Lenovo 14 Trackpad Doesn't Work

Support
1

Hello Y’all:

I recently picked up a Lenovo 14w, and I can’t get the trackpad to work. I tried Fedora, Ubuntu, Elementary, Linux Mint, and now Manjaro. None of the Linux distro’s are compatible with my Lenovo 14 w’s trackpad. I’ve spent hours on this stupid thing, making me regret my purchase of an otherwise very nice laptop. I have tried numerous “fixes,” which have either done nothing, or knocked out my Wifi.

The fixes that I have done thus far: updated the BIOS using suggestions that I found online, and I have edited GRUB, with prescribed suggestions. I ave also tried using Synaptic’s drivers. Nothing has worked.

I am running the latest version of Manjaro - a surprisingly polished and fast OS, I must say. On the hardware side, I am running an Elantouch trackpad - which, when I use Xinput, doesn’t even come up: the OS isn’t recognizing the hardware. The trackpad works fine with Windows, and it works fine when I go into the BIOS screen. But once Linux boots, the touchpad becomes useless.

One thing I ask: when replying, please don’t tell me “download a tarball,” etc., as my understanding of Linux is very basic (which is why I am putting my question here). Please give me step by step instructions, written in a way that someone with no understanding, would grasp. Thank you in advance for your time.

2

Hi there,
Welcome to Manjaro.

To start can we please get some general system information?

Enter into your terminal (gnome-terminal) the following command and press Enter:

inxi -Farz | curl -F 'file=@-' https://0x0.st
A note on copying and pasting in the terminal

You can copy and paste the text in the terminal using your mouse and the right-click menu.
If you attempt to use the keyboard to copy the shortcut is Ctrl+Shift+c.
And to paste the shortcut is Ctrl+Shift+v.

This should produce an https link.

Please share it here.

3

Thank you for your interest in my problem, and for your easy to understand reply:

https://0x0.st/XPK1.txt

4

Thanks.

Darn, because that is the first hit searching for this model.
Like here:
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1380231/lenovo-14w-2-touchpad-doesnt-work-with-ubuntu-18-04

But then again … looking at your output

Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: LENOVO product: 82N9 v: Lenovo 14w Gen 2
    serial: <superuser required> Chassis: type: 10 v: Lenovo 14w Gen 2
    serial: <superuser required>
  Mobo: LENOVO model: LNVNB161216 v: SDK0T76465WIN
    serial: <superuser required> part-nu: LENOVO_MT_82N9_BU_idea_FM_14w Gen 2
    uuid: <superuser required> UEFI: LENOVO v: H0CN25WW date: 04/10/2023

And comparing it to the lenovo website

It appears you do have BIOS updates available.

Otherwise the outlook is not looking very good…

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/758043/lenovo-14w-gen-2-touchpad-does-not-work-on-linux

https://forum.mxlinux.org/viewtopic.php?t=78260&sid=9949a83f6fc6c1fb244689cfd4f7eb09&start=10

5

I very much appreciate your time.

Alright…I am a newbie, so please help me out: the link shows BIOS updates, but they’re .exe files. So I am completely lost on how I would apply these to a linux system.

6

I wonder if this might be helpful, as the Lenovo 82A2 Yoga Slim 7 14ARE05 also uses an Elan touchpad:

Edit: I just saw that you are using Gnome, not KDE, but hopefully the above solution might still apply.

1 Like
7

Taking a closer look you might have to use windoze.
Sometimes a clone like Hirens is OK, but I am not sure in this instance.
Lenovo sometimes releases firmware in bootable ISO format.
But this is just .exe … there is some possibility there are BIOS-executable files inside it, but its an involved process.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Flashing_BIOS_from_Linux#Lenovo


On that note you may find the running modules with something like

lsmod | grep -E 'elan|i2|touch|synapt'
1 Like
8

Thank you for your thoughtful reply!

1 Like
9

Thank you for your ongoing assistance…I am gonna try a few things, but it looks like I might either be forced to use a mouse, or go to Windows.

Unfortunately, I am outside of the return window…

10

Hello, I have the same laptop and a patch has been pusblished by an user on a forum for the touchpad.

You have to edit your acpi tables, after that the kernel will recognize the touchpad.

The patch :

--- dsdt.dsl.orig	2024-06-30 23:58:25.419902337 -0400
+++ dsdt.dsl	2024-07-01 00:13:43.174559656 -0400
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@
  *     Compiler ID      "INTL"
  *     Compiler Version 0x20180313 (538444563)
  */
-DefinitionBlock ("", "DSDT", 1, "LENOVO", "AMD", 0x00001000)
+DefinitionBlock ("", "DSDT", 1, "LENOVO", "AMD", 0x00001001)
 {
     External (_PR_.C000, DeviceObj)
     External (_PR_.C000.PPCV, IntObj)
@@ -7774,8 +7774,7 @@
                     })
                     Return (ConcatenateResTemplate (SBFB, SBFG))
                 }
-
-                If ((^^^PCI0.LPC0.H_EC.ECRD (RefOf (^^^PCI0.LPC0.H_EC.TPTY)) == 0x02))
+                Else
                 {
                     Name (SBFC, ResourceTemplate ()
                     {

For me the WiFi is working on Ubuntu

I can’t send a link here, there is a guide that you can find on gist.github of lamperez to load Custom ACPI Tables

11

Different Thinkpad, similar problem?

I considered other patch hacks, but I’ve been down that road too many times before, and I’d like to avoid that.

My OP: Touchpad not working on Thinkpad X1 Extreme gen 3

I have come to the conclusion that I have to switch back to X11 from Wayland.

(I still think udev is causing this, but I’m unsure how to fix it.)