agora touchpad
If you followed the post on this site where I explained how to enable the touchpad on your kogan agora netbook (http://agoranetbook.kayno.net/2009/04/25/oh-my-touchpad-doesnt-work/), you (as well as Josh) have probably found that every time the linux kernel is updated, your touchpad stops working until you add the i8042.nomux option back to your grub menu.lst file.
I have however found a way to solve this, and have just updated my netbook with Ubuntu Netbook Remix to the latest kernel (2.6.28-14) without losing my touchpad. Here is what you need to do:
In your terminal:
sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst
First, remove all instances of i8042.nomux that you have previously added. Now you need to find the line where the kernel options are set – “# kopt=…”. Mine looked something like this:
# kopt=root=UUID=4f3de232-2543-4359-43e2-a2ea36ef4043 ro
And add i8042.nomux to the end of line:
# kopt=root=UUID=4f3de232-2543-4359-43e2-a2ea36ef4043 ro i8042.nomux
Whilst it might be tempting to remove the # from the beginning of the line, don’t – it clearly states in menu.lst: “DO NOT UNCOMMENT THEM, Just edit them to your needs”.
Save and close menu.lst, and finally you need to run the update-grub command. This will take the kernel options (including i8042.nomux) and add them to all the kernel boot lines:
sudo update-grub
Searching for GRUB installation directory ... found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file ... found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file ... found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image ... none found, skipping ...
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-14-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/memtest86+.bin
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst ... done
If you check /boot/grub/menu.lst now, you will see that i8042.nomux is back as a boot option for each kernel, however it still remains as a default kernel option (on the “# kopt” line). As it is a default kernel option, every time you update your kernel, the option will be added to the boot options for the new kernel.
Now your touchpad should always respond to your finger tips – even after a kernel update!
Hi Kayno -
For some reason my kernels are not updated with the i8042.nomux line even though your instructions occurred correctly. Here is my entry in the menu.1st file:
# kopt=root=UUID=470a8046-cbaf-4805-bdcc-d455abf1abb5 ro i8042.nomux
“sudo update-grub
Searching for GRUB installation directory … found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file … found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file … found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image … none found, skipping …
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-14-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/memtest86+.bin
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst … done”‘
Any ideas?
Hi Travis
I have just updated my kogan to the latest kernel – 2.6.28-15 – and I had no problems. My grub config was updated for the new kernel, and included the i8042.nomux option.
One thing i did notice – the option is not added to the end of the boot line, but somewhere in the middle now. Perhaps you were expecting it to be on the end of the line, and did not see it in the middle?
Did you try rebooting after a kernel update to see if the touchpad worked?
Cheers
Kayne
Hmmm… how to do this on 9.10 Karmic, which uses Grub 2? /boot/grub/menu.lst is an empty file!
Mike
Edit /etc/default/grub
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=”quiet splash”
to
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT=”quiet splash i8042.nomux”
then update grub
sudo update-grub2
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@ Mike Brown
try /boot/grub/grub.cfg
you can edit this
Hi there, do you already have a solution for ubuntu 10.4? touchpad does not work again, I tried your instructions for 9.10 butno luck- I have no clue about linux, would need step by step instructions. Thanks heaps Steph
Yeah the fact that this isn’t updated anymore is really frustrating. 10.04 has been out for months now and neither the Kogan site or this blog has updates for new Agora users or linux updaters. Am forced to use an external mouse which makes my netbook much less portable than it should be.
Nickamc – check out http://agoranetbook.kayno.net/2010/07/23/upgrading-ubuntu-10-04-to-grub-2/. Hopefully it has something that will help you, otherwise get back to me and I’ll see if I can help some more.
Steph – check out http://agoranetbook.kayno.net/2010/07/23/upgrading-ubuntu-10-04-to-grub-2/. Hopefully it has something that will help you, otherwise get back to me and I’ll see if I can help some more.
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