Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 7)
The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon, 7th generation is an ultrabook introduced in early 2019. It features a 14" screen, 8th-gen Intel Core processors and integrated Intel UHD 620 graphics.
To ensure you have this version, install the package dmidecode and run:
# sudo dmidecode -s system-version ThinkPad X1 Carbon 7th
Device | Working | Modules |
Intel graphics | Yes | i915, (intel_agp) |
Wireless network | Yes | iwlmvm |
Native Ethernet with included dongle | Yes | ? |
Mobile broadband Fibocom | No¹ | ? |
Audio | Yes | snd_hda_intel |
Microphone | Partial⁴ | snd_hda_intel |
Touchpad | Yes | psmouse, rmi_smbus, i2c_i801 |
TrackPoint | Yes | psmouse, rmi_smbus, i2c_i801 |
Camera | Yes | uvcvideo |
Fingerprint reader | No² | ? |
Power management | Yes³ | ? |
Bluetooth | Yes | btusb |
Keyboard backlight | Yes | thinkpad_acpi |
Function/Multimedia keys | Yes | ? |
|
Contents
Hardware
Additional hardware information from lsusb
and lspci
can be found bellow when using the linux kernel 5.2.7:
lsusb
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub Bus 003 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub Bus 001 Device 003: ID 06cb:00bd Synaptics, Inc. Bus 001 Device 002: ID 04f2:b67c Chicony Electronics Co., Ltd Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
lspci
00:00.0 Host bridge: Intel Corporation Device 3e34 (rev 0c) 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation UHD Graphics 620 (Whiskey Lake) (rev 02) 00:04.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v5/E3-1500 v5/6th Gen Core Processor Thermal Subsystem (rev 0c) 00:08.0 System peripheral: Intel Corporation Xeon E3-1200 v5/v6 / E3-1500 v5 / 6th/7th Gen Core Processor Gaussian Mixture Model 00:12.0 Signal processing controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP Thermal Controller (rev 11) 00:14.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP USB 3.1 xHCI Controller (rev 11) 00:14.2 RAM memory: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP Shared SRAM (rev 11) 00:14.3 Network controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP CNVi [Wireless-AC] (rev 11) 00:15.0 Serial bus controller [0c80]: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP Serial IO I2C Controller #0 (rev 11) 00:15.1 Serial bus controller [0c80]: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP Serial IO I2C Controller #1 (rev 11) 00:16.0 Communication controller: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP MEI Controller #1 (rev 11) 00:1d.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP PCI Express Root Port #9 (rev f1) 00:1d.4 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP PCI Express Root Port #13 (rev f1) 00:1f.0 ISA bridge: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP LPC Controller (rev 11) 00:1f.3 Audio device: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP High Definition Audio Controller (rev 11) 00:1f.4 SMBus: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP SMBus Controller (rev 11) 00:1f.5 Serial bus controller [0c80]: Intel Corporation Cannon Point-LP SPI Controller (rev 11) 00:1f.6 Ethernet controller: Intel Corporation Ethernet Connection (6) I219-V (rev 11) 03:00.0 Non-Volatile memory controller: Sandisk Corp WD Black 2018/PC SN720 NVMe SSD 05:00.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02) 06:00.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02) 06:01.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02) 06:02.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02) 06:04.0 PCI bridge: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02) 07:00.0 System peripheral: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 NHI (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02) 2d:00.0 USB controller: Intel Corporation JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 USB Controller (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] (rev 02)
BIOS
The most convenient way to install Arch Linux is by disabling "Secure Boot" Security -> Secure Boot - Set to "Disabled"
. However it is possible to self-sign your kernel and boot with it enabled. For further information have a look at the Secure Boot article.
In case your efivars
are not properly set it is most likely due to you not being booted into UEFI. Should the problem persist be sure to consult the UEFI#UEFI variables section.
Updates
Automatic (Linux Vendor Firmware Service)
In August of 2018 Lenovo has joined the Linux Vendor Firmware Service (LVFS) project, which enables firmware updates from within the OS. BIOS updates (and possibly other firmware such as the Thunderbolt controller) can be queried for and installed through fwupd. Currently, there is one small BIOS update available through fwupd.
Manual (fwupdmgr)
Lenovo may in the future provide cabinet files that can be directly installed with fwupdmgr.
Check for Linux .cab
files from the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon (Gen 7) driver website.
