Arch Linux

jackro

Member

Registered: 2014-09-21

Posts: 14

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Anyone else getting terrible graphics performance (like can't even scroll fluidly in a pdf) on the Pixel 2? I am using the xf86-video-intel driver and can't even watch a YouTube video.

My apologies for reposting this, but it has not received any attention yet. It makes me nervous of hardware failures when I haven't heard any complaints from others.

satchmosgroove

Member

From: Long Beach, NY

Registered: 2010-01-13

Posts: 88

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I can't report any problems at all, but maybe this helps/clarifies some of the last posts. Mine just works fine (besides the microphone and sometimes loosing sound after suspend)

I did the following (according to the arch wiki or tsowell's instructions on github):
  1. setting gbb flags according to https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ch … by_default
  2. reset ssd to factory default: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SS … l_clearing
  3. LUKS/LVM installation
  4. Samus kernel from AUR
  5. GRUB as a bootloader
  6. Following settings from tsowell: https://github.com/tsowell/linux-samus
  7. No swap at all
  8. xorg-server, xorg-server-utils, xorg-apps, xf86-video-intel, plasma/kf5

This just worked and I never had degrading performance of any kind. The CTRL-L switch is gone. Only text entry needed on bootup is the password to unlock encryption.

jackro

Member

Registered: 2014-09-21

Posts: 14

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I can't report any problems at all, but maybe this helps/clarifies some of the last posts. Mine just works fine (besides the microphone and sometimes loosing sound after suspend)

I did the following (according to the arch wiki or tsowell's instructions on github):
  1. setting gbb flags according to https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ch … by_default
  2. reset ssd to factory default: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SS … l_clearing
  3. LUKS/LVM installation
  4. Samus kernel from AUR
  5. GRUB as a bootloader
  6. Following settings from tsowell: https://github.com/tsowell/linux-samus
  7. No swap at all
  8. xorg-server, xorg-server-utils, xorg-apps, xf86-video-intel, plasma/kf5

This just worked and I never had degrading performance of any kind. The CTRL-L switch is gone. Only text entry needed on bootup is the password to unlock encryption.

Odd, I noticed that this video performance issue is just happening in firefox, not chrome. What browser are you using, and which OpenGL library do you have. I am using mesa and mesa-libgl.

satchmosgroove

Member

From: Long Beach, NY

Registered: 2010-01-13

Posts: 88

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

same library here. I use the dev channel of chromium from AUR (has the hidpi support)

bja

Member

Registered: 2015-06-09

Posts: 2

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I have normally used a standard kernel config so that does sound promising.
I'll chicken and wait for someone bolder than I.
(Please do let me know if/when you do that though!)

I've been using this for a couple days. I had to edit the kernel config to build tun/tap support and a couple drivers that I use for usb stuff and then the paths in the build.sh that were provided for arch needed some massaging, but it's been running fine.

genki

Member

Registered: 2015-01-03

Posts: 17

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

@bja That's great to hear, thanks for the update.
Could you comment on any things that appear to not be working correctly?
I'm especially curious about the microphone. It appears in here that things are slightly inconclusive.
Or does all seem well?

Hideaki

Member

From: Seattle, WA

Registered: 2009-01-19

Posts: 37

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I kept running into issue after issue with the supplied kernel config for linux-samus4(32-bit binaries wouldn't run, no F2FS support, no SWAP support, no USB ethernet adapter support, etc), so I made a build based on the kernel config of tsowell's linux-samus package. I've been running this for a day now and it works great. I still can't get the Mic to work, but everything else is peachy.

Here it is: https://docs.google.com/uc?id=0BxYCH5jh … t=download

satchmosgroove

Member

From: Long Beach, NY

Registered: 2010-01-13

Posts: 88

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

sounds like my machine. Only that I just installed linux-samus 3.19 from AUR :-)

Hideaki

Member

From: Seattle, WA

Registered: 2009-01-19

Posts: 37

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I still have 2 major and 1 minor issue with audio that I can't seem to resolve(using pulseaudio).

