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alcornoqui

Member

Registered: 2014-07-28

Posts: 832

[SOLVED] Brightness: acpi_video0 & intel_backlight

Hello. I have some trouble with the brightness controls on my netbook (hardware and software details below):

Fn+F5/F6 seems to use acpi_video0. Fn keys make the brightness change, and the notification popup appear, but don't move the bar in the popup nor the slider in the Power Manager plugin.

Xfce Power Manager v 1.6.1 seems to use intel_backlight when I use the slider or scroll over the panel icon. This way I can get higher max brightness compared to using the Fn keys.

I'd like to use intel_backlight, as it has a bigger max value and is more fine grained (off-topic, anyone knows about the logarithmic scale proposed here, sounded great!), and marginally would like the slider and notification popup update their position properly.

Here's some info from my system:   

user@netbook:~$ cat /proc/cmdline
BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.13.0-1-686-pae root=UUID=bcb90034-53b6-482c-a4b1-b35db0c2b510 ro quiet

I tried some of the "popular" acpi options on the grub command line, to no visible effect.

user@netbook:~$ lspci -k | grep -iA2 VGA
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 945GSE Express Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 03)
	Subsystem: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Mobile 945GSE Express Integrated Graphics Controller
	Kernel driver in use: i915

user@netbook:~$ for i in /sys/class/backlight/*; do echo $i;cat $i/brightness;cat $i/max_brightness;done
/sys/class/backlight/acpi_video0
14
15
/sys/class/backlight/intel_backlight
7989
39780

user@netbook:~$ pastebinit /var/log/Xorg.0.log
https://pastebin.com/60pFPuSy

user@netbook    :~$ inxi -GMS
System:    Host: mx1 Kernel: 4.13.0-1-686-pae i686 bits: 32 Desktop: Xfce 4.12.3 
           Distro: MX-17_386 Horizon December 15  2017 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: ASUSTeK product: 1005HA v: x.x serial: <root required> 
           Mobo: ASUSTeK model: 1005HA v: x.xx serial: <root required> BIOS: American Megatrends v: 1102 
           date: 10/16/2009 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel Mobile 945GSE Express Integrated Graphics driver: i915 v: kernel 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.19.2 driver: intel resolution: 1024x600~60Hz 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel 945GME x86/MMX/SSE2 v: 1.4 Mesa 18.2.6 

Following advice from old forum posts, I modified these two file, maybe I should just modify one of them?

user@netbook:~$ cat /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf
Section "Device"
        Identifier  "card0"
        Driver      "intel"
        Option      "Backlight"    "intel_backlight"
        BusID       "PCI:0:2:0"
EndSection

user@netbook:~$ cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf 
Section "Device"
   Identifier  "Intel Graphics"
   Driver      "intel"
   Option      "AccelMethod" "sna"             # was "uxa"
   Option      "Backlight"   "intel_backlight" # I added this line
   Option      "TearFree"    "true"
   BusID       "PCI:0:2:0"                     # and maybe this one too? I don't remember!

Thanks for any help!

Last edited by alcornoqui (2019-01-10 14:34:17)

ToZ

Administrator

From: Canada

Registered: 2011-06-02

Posts: 11,000

Re: [SOLVED] Brightness: acpi_video0 & intel_backlight

First of all, delete the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf file (it's missing the "EndSection" directive). Xorg is using both and maybe hanging up on it. Using just the one in /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf, after reboot, do you now get only one backlight entry in /sys/class/backlight?

I tried some of the "popular" acpi options on the grub command line, to no visible effect.

Try also the "acpi_backlight=vendor" kernel parameter again. Check to see if it gives you only one backlight entry.

(off-topic, anyone knows about the logarithmic scale proposed here, sounded great!),

Looks like just a proposal so far, not implemented yet.

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alcornoqui

Member

Registered: 2014-07-28

Posts: 832

Re: [SOLVED] Brightness: acpi_video0 & intel_backlight

Hell yeah! You're the #1, ToZ!

Deleted /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-intel.conf, added the "acpi_backlight=vendor" kernel parameter, updated grub and... everything works after reboot (had to re-enable the option in the power manager to handle keyboard shortcuts for brightness, that's all).

Thanks a lot.