Arch Linux

katafrakt

Member

From: Kraków

Registered: 2010-06-08

Posts: 22

[MSI GE60] Flickering backlight

Hi! I have a MSI GE60 2PC Apache laptop, which worked quite well with Arch Linux until lately. After updating kernel to linux-4.6.2-1 the backlight started to flicker terribly (I think it might have flickered before, but now it's pretty much unusable). I also see parts of my display manager in between the flickers, if that means anything. I tried to play with http://devbraindom.blogspot.com/2013/03 … intel.html but I only managed to make it even worse.

I also tried with and without xf86-video-intel and with and without early modesetting enabled.

> intel_reg read 0xC8254
BLC_PWM_PCH_CTL2 (0x000c8254): 0x149909e7 (freq 5273, cycle 2535)

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 4th Gen Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 06) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
	Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. [MSI] Device 1108
	Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 27
	Memory at f7400000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
	Memory at d0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
	I/O ports at f000 [size=64]
	Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
	Capabilities: <access denied>
	Kernel driver in use: i915
	Kernel modules: i915

Any ideas?

Cobra_Fast

Member

Registered: 2016-06-25

Posts: 7

Re: [MSI GE60] Flickering backlight

I just ran into this problem as well, with a very similar model MSI laptop.
I also noticed the flickering backlight carrys over to other OS'es with a warm reboot.
The only fix I've found so far is to cold start (disconnect power and battery) and then boot an older kernel or something other than linux.
Downgrading the kernel (from /var/cache/pacman/pkg) only fixes it with a cold (and power-disconnected) reboot as well, with a warm reboot the flickering will carry over to the downgraded kernel.

Perhaps someone can think of an actual fix for this?

Last edited by Cobra_Fast (2016-06-25 21:07:26)