- Make sure the AC adapter is firmly connected to the target computer.
- Launch Terminal.
- Move to the directory where the cabinet file was placed.
- Run
fwupdmgr install xxxxxxxx.cab
to schedule firmware update. - Restart the system.
- The computer will be restarted and the UEFI BIOS will be updated.
Enabling S3
To enable S3 support, make sure you go into the BIOS configuration, and Config -> Power -> Sleep State - Set to "Linux"
. This should make S3 available. To verify, after making the changes in the BIOS configuration, boot into Linux, and run the dmesg
command again to make sure that S3 is now available.
Verifying S3
To check whether S3 is recognized and usable by Linux, run:
dmesg | grep -i "acpi: (supports"
and check for S3
in the list.
S3 Suspend Bug with Bluetooth Devices
Occasionally your Thinkpad will wake up immediately after suspending with certain bluetooth devices added. To prevent this, remove the devices or disable bluetooth before suspending.
BIOS configurations
-
Config -> Thunderbolt BIOS Assist Mode - Set to "Enabled"
. When disabled, on Linux, power usage appears to be significantly higher because of a substantial number of CPU wakeups during s2idle.
Power management/Throttling issues
Due to wrong configured power management registers the CPU may consume a lot less power than under windows and the thermal throttling occurs at 80°C (97°C when using Windows, see T480s throttling bug).
There is a post in the official Lenovo forum to inform Lenovo about this issue.
Throttling fix
throttled replaces lenovo-throttling-fix-gitAUR[broken link: package not found] used previously. Install throttled, then run
sudo systemctl enable --now lenovo_fix.service
Touchpad fix
The touchpad works fine out of the box, except that TLP does not detect that the Synaptics Touchpad is indeed an input device, so it does not exclude it from the USB_AUTOSUSPEND feature. You can tell that this is the issue if the touchpad works for just a moment after waking up from suspend, and then stops working again.
The fix is to add the touchpad to the USB_BLACKLIST in TLP's config:
USB_BLACKLIST="06cb:00bd" <=========== use lsusb to get the correct UUID
Volume Controls
In order for volume controls to work correctly you must edit /usr/share/pulseaudio/alsa-mixer/paths/analog-output.conf.common
by adding the following above [Element PCM]
:
[Element Master] switch = mute volume = ignore
A PulseAudio restart is required for this change to take affect. Make sure to increase the "Master" channel volume to 100% for the top-firing speakers to work (using amixer or alsamixer, found in alsa-utils).
Persistent fix
Upgrading or reinstalling pulseaudio will overwrite this file, and pulseaudio does not offer another way to make this configuration change. To prevent pacman from overwriting the file, add the following line under `[options]` in `/etc/pacman.conf`:
NoUpgrade = usr/share/pulseaudio/alsa-mixer/paths/analog-output.conf.common
Disabling red LED in ThinkPad logo
To disable the red LED in the ThinkPad logo on the cover:
1. Enable writing to the embedded controller registers by adding the kernel parameter ec_sys.write_support=1
.
If you use UEFI boot, you can add this parameter in /boot/efi/loader/entries/arch.conf
under "options".
2. Then, you can disable directly the LED with this command:
# echo -n -e "\x0a" | sudo dd of="/sys/kernel/debug/ec/ec0/io" bs=1 seek=12 count=1 conv=notrunc 2> /dev/null
To disable the LED at startup, you can create a systemd service:
1. Create a sh script (/root/disable_led.sh for instance) and put this :
#!/bin/bash echo -n -e "\x0a" | dd of="/sys/kernel/debug/ec/ec0/io" bs=1 seek=12 count=1 conv=notrunc 2> /dev/null
2. Create a new service unit file in {{ic|/etc/systemd/system} called "led.service", and insert the following:
Description=Disabling thinkpad led [Service] ExecStart=/root/disable_led.sh [Install] WantedBy=multi-user.target
3. Start and enable this service:
# systemctl start led.service # systemctl enable led.service
Additional resources
- ThinkWiki X1 Carbon 7th Gen page
- Dell XPS 13 9370 quirks: Some pointers on getting Watt usage down to ~2W, Intel video powersaving features might be interesting, see also the Intel graphics page for interesting power-saving options.
- Intel Blog: Best practice to debug Linux* suspend/hibernate issues, including the pm-graph tool to analyze power usage during suspend
- How to fix volume control (ALSA problem) This is where the volume fix came from originally.