Translation(s): none

Models covered
Chromebook Pixel Ludicrous Speed

[ATTACH]

Overall Status

Core Components

Boot Standard Kernel:

{i} (see below)

LAN network card:

{OK}

Detect hard drives:

{OK}

Extra Features

CPU Frequency Scaling

{OK}

Hibernation

[?] (not tested)

Sleep / Suspend

{OK}

Xorg

{i} (see below)

- OpenGL

{OK}

- Resize-and-Rotate(randr)

{OK}

Switch to External Screen

[?]

Touchpad and touchscreen

{i} (see below)

Wireless/Wifi

X-(

Sound

/!\

Keyboard's Hotkeys

{OK}

Legend :
{OK} = OK ; {X} Unsupported(No Driver) ; /!\ = Error (Couldn't get it working); [?] Unknown, Not Test ; [-] Not-applicable
{i} = Configuration Required; X-( = Only works with a non-free driver and or firmware

Important Notes

Installing Debian onto the Chromebook Pixel is a slightly unusual affair due to its signed bootloader, but is