Touchpad dead after upgrade to LMDE 5

[lmRobi]

I had my Fujitsu UH572 notebook running well under LMDE 4.
When starting with LMDE 4 in the beginning I had some trouble getting the touchpad to work.
This was solved by a tweak I found in a forum. Changing the grub configuration did the trick:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux quiet splash"

Unfortunately after running the upgrade LMDE 4 -> LMDE 5 the touchpad is dead.
The modified grub entry is still in the new configuration.

xserver-xorg-input-synaptics is installed

In /var/log/Xorg.0.log I found these entries about the touchpad that end with " Ignoring device from InputClass"

[ 8.478] ABI class: X.Org XInput driver, version 24.1
[ 8.478] (II) Using input driver 'synaptics' for 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPa>
[ 8.478] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: always reports core events
[ 8.478] (**) Option "Device" "/dev/input/event5"
[ 8.527] (II) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: found clickpad property
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: x-axis range 1472 - 54>
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: y-axis range 1408 - 44>
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: pressure range 0 - 255
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: finger width range 0 ->
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: buttons: left double t>
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: Vendor 0x2 Product 0x7
[ 8.527] (**) Option "SoftButtonAreas" "50% 0 82% 0 0 0 0 0"
[ 8.527] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: touchpad found
[ 8.527] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: always reports core events
[ 8.563] (**) Option "config_info" "udev:/sys/devices/platform/i8042/serio1>
[ 8.563] (II) XINPUT: Adding extended input device "SynPS/2 Synaptics Touch>
[ 8.563] (**) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) MinSpeed is no>
[ 8.563] (**) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) MaxSpeed is no>
[ 8.563] (**) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) AccelFactor is>
[ 8.563] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) keeping acceleration sche>
[ 8.563] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) acceleration profile 1
[ 8.563] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) acceleration factor: 2.000
[ 8.563] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: (accel) acceleration threshold: 4
[ 8.563] (--) synaptics: SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: touchpad found
[ 8.563] (II) config/udev: Adding input device SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad (>
[ 8.563] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: Ignoring device from InputClass ">
[ 8.563] (**) SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad: Ignoring device from InputClass ">

Any ideas how I can fix this are highly appreciated!
Thanks

[lmRobi]

Does nobody have any idea?

[SMG]

I had my Fujitsu UH572 notebook running well under LMDE 4.
When starting with LMDE 4 in the beginning I had some trouble getting the touchpad to work.
This was solved by a tweak I found in a forum. Changing the grub configuration did the trick:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux quiet splash"

Unfortunately after running the upgrade LMDE 4 -> LMDE 5 the touchpad is dead.
The modified grub entry is still in the new configuration.

Maybe those parameters are not needed with the newer kernel and are now causing problems?

Have you tried booting to a live session of LMDE5 to see if it works? Maybe something happened during the upgrade that is causing a problem.

[TuxSymphony]

I'd agree with SMG, try removing i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux from the line leaving "quiet splash"
[save] then sudo-update-grub via terminal

[lmRobi]

Thanks for the suggestions.
1. Boot from an original LMDE5 USB-Stick -> no touchpad
2. Removing i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux from the grup config -> no touchpad
(as expected, since this would be similar to 1.)
Do you have any other ideas what I can try?
Thanks

[SMG]

Thanks for the suggestions.
1. Boot from an original LMDE5 USB-Stick -> no touchpad

I would interpret this to mean the upgrade worked properly which would mean something in the newer version either of the kernel or of Debian Bullseye is an issue on your system.

Have you checked to make sure the Touchpad is showing as enabled in the Mouse and Touchpad app? (Maybe something changed that setting without you realizing it.) This link UH572 Touchpad disable indicates Fn+F4 turns it on and off in a Windows install.

I did find a topic on another forum Debian Bullseye Touchpad Not Working SynPS/2 Synaptics Touchpad, but, unfortunately, there is no resolution there.

The Debian Wiki: Synaptics does not list anything newer than Debian 9 "Stretch", however, it does list instructions for giving the Synaptic driver priority. I do not know if that might work with the Debian Bullseye base of LMDE5. Consider taking a Timeshift snapshot if you want to give it a try.

[lmRobi]

The upgrade from LMDE4 -> 5 went through pretty smooth. There where several packages removed and dependencies changed - I don't recall the details.
Yes the touchpad shows up and is enable (I also turned it off, rebooted and turned on again)
Fn-4 has no impact also not on the external mouse I'm currently using.

As described in the Debian Wiki - I uninstalled xserver-xorg-input-synaptics so that only the three other xserver-xorg-input-... are left.
No sucess,

I also tried to boot into the regular Linux Mint 20.3 Edition. Also no Touchpad there. But although the basis is Ubuntu, the debian core probably is the same.

