blog/Fixing_the_Linux_black_screen_of_death_on_machines_with_Intel_HD_video.html

   1 <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
   2           "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
   3 <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" dir="ltr">
   4   <head>
   5     <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" />
   6     <title>Petter Reinholdtsen: Fixing the Linux black screen of death on machines with Intel HD video</title>
   7     <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/style.css" />
   8     <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="screen" href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/vim.css" />
   9
  10
  11   </head>
  12   <body>
  13     <div class="title">
  14  <h1>
  15      <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/">Petter Reinholdtsen</a>
  16
  17  </h1>
  18
  19 </div>
  20
  21
  22     <div class="entry">
  23       <div class="title">Fixing the Linux black screen of death on machines with Intel HD video</div>
  24       <div class="date">11th June 2013</div>
  25       <div class="body"><p>When installing RedHat, Fedora, Debian and Ubuntu on some machines,
  26 the screen just turn black when Linux boot, either during installation
  27 or on first boot from the hard disk.  I've seen it once in a while the
  28 last few years, but only recently understood the cause.  I've seen it
  29 on HP laptops, and on my latest acquaintance the Packard Bell laptop.
  30 The reason seem to be in the wiring of some laptops.  The system to
  31 control the screen background light is inverted, so when Linux try to
  32 turn the brightness fully on, it end up turning it off instead.  I do
  33 not know which Linux drivers are affected, but this post is about the
  34 i915 driver used by the
  35 <a href="http://www.linlap.com/packard_bell_easynote_lv">Packard Bell
  36 EasyNote LV</a>, Thinkpad X40 and many other laptops.</p>
  37
  38 <p>The problem can be worked around two ways.  Either by adding
  39 i915.invert_brightness=1 as a kernel option, or by adding a file in
  40 /etc/modprobe.d/ to tell modprobe to add the invert_brightness=1
  41 option when it load the i915 kernel module.  On Debian and Ubuntu, it
  42 can be done by running these commands as root:</p>
  43
  44 <pre>
  45 echo options i915 invert_brightness=1 | tee /etc/modprobe.d/i915.conf
  46 update-initramfs -u -k all
  47 </pre>
  48
  49 <p>Since March 2012 there is
  50 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=4dca20efb1a9c2efefc28ad2867e5d6c3f5e1955">a
  51 mechanism in the Linux kernel</a> to tell the i915 driver which
  52 hardware have this problem, and get the driver to invert the
  53 brightness setting automatically.  To use it, one need to add a row in
  54 <a href="http://git.kernel.org/cgit/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c">the
  55 intel_quirks array</a> in the driver source
  56 <tt>drivers/gpu/drm/i915/intel_display.c</tt> (look for "<tt>static
  57 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks</tt>"), specifying the PCI device
  58 number (vendor number 8086 is assumed) and subdevice vendor and device
  59 number.</p>
  60
  61 <p>My Packard Bell EasyNote LV got this output from <tt>lspci
  62 -vvnn</tt> for the video card in question:</p>
  63
  64 <p><pre>
  65 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation \
  66     3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0156] \
  67     (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
  68  Subsystem: Acer Incorporated [ALI] Device [1025:0688]
  69  Control: I/O+ Mem+ BusMaster+ SpecCycle- MemWINV- VGASnoop- \
  70     ParErr- Stepping- SE RR- FastB2B- DisINTx+
  71  Status: Cap+ 66MHz- UDF- FastB2B+ ParErr- DEVSEL=fast >TAbort- \
  72     <TAbort- <MAbort->SERR- <PERR- INTx-
  73  Latency: 0
  74  Interrupt: pin A routed to IRQ 42
  75  Region 0: Memory at c2000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
  76  Region 2: Memory at b0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
  77  Region 4: I/O ports at 4000 [size=64]
  78  Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
  79  Capabilities: <access denied>
  80  Kernel driver in use: i915
  81 </pre></p>
  82
  83 <p>The resulting intel_quirks entry would then look like this:</p>
  84
  85 <p><pre>
  86 struct intel_quirk intel_quirks[] = {
  87        ...
  88         /* Packard Bell EasyNote LV11HC needs invert brightness quirk */
  89         { 0x0156, 0x1025, 0x0688, quirk_invert_brightness },
  90        ...
