[SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

unplugged23 · 2015-08-23 01:20:32

Hello all.

This weekend I've been working on getting Arch set up on my Dell XPS 13. I've got arch running, and gnome installed, but I can't use the touchpad. The wiki entry for my laptop seems to suggest that everything should mostly work out of the box with the touchpad (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/De … )#Touchpad) so I'm not really sure where to begin.

I feel I should go ahead and say that I'm not completely confident that I've got a solid installation of Arch at the moment. I followed the beginners guide all the way through, however I ran into a number of issues getting x/gnome installed and running. The beginner's guide doesn't address installing a DE at all, and the wiki pages I looked at for xorg and gnome both seemed to be missing installation and configuration steps. I'd like to improve them at some point, but I don't quite have the knowledge yet to do so. Anyways, that to say that don't assume I've done anything correctly while installing Arch

From the gnome desktop, I initially assumed that the touchpad wasn't working at all. Moving my finger across it, left clicking, and right clicking had no effect. However, I was able to use the keyboard to launch a terminal window, the border of which happened to be right in line with the mouse pointer. At this point, I noticed left clicking actually affected the terminal window (changing my cursor to the arrow to show that I can resize the window), so I know the touchpad is providing some input. I just can't actually use it to move the mouse.

If anyone could help me get the touch pad working, I would greatly appreciate it!

Last edited by unplugged23 (2015-08-23 21:20:32)

bulletmark · 2015-08-23 02:52:58

I have a 2015 Dell XPS 13 using GNOME and the touchpad works really well with completely default settings, kernel, and software. I disagree with that wiki page and think it best to leave everything default with GNOME, i.e. don't blacklist the psmouse module and don't create any conf file at all in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d. GNOME will use libinput by default. Just open the GNOME Mouse & Trackpad settings display and set "Tap to click", "Two finger scroll", and "Natural Scrolling" all on. One, two (right click), and three (middle click) finger taps work well.

Sorry, don't know what your specific problem is but I do know that trackpad works well with GNOME and stock configuration.

Last edited by bulletmark (2015-08-23 03:02:20)

unplugged23 · 2015-08-23 06:53:00

Hmm... Do you have any idea how I could troubleshoot? Everything should still be stock at this point. Literally the only things I've done is pacstrap -I base base-devel and pacman -S gnome gnome-extras. Should be completely stock.

bulletmark · 2015-08-23 07:56:46

Is your system up to date?

unplugged23 · 2015-08-23 17:57:32

Yes, just ran pacman -Syu (only thing installed were a couple python packages) and rebooted. Still no luck.

unplugged23 · 2015-08-23 21:20:14

Ok, so feeling a little dumb right now. Problem resolved by installing xf86-input-synapitcs.

bulletmark · 2015-08-23 22:27:14

I don't have xf86-input-synaptics installed and my touchpad works perfectly. As I said above, default xorg uses libinput rather than synaptics and in my extensive testing since I have had this laptop, libinput works much better than synaptics after the massive amount of improvements libinput has had over the last 3 months. Make sure xf86-input-libinput is installed. You should not have any files in /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d. Make sure you are using BIOS A05. I am using kernel args pcie_aspm=force i915.enable_rc6=7 as per the wiki.

PS:. Also the wiki used to recommend that you disable /org/gnome/settings-daemon/plugins/mouse/ in dconf but make sure that is enabled, i.e. put it back to default.

Last edited by bulletmark (2015-08-23 22:30:49)

uladk84 · 2015-10-01 20:21:29

bulletmark, where have you set up your kernel args?

The arch page on the XPS 13 2015 says:
"As of version A05, the BIOS does not pass any boot parameters to the kernel. Use a UEFI boot loader instead. systemd-boot works with current kernels. "

I was using grub to set the kernel parameters, but now I have them in /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf:
"options i915 modeset=1 enable_rc6=7 enable_psr=1"

but running "cat /sys/module/i915/parameters/enable_rc6" always shows "1"

How did you set yours up?

Cheers

bulletmark · 2015-10-01 23:01:28

@uladk84, I just use the kernel args recommended in the XPS13 wiki but they really don't have anything to do with the touchpad. I use systemd-boot so I put the args in my /boot/loader/entries/arch.conf file.

Systemd-boot is simple, is easy to configure, and makes logical sense. That's completely unlike grub/grub2 which I am very happy to banish to obscurity.

uladk84 · 2015-10-02 02:51:20

@bulletmark, that was what I was looking for! I cannot find any documentation on where to put the args with systemd-boot. I too switched from grub.

Can you post the contents of your /boot/loader/entries/arch.conf file? I still can't find an existing example to reference.

Cheers!

bulletmark · 2015-10-02 02:58:22

@uladk84

title Arch Linux
linux /vmlinuz-linux
initrd /intel-ucode.img
initrd /initramfs-linux.img
options root=/dev/sda5 rw pcie_aspm=force i915.enable_rc6=7

Note: intel-ucode line only needed if that package is installed.

uladk84 · 2015-10-02 04:09:24

@bulletmark. Thanks! What kernel are you running? Also, what is your output of "cat /sys/module/i915/parameters/enable_rc6"? I'm still getting "1".

I aslo get this error "-bash: echo: write error: Input/output error" when running "echo 7 > /sys/module/i915/parameters/enable_rc6" as root.

Do you see anything similar?

bulletmark · 2015-10-03 03:16:02

@uladk84, I'm running stock Arch kernel 4.2.1-1. sudo cat /sys/module/i915/parameters/enable_rc6 returns "1". I get permission denied when trying to write that enable_rc6 value.
It has permissions "-r-------- 1 root root 4096 Oct 3 13:13 enable_rc6".

Arch Linux

#1 2015-08-23 01:20:32

[SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#2 2015-08-23 02:52:58

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#3 2015-08-23 06:53:00

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#4 2015-08-23 07:56:46

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#5 2015-08-23 17:57:32

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#6 2015-08-23 21:20:14

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#7 2015-08-23 22:27:14

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#8 2015-10-01 20:21:29

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#9 2015-10-01 23:01:28

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#10 2015-10-02 02:51:20

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#11 2015-10-02 02:58:22

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#12 2015-10-02 04:09:24

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

#13 2015-10-03 03:16:02

Re: [SOLVED] Dell XPS 13 Touchpad

Board footer