I guess there has been some impropvements with the sideeffect, that my touchpad is no longer supported.
Sounds like I need to use an external mouse, until someone finds a fix for this improvement. I hope I'm not the only one waiting for this.
Thanks for your support so far.

[Marie SWE]

If the touchpad is dead in Mint20.3 and LMDE5.. if you try LMDE4 live just to verify it still working there... if not, it can be that it is disabled in Bios of some unexplained reason or an address conflict, that shouldn't be possible year 2022.
This is just a long shot in the dark, so to speak.

[lmRobi]

I can't check with LMDE4 without reinstalling the whole partition via dd again.
The touchpad requires an additional command in grub in LMDE4:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux quiet splash"
I don't know how to include this line in a bootable LMDE 4 Stick. Making the Stick persistent seems to be a science by itself due to a bug in the used Ubuntu installer (i gave up on this).
However, the touchpad worked before running the upgrade to LMDE5 and it works fine when booting into Windows (dual boot system).
This seemsto me, that it it cannot be disabled in the BIOS. BTW I don't find an option for the touchpad in the BIOS.

[SMG]

The touchpad requires an additional command in grub in LMDE4:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux quiet splash"

This topic What does the 'i8042.nomux=1' kernel option do during booting of Ubuntu? has a response which explains:

This is an arcane option, only necessary on some rare devices (one of which you have). The only documentation is one line in the kernel parameters list.

The i8042 controller controls PS/2 keyboards and mice in PCs. It seems that on your laptop, both the keyboard and the touchpad are connected through that chip.
...
The Linux driver tries to find out whether the i8042 controller supports multiplexing, but sometimes guessing wrongly. With the i8042.nomux=1 parameter, the driver does not try to detect whether the controller supports multiplexing and assumes that it doesn't.

Looking at the link in that response, here are all the i8042 parameters (of which i8042.notimeout is also explained).

Code: Select all

         i8042.debug	[HW] Toggle i8042 debug mode
	i8042.unmask_kbd_data
			[HW] Enable printing of interrupt data from the KBD port
			     (disabled by default, and as a pre-condition
			     requires that i8042.debug=1 be enabled)
	i8042.direct	[HW] Put keyboard port into non-translated mode
	i8042.dumbkbd	[HW] Pretend that controller can only read data from
			     keyboard and cannot control its state
			     (Don't attempt to blink the leds)
	i8042.noaux	[HW] Don't check for auxiliary (== mouse) port
	i8042.nokbd	[HW] Don't check/create keyboard port
	i8042.noloop	[HW] Disable the AUX Loopback command while probing
			     for the AUX port
	i8042.nomux	[HW] Don't check presence of an active multiplexing
			     controller
	i8042.nopnp	[HW] Don't use ACPIPnP / PnPBIOS to discover KBD/AUX
			     controllers
	i8042.notimeout	[HW] Ignore timeout condition signalled by controller
	i8042.reset	[HW] Reset the controller during init, cleanup and
			     suspend-to-ram transitions, only during s2r
			     transitions, or never reset
			Format: { 1 | Y | y | 0 | N | n }
			1, Y, y: always reset controller
			0, N, n: don't ever reset controller
			Default: only on s2r transitions on x86; most other
			architectures force reset to be always executed
	i8042.unlock	[HW] Unlock (ignore) the keylock
	i8042.kbdreset	[HW] Reset device connected to KBD port
	i8042.probe_defer
			[HW] Allow deferred probing upon i8042 probe errors

I do not know enough about that touchpad hardware or how the kernel is seeing it to know what to suggest.

[Marie SWE]

I can't check with LMDE4 without reinstalling the whole partition via dd again.
The touchpad requires an additional command in grub in LMDE4:
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="i8042.notimeout i8042.nomux quiet splash"
I don't know how to include this line in a bootable LMDE 4 Stick. Making the Stick persistent seems to be a science by itself due to a bug in the used Ubuntu installer (i gave up on this).
However, the touchpad worked before running the upgrade to LMDE5 and it works fine when booting into Windows (dual boot system).
This seemsto me, that it it cannot be disabled in the BIOS. BTW I don't find an option for the touchpad in the BIOS.

aha, okay I didn't know you dualboot with windows and it works in windows.
It was just a long shot in the dark, as i did say in my previous post. sometimes it happens that bios settings get changed by OS.
And very unusual so can other USB things interfere with each other, so when you disable webcam and other USB things in bios it can start working... it is really an uncommon thing nowadays.. But it's a long shot in the dark to try rule out things. but as it works in windows, it is really-really a loooong shot in the dark.
and i If you have USB keyboard be very observant on what you disable in bios.. so you don't have to do a cmos reset to get it back.

My lab laptop is older than your laptop it is a HP first gen i5 and that touchpad did work on Mint 20.3, so I don't think your hardware is to old... it is probably just a tiny thing to solve as you did in LMDE4.. So don't give up yet.