  91 }
  92 </pre></p>
  93
  94 <p>According to the kernel module instructions (as seen using
  95 <tt>modinfo i915</tt>), information about hardware needing the
  96 invert_brightness flag should be sent to the
  97 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/dri-devel">dri-devel
  98 (at) lists.freedesktop.org</a> mailing list to reach the kernel
  99 developers.  But my email about the laptop sent 2013-06-03 have not
 100 yet shown up in
 101 <a href="http://lists.freedesktop.org/archives/dri-devel/2013-June/thread.html">the
 102 web archive for the mailing list</a>, so I suspect they do not accept
 103 emails from non-subscribers.  Because of this, I sent my patch also to
 104 the Debian bug tracking system instead as
 105 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/710938">BTS report #710938</a>, to make
 106 sure the patch is not lost.</p>
 107
 108 <p>Unfortunately, it is not enough to fix the kernel to get Laptops
 109 with this problem working properly with Linux.  If you use Gnome, your
 110 worries should be over at this point.  But if you use KDE, there is
 111 something in KDE ignoring the invert_brightness setting and turning on
 112 the screen during login.  I've reported it to Debian as
 113 <a href="http://bugs.debian.org/711237">BTS report #711237</a>, and
 114 have no idea yet how to figure out exactly what subsystem is doing
 115 this.  Perhaps you can help?  Perhaps you know what the Gnome
 116 developers did to handle this, and this can give a clue to the KDE
 117 developers?  Or you know where in KDE the screen brightness is changed
 118 during login?  If so, please update the BTS report (or get in touch if
 119 you do not know how to update BTS).</p>
 120
 121 <p>Update 2013-07-19: The correct fix for this machine seem to be
 122 acpi_backlight=vendor, to disable ACPI backlight support completely,
 123 as the ACPI information on the machine is trash and it is better to
 124 leave it to the intel video driver to control the screen
 125 backlight.</p>
 126 </div>
 127
 128       <div class="tags">Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.</div>
 129
 130
 131     </div>
 132
 133
 134
 135
 136     <div id="sidebar">
 137
 138
 139
 140 <h2>Archive</h2>
 141 <ul>
 142
 143 <li>2014
 144 <ul>
 145
 146 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 147
 148 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (1)</a></li>
 149
 150 </ul></li>
 151
 152 <li>2013
 153 <ul>
 154
 155 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
 156
 157 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
 158
 159 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
 160
 161 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
 162
 163 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 164
 165 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
 166
 167 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 168
 169 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 170
 171 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 172
 173 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
 174
 175 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
 176
 177 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 178
 179 </ul></li>
 180
 181 <li>2012
 182 <ul>
 183
 184 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 185
 186 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
 187
 188 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
 189
 190 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
 191
 192 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
 193
 194 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
 195
 196 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
 197
 198 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 199
 200 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
 201
 202 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
 203
 204 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
 205
 206 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 207
 208 </ul></li>
 209
 210 <li>2011
 211 <ul>
 212
 213 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
 214
 215 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 216
 217 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
 218
 219 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 220
 221 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
 222
 223 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 224
 225 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 226
 227 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 228
 229 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
 230
 231 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 232
 233 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 234
 235 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
 236
 237 </ul></li>
 238
 239 <li>2010
 240 <ul>
 241
 242 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 243
 244 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
 245
 246 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
 247
 248 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
 249
 250 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 251
 252 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
 253
 254 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
 255
 256 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
 257
 258 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
 259
 260 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
 261
 262 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
 263
 264 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
 265
 266 </ul></li>
 267
 268 <li>2009
 269 <ul>
 270
 271 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
 272
 273 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
 274
 275 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
 276
 277 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
 278
 279 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 280
 281 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
 282
 283 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
 284
 285 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 286
 287 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
 288
 289 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 290
 291 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 292
 293 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 294
 295 </ul></li>
 296
 297 <li>2008
 298 <ul>
 299
 300 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
 301
 302 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 303
 304 </ul></li>
 305
 306 </ul>
 307
 308
 309
 310 <h2>Tags</h2>
 311 <ul>
 312
 313  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (13)</a></li>
 314
 315  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
 316
 317  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
 318
 319  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
 320
 321  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (8)</a></li>
 322
 323  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (14)</a></li>
 324
 325  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
 326
 327  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
 328
 329  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (93)</a></li>
 330
 331  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (144)</a></li>
 332
 333  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
 334
 335  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (10)</a></li>
 336
 337  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
 338
 339  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (235)</a></li>
 340
 341  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (21)</a></li>
 342
 343  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
 344
 345  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (12)</a></li>
 346
 347  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (5)</a></li>
 348
 349  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (11)</a></li>
 350
 351  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (39)</a></li>
 352
 353  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (7)</a></li>
 354
 355  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (18)</a></li>
 356
 357  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (8)</a></li>
 358
 359  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (6)</a></li>
 360
 361  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
 362
 363  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (7)</a></li>
 364
 365  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (25)</a></li>
 366
 367  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (239)</a></li>
 368
 369  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (161)</a></li>
 370
 371  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (9)</a></li>
 372
 373  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
 374
 375  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (45)</a></li>
 376
 377  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (68)</a></li>
 378
 379  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (1)</a></li>
 380
 381  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
 382
 383  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (2)</a></li>
 384
 385  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (9)</a></li>
 386
 387  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
 388
 389  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (4)</a></li>
 390
 391  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
 392
 393  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (34)</a></li>
 394
 395  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
 396
 397  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (4)</a></li>
 398
 399  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (44)</a></li>
 400
 401  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (3)</a></li>
 402
 403  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (9)</a></li>
 404
 405  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (21)</a></li>
 406
 407  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (1)</a></li>
 408
 409  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (8)</a></li>
 410
 411  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (39)</a></li>
 412
 413  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
 414
 415  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (28)</a></li>
 416
 417 </ul>
 418
 419
 420     </div>
 421     <p style="text-align: right">
 422  Created by <a href="http://steve.org.uk/Software/chronicle">Chronicle v4.6</a>
 423 </p>
 424
 425   </body>
 426 </html>