type: 10 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: Hewlett-Packard model: 2209 v: 57.36 serial: <filter> UEFI: Insyde v: F.14 date: 07/28/2014 
Battery:   ID-1: BAT1 charge: 13.8 Wh condition: 22.6/30.1 Wh (75%) volts: 7.3/7.2 model: COMPAL PABAS0241231 type: Li-ion 
           serial: <filter> status: Discharging 
CPU:       Topology: Quad Core model: Intel Pentium N3540 bits: 64 type: MCP arch: Silvermont rev: 8 L2 cache: 1024 KiB 
           flags: lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 17326 
           Speed: 500 MHz min/max: 500/2666 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 675 2: 1183 3: 526 4: 904 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series Graphics & Display vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: i915 
           v: kernel bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:0f31 
           Device-2: Cheng Uei Precision Industry (Foxlink) Webcam type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus ID: 1-3:2 chip ID: 05c8:036e 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.3 compositor: kwin_x11 driver: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa alternate: intel 
           resolution: 1366x768~60Hz s-dpi: 96 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel Bay Trail v: 4.2 Mesa 19.3.4 compat-v: 3.0 direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series High Definition Audio vendor: Hewlett-Packard 
           driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus ID: 00:1b.0 chip ID: 8086:0f04 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.3.18-lp152.19-default 
Network:   Device-1: Ralink RT3290 Wireless 802.11n 1T/1R PCIe vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: rt2800pci v: 2.3.0 port: 2000 
           bus ID: 02:00.0 chip ID: 1814:3290 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           Device-2: Realtek RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: r8169 v: kernel port: 1000 
           bus ID: 04:00.0 chip ID: 10ec:8136 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter> 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 465.76 GiB used: 8.48 GiB (1.8%) 
           ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: MQ01ABF050 size: 465.76 GiB speed: 3.0 Gb/s rotation: 5400 rpm 
           serial: <filter> rev: 2C scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / size: 163.85 GiB used: 8.25 GiB (5.0%) fs: btrfs dev: /dev/dm-2 
           ID-2: /home size: 292.02 GiB used: 229.2 MiB (0.1%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/dm-3 
           ID-3: /opt size: 163.85 GiB used: 8.25 GiB (5.0%) fs: btrfs dev: /dev/dm-2 
           ID-4: /tmp size: 163.85 GiB used: 8.25 GiB (5.0%) fs: btrfs dev: /dev/dm-2 
           ID-5: /var size: 163.85 GiB used: 8.25 GiB (5.0%) fs: btrfs dev: /dev/dm-2 
Swap:      ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 3.73 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2 dev: /dev/dm-1 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 44.0 C mobo: 31.0 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Repos:     No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/openSUSE-Leap-15.2-1.repo 
           No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-debug-non-oss.repo 
           No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-debug-update-non-oss.repo 
           No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-debug-update.repo 
           No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-debug.repo 
           Active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-non-oss.repo 
           1: repo-non-oss ~ http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/leap/$releasever/repo/non-oss/
           Active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-oss.repo 
           1: repo-oss ~ http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/leap/$releasever/repo/oss/
           No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-source-non-oss.repo 
           No active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-source.repo 
           Active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-update-non-oss.repo 
           1: repo-update-non-oss ~ http://download.opensuse.org/update/leap/$releasever/non-oss/
           Active zypp repos in: /etc/zypp/repos.d/repo-update.repo 
           1: repo-update ~ http://download.opensuse.org/update/leap/$releasever/oss/
Info:      Processes: 214 Uptime: N/A Memory: 3.73 GiB used: 984.1 MiB (25.8%) Init: systemd v: 234 runlevel: 5 
           target: graphical.target Compilers: gcc: N/A Shell: bash v: 4.4.23 running in: konsole inxi: 3.1.00 
=========================
Output of lsusb

Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 1a40:0101 Terminus Technology Inc. Hub
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 05c8:036e Cheng Uei Precision Industry Co., Ltd (Foxlink) Webcam
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
=========================
Output of lspci

00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series SoC Transaction Register (rev 0e)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series Graphics & Display (rev 0e)
00:13.0 SATA controller: Intel Corporation Atom Processor E3800 Series SATA AHCI Controller (rev 0e)
00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx, Celeron N2000 Series USB xHCI (rev 0e)
00:1a.0 Encryption controller: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series Trusted Execution Engine (rev 0e)
00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series High Definition Audio Controller (rev 0e)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Atom Processor E3800 Series PCI Express Root Port 1 (rev 0e)
00:1c.1 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Atom Processor E3800 Series PCI Express Root Port 2 (rev 0e)
00:1c.2 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Atom Processor E3800 Series PCI Express Root Port 3 (rev 0e)
00:1c.3 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Atom Processor E3800 Series PCI Express Root Port 4 (rev 0e)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Atom Processor Z36xxx/Z37xxx Series Power Control Unit (rev 0e)
00:1f.3 SMBus: Intel Corporation Atom Processor E3800 Series SMBus Controller (rev 0e)
02:00.0 Network controller: Ralink corp. RT3290 Wireless 802.11n 1T/1R PCIe
02:00.1 Bluetooth: Ralink corp. RT3290 Bluetooth
03:00.0 Unassigned class [ff00]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTS5227 PCI Express Card Reader (rev 01)
04:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller (rev 07)

malcolmlewis · September 15, 2020, 1:26pm

Hi and welcome to the Forum
Is the xf86-input-libinput installed? See https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/543073-I-installed-Leap-15-2-and-after-upgrading-I-had-no-keyboard

Dewleno · September 16, 2020, 4:18am

Hello, and thank you!

Unfortunately, xf86-input-libinput didn’t resolve the issue. It was already installed on my system before the update.

Is there a way to get a complete list of what changed/changes between updates? Perhaps, I can narrow my search through there.

Luca · September 16, 2020, 1:48pm

I had a very similar problem, after kernel update on Debian, Void, and openSUSE I was left without a keyboard. And in my case, the SUSE engineer who was helping me discovered that the solution would be to remove the xf89-input-libinput driver.
Here is his analysis:

"Ok. Apparently now “evdev” driver took over keyboard support and “synaptics” driver touchpad support. Not sure why they are loaded if you removed everything in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d. Hmm … maybe the files for evdev and synaptics are still there …

This also means the “libinput” driver would be the culprit here (or at least is together with the updated kernel) and removing xf86-input-libinput package would be a workaround for you. Unfortunately you now removed content in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d and to bring this back you would need to reinstall some packages, probably these are:

systemd
xf86-input-evdev
xorg-x11-server
xf86-input-synaptics

Then uninstall

xf86-input-libinput

Hope this gives you a useful workaround. Why libinput driver no longer works together with updated kernel I have no idea at the moment."

Then, I reinstalled openSUSE Leap 15.2, and just removed the file ‘libinput.conf’ from the /etc/x11/xorg.conf.d directory, and even with the updated system I have a keyboard again.

Dewleno · September 21, 2020, 6:49pm

Hello, everyone!

Sorry for the long delay in replying. Life has been a bit of a hassle this past few weeks, and I’ve only found time to tackle it today.

I’ve actually solved the issue (I think). Technically, I found the workaround while I was messing around with Debian 10. However, I’m slightly confident that the workaround is universal and would’ve worked if I still had Leap 15.2 installed.

I found the solution on an ArchLinux forum post. It seemed that the laptop’s tablet mode was interfering with the keyboard, so it got fixed by blacklisting intel_vbtn. I fixed the touchpad by installing the synaptics driver.

Thanks for everyone’s help, and I’m sorry I wasn’t able to reply as quickly as I would have liked to.

Cheers!