Thinkpad Keyboard II - bluetooth pairing and special keys issues

Support
,
1

I got an external ThinkPad Trackpoint Keyboard II and connected it to my Thinkpad T495 via a USB dongle without any issues (the keyboard has a bluetooth mode and a 2.4GHz mode). When I try to pair it in the bluetooth setting, blueman sees the keyboard, but I get the “pairing failed” message. I’m not sure how to diagnose the problem. Could anyone help me or give me suggestions as to how I can further diagnose this? My inxi output is below.

The other issue I have is with special keys - has anyone been successful in getting all of them to work on a Thinkpad Keyboard IIh F1-F3 and F5-F7 equivalents (sound, brightness, etc) work, but F4 or F8-F12 do not. I tried xev and these keys don’t even seem to register anything. I would appreciate any leads or advice as to how to fix that (I was especially hoping to get F4/mic mute and F10/bluetooth toggle to work. I should add that the same keys work on my internal Thinkpad keyboard, where they have the same layout.

My inxi:

System:
  Kernel: 5.10.23-1-MANJARO x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 10.2.0 
  Desktop: Xfce 4.16.0 tk: Gtk 3.24.24 info: xfce4-panel, plank wm: xfwm4 
  vt: 7 dm: LightDM 1.30.0 Distro: Manjaro Linux base: Arch Linux 
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: LENOVO product: 20NJ0002US v: ThinkPad T495 
  serial: <filter> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <filter> 
  Mobo: LENOVO model: 20NJ0002US serial: <filter> UEFI-[Legacy]: LENOVO 
  v: R12ET34W(1.04 ) date: 04/19/2019 
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT0 charge: 34.3 Wh (79.6%) condition: 43.1/50.5 Wh (85.5%) 
  volts: 12.3 min: 11.5 model: SMP 02DL008 type: Li-poly serial: <filter> 
  status: Unknown cycles: 400 
  Device-1: hid-0003:17EF:60EE.0009-battery 
  model: Lenovo TrackPoint Keyboard II serial: N/A charge: N/A status: N/A 
Memory:
  RAM: total: 21.14 GiB used: 6.78 GiB (32.1%) 
  RAM Report: 
  permissions: Unable to run dmidecode. Root privileges required. 
CPU:
  Info: Quad Core model: AMD Ryzen 5 PRO 3500U w/ Radeon Vega Mobile Gfx 
  bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Zen/Zen+ note: check rev: 1 cache: L2: 2 MiB 
  bogomips: 33550 
  Speed: 1222 MHz min/max: 1400/2100 MHz boost: enabled Core speeds (MHz): 
  1: 1222 2: 1222 3: 1396 4: 1397 5: 1394 6: 1397 7: 1222 8: 1219 
  Flags: 3dnowprefetch abm adx aes aperfmperf apic arat avic avx avx2 bmi1 
  bmi2 bpext clflush clflushopt clzero cmov cmp_legacy constant_tsc cpb 
  cpuid cr8_legacy cx16 cx8 de decodeassists extapic extd_apicid f16c 
  flushbyasid fma fpu fsgsbase fxsr fxsr_opt ht hw_pstate ibpb irperf 
  lahf_lm lbrv lm mca mce misalignsse mmx mmxext monitor movbe msr mtrr 
  mwaitx nonstop_tsc nopl npt nrip_save nx osvw overflow_recov pae pat 
  pausefilter pclmulqdq pdpe1gb perfctr_core perfctr_llc perfctr_nb 
  pfthreshold pge pni popcnt pse pse36 rdrand rdseed rdtscp rep_good sep sev 
  sev_es sha_ni skinit smap smca sme smep ssbd sse sse2 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a 
  ssse3 succor svm svm_lock syscall tce topoext tsc tsc_scale 
  v_vmsave_vmload vgif vmcb_clean vme vmmcall wdt xgetbv1 xsave xsavec 
  xsaveerptr xsaveopt xsaves 
Graphics:
  Device-1: AMD Picasso vendor: Lenovo driver: amdgpu v: kernel 
  bus-ID: 06:00.0 chip-ID: 1002:15d8 class-ID: 0300 
  Device-2: Chicony Integrated Camera (1280x720@30) type: USB 
  driver: uvcvideo bus-ID: 4-2.1:4 chip-ID: 04f2:b604 class-ID: 0e02 
  serial: <filter> 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.10 driver: loaded: modesetting 
  alternate: ati,fbdev,vesa resolution: 1920x1080~60Hz s-dpi: 96 
  OpenGL: renderer: AMD Radeon Vega 8 Graphics (RAVEN DRM 3.40.0 
  5.10.23-1-MANJARO LLVM 11.1.0) 
  v: 4.6 Mesa 20.3.4 direct render: Yes 
Audio:
  Device-1: AMD Raven/Raven2/Fenghuang HDMI/DP Audio vendor: Lenovo 
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 06:00.1 chip-ID: 1002:15de 
  class-ID: 0403 
  Device-2: AMD Raven/Raven2/FireFlight/Renoir Audio Processor 
  vendor: Lenovo driver: N/A bus-ID: 06:00.5 chip-ID: 1022:15e2 
  class-ID: 0480 
  Device-3: AMD Family 17h HD Audio vendor: Lenovo driver: snd_hda_intel 
  v: kernel bus-ID: 06:00.6 chip-ID: 1022:15e3 class-ID: 0403 
  Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.10.23-1-MANJARO running: yes 
  Sound Server-2: JACK v: 0.125.0 running: no 
  Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 14.2 running: yes 
  Sound Server-4: PipeWire v: 0.3.23 running: yes 
Network:
  Device-1: Intel Wireless-AC 9260 driver: iwlwifi v: kernel bus-ID: 01:00.0 
  chip-ID: 8086:2526 class-ID: 0280 
  IF: wlp1s0 state: up mac: <filter> 
  IP v4: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global 
  broadcast: <filter> 
  IP v6: <filter> type: noprefixroute scope: link 
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet 
  vendor: Lenovo driver: r8169 v: kernel port: 3400 bus-ID: 03:00.0 
  chip-ID: 10ec:8168 class-ID: 0200 
  IF: enp3s0f0 state: down mac: <filter> 
  Device-3: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet 
  vendor: Lenovo driver: r8169 v: kernel port: 2000 bus-ID: 04:00.0 
  chip-ID: 10ec:8168 class-ID: 0200 
  IF: enp4s0 state: down mac: <filter> 
  WAN IP: <filter> 
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Intel Wireless-AC 9260 Bluetooth Adapter type: USB driver: btusb 
  v: 0.8 bus-ID: 4-1:10 chip-ID: 8087:0025 class-ID: e001 
  Report: This feature requires one of these tools: hciconfig/bt-adapter 
Logical:
  Message: No LVM data was found. 
RAID:
  Message: No RAID data was found. 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 476.94 GiB used: 99.01 GiB (20.8%) 
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Samsung model: MZVLB512HBJQ-000L7 
  size: 476.94 GiB speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 rotation: SSD serial: <filter> 
  rev: 3L2QEXF7 temp: 37.9 C scheme: MBR 
  Message: No Optical or Floppy data was found. 
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 468.45 GiB used: 99.01 GiB (21.1%) fs: ext4 
  dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1 label: N/A uuid: 3ad07520-f46a-4231-97b3-a1860800622a 
Swap:
  Alert: No Swap data was found. 
Unmounted:
  Message: No Unmounted partitions found. 
USB:
  Hub-1: 1-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 1 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-2: 2-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 4 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Device-1: 2-3:5 info: Lenovo TrackPoint Keyboard II 
  type: Keyboard,Mouse,HID driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 3 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 12 Mb/s power: 100mA chip-ID: 17ef:60ee class-ID: 0300 
  Hub-3: 3-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 4 rev: 3.1 
  speed: 10 Gb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0003 class-ID: 0900 
  Hub-4: 4-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 2 rev: 2.0 
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900 
  Device-1: 4-1:10 info: Intel Wireless-AC 9260 Bluetooth Adapter 
  type: Bluetooth driver: btusb interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s 
  power: 100mA chip-ID: 8087:0025 class-ID: e001 
  Hub-5: 4-2:3 info: Genesys Logic Hub ports: 4 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s 
  power: 100mA chip-ID: 05e3:0610 class-ID: 0900 
  Device-1: 4-2.1:4 info: Chicony Integrated Camera (1280x720@30) 
  type: Video driver: uvcvideo interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s 
  power: 500mA chip-ID: 04f2:b604 class-ID: 0e02 serial: <filter> 
  Device-2: 4-2.4:5 info: Synaptics Prometheus MIS Touch Fingerprint Reader 
  type: <vendor specific> driver: N/A interfaces: 1 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s 
  power: 100mA chip-ID: 06cb:00bd class-ID: ff00 serial: <filter> 
  Hub-6: 5-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 1 rev: 3.1 
  speed: 10 Gb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0003 class-ID: 0900 
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 64.0 C mobo: 0.0 C gpu: amdgpu temp: 64.0 C 
  Fan Speeds (RPM): cpu: 0 
Info:
  Processes: 322 Uptime: 4d 2h 25m wakeups: 311 Init: systemd v: 247 
  Compilers: gcc: 10.2.0 Packages: 1624 pacman: 1620 snap: 4 Shell: Bash 
  v: 5.1.0 running-in: xfce4-terminal inxi: 3.3.03
2