1. Audio works after rebooting, but is dead when coming back from suspend. I tried this fix on the wiki, but it doesn't fix the issue: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pu … om_suspend
2. Mic is still busted. Adding those lines to /etc/pulse/default.pa causes pulseaudio to fail to start at all.
3. Headphone jack detection is broken, have to manually switch to and from the headphone device

Has anyone gotten these solved?

satchmosgroove

Member

From: Long Beach, NY

Registered: 2010-01-13

Posts: 88

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I am pretty sure my no-audio-after-suspend-issue is gone. It happened a week ago and I never lost audio since.  Don't know what did the trick as I just upgraded as usual.

jackro

Member

Registered: 2014-09-21

Posts: 14

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Has anyone tried Linux 4.1.2? How does it compare to linux-samus from the AUR?

hobn

Member

Registered: 2014-06-24

Posts: 30

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I've been running linux-samus4 for a while now with no problems. I see no reason not to switch over from linux-samus. I still haven't gotten the microphone to work though. I don't think I set up pulseaudio right; I'm used to just using alsa.

genki

Member

Registered: 2015-01-03

Posts: 17

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

@hobn I also am on linux-samus4, had troubles with the microphone originally, and had also only used alsa beforehand.
So, here's what I did to make it work (anyone please feel free to hop in and say if I'm misunderstanding something)

1) Installed 'pulseaudio' and 'pulseaudio-alsa' from 'extra'.
2) Followed all the steps in Raphael's README about setting up audio.
3) Put `pulseaudio -D &`in my `.xinitrc`(this starts the pulseaudio daemon on your `startx`).
4) Installed `pavucontrol` (Not sure if this is necessary, but it made it work and I haven't bothered yet to understand pulseaudio to change it).
5) Opened `pavucontrol`, go to the 'Input Devices' tab and make sure the top microphone is unmuted, and set as the 'fallback device' (see the buttons at the top right). The second 'bdw-rt5677' listed seems to be the Chromebook always-on-listening thing for 'Ok Google' commands, so you can just mute it, it seems.
6) At this point after rebooting my microphone was working, but then my output audio was not. So, I opened up `pavucontrol` again, went to the 'Output Devices' tab, made sure the 'bdw-rt677 Analog Stereo' device was unmuted, and set as the fallback device. And also, since I want audio through the headphones, I set the 'Port' dropdown to 'Headphones', and set the volume to 100% (0dB) (There is a slight issue with low default volume) [0]. From here on out, use `pavucontrol` to control audio (e.g. not `alsamixer`).
7) I then rebooted (I doubt this was necessary, I bet it would've worked right then), and from then on, both the volume and microphone has worked great.

[0]: It also seems as per https://github.com/raphael/linux-4.1-samus/issues/19, that the recent commits to the repo fix low-volume issues. I haven't gotten these new fixes yet. I think it just has to do with output. I'm going to get them soon, in the meantime I had just dealt by turning up audio volume to max.

Last edited by genki (2015-07-30 12:12:12)

hobn

Member

Registered: 2014-06-24

Posts: 30

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Thanks very much genki! I've gotten my microphone to work but it seems finicky and doesn't always stay working. But has anybody noticed that their headphones have the channels flipped? As in, you hear sound on the opposite side.

genki

Member

Registered: 2015-01-03

Posts: 17

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

No problem! Re the microphone, not sure about that.
As for the channels flipped, see https://github.com/raphael/linux-4.1-samus/issues/19.
As mentioned in the issue, this has just been resolved. So, I would reinstall from the repo.

Last edited by genki (2015-08-11 11:22:08)

hobn

Member

Registered: 2014-06-24

Posts: 30

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I'm almost there to having flawless sound!

Does anyone see reason to keep around the HDA Intel HDMI sink or the second bdw-rt5677 source? I changed my pulse default.pa so that only the bdw-rt5677 sink is loaded along with the correct one of its two sources.

rearden

Member

Registered: 2015-08-26

Posts: 1

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I'm still not totally clear on what happens if I don't remove the write protection screw. Can someone clear up the ramifications for me? I really want Arch on my Pixel, but it is expensive and I don't want to just go messing around with things without a clear understanding of what will happen if I do something.

satchmosgroove

Member

From: Long Beach, NY

Registered: 2010-01-13

Posts: 88

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I can't report any problems at all, but maybe this helps/clarifies some of the last posts. Mine just works fine (besides the microphone and sometimes loosing sound after suspend)

I did the following (according to the arch wiki or tsowell's instructions on github):
  1. setting gbb flags according to https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Ch … by_default
  2. reset ssd to factory default: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SS … l_clearing
  3. LUKS/LVM installation
  4. Samus kernel from AUR
  5. GRUB as a bootloader
  6. Following settings from tsowell: https://github.com/tsowell/linux-samus
  7. No swap at all
  8. xorg-server, xorg-server-utils, xorg-apps, xf86-video-intel, plasma/kf5

This just worked and I never had degrading performance of any kind. The CTRL-L switch is gone. Only text entry needed on bootup is the password to unlock encryption.

The link in step 1 will explain what to remove the write protection for. In a nutshell: you need to remove it to make it boot into seabios by default. This will save you from manually entering dev-mode every time you reboot. Nothing more, nothing less. It's easy to do, most tricky thing for me was to put the rubber back in place perfectly. I didn't want to glue it back in and it's holding up without doing so. After all this, crew is back in and it's working like any other laptop. For me only grub worked and syslinux didn't, though.

genki

Member

Registered: 2015-01-03

Posts: 17

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Has anyone bought any [USB C -> VGA] adapter and successfully set it up with the CB2?
If so, could you give a link to which one?
If you attempted and it did not work, could I bother you to say which one it was?
Thanks for your time!

satchmosgroove

Member

From: Long Beach, NY

Registered: 2010-01-13

Posts: 88

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I only bought this. It's USB-C-to-HDMI and it just works. Only problem I was running into is that in my HomeTheater setup everything is going through a receiver and then to a projector. So, there is no Monitor/Resolution detected. But it worked with almost every TV in hotels/meeting rooms. There were one or two TVs where it did not work, but I blame it on that HDMI cable or TV.

genki

Member

Registered: 2015-01-03

Posts: 17

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Great, thanks for the link! And good to know.
I _might_ be able to make HDMI work for what I'm thinking, so I'll keep this in mind.
Thanks again.

jackro

Member

Registered: 2014-09-21

Posts: 14

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Anyone else getting terrible graphics performance (like can't even scroll fluidly in a pdf) on the Pixel 2? I am using the xf86-video-intel driver and can't even watch a YouTube video.

Anyone else experience this? I haven't heard from anyone with a pixel 2 yet, I guess could somebody try using Firefox, zathura, or silder?

Edit: Fixed this: use this for your /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf

Section "Device"
   Identifier  "Intel Graphics"
   Driver      "intel"
   Option      "AccelMethod"  "glamor"
EndSection

Last edited by jackro (2015-09-10 05:33:12)

wulvyrn

Member

Registered: 2015-02-02

Posts: 19

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Is the wiki page still the most current?  I was also curious to why the Chromebook pixel 2 page wasn't even listed on the Chromebook page anywhere.

I've been monkeying with arch Linux on the Chromebook pixel 2 for a few days and after reading several forums and older entries seem to be a bit outdated and the wiki doesn't contain some of the fixes listed I've found.  Or is this just a dead project?

genki

Member

Registered: 2015-01-03

Posts: 17

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

Hmm, what other issues have you been experiencing?
For what it's worth, I've just been using the custom kernel mentioned in the wiki: https://github.com/raphael/linux-samus, with no lasting issues.

wulvyrn

Member

Registered: 2015-02-02

Posts: 19

Re: Google Chromebook Pixel 2

I wanted the grub video mode to work.  I found grub would work setting the video to 1280x850x16 vice just telling the output to be in console mode.  The video mode option wasn't listed on the wiki.

I have installed the linux-samus kernel but haven't tried the sound or video scripts as when its installed via yaourt, there scripts are not on system.

I haven't found a good or easy solution to getting i3 better fonts.  I'll have to try a few methods other people suggested but nothing on the wiki.

Some also say to install zram but nothing about zram on the wiki.  I was tired of ChromeOS and wanted a change.  I use a few linux programs and crouton wouldn't give me what I wanted so I'm here.

Last edited by wulvyrn (2015-11-22 21:49:48)