I followed the blueman debugging instructions and here is what I get when run blueman-applet --loglevel debug and try to pair the keyboard (and I get the pairing failed notification):

blueman-applet 21.35.58 DEBUG    Base:74 do_g_properties_changed: /org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_4D_E8_D6_A6_5C {'Connected': False}
blueman-manager 21.35.59 ERROR    Manager:201 error_handler:  Authentication Canceled
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/lib/python3.9/site-packages/blueman/bluez/Base.py", line 81, in callback
    value = proxy.call_finish(result).unpack()
gi.repository.GLib.GError: g-io-error-quark: GDBus.Error:org.bluez.Error.AuthenticationCanceled: Authentication Canceled (36)
blueman-applet 21.35.59 DEBUG    Base:74 do_g_properties_changed: /org/bluez/hci0/dev_E4_4D_E8_D6_A6_5C {'Connected': True}

I tried googling parts of it, but I don’t understand what’s going on. Could someone help me?

3

Hi, writing to follow up that bluetooth started working as of Oct 2021, but middle button scrolling seems to be disabled (middle button clicks work, opening new tabs, for instance). Anyone having the same issue or any ideas how to deal with this?

4

Hi, I have the same issue with my external ThinkPad Trackpoint Keyboard II working only with the wifi dongle (on a Thinkpad P15s Gen 2). Recognized on Bluetooth with strong signal but not working and disconnects after a few seconds. Did you do anything that would explain how it started to work for you?

On the other hand the middle button scrolling works fine for me (wifi-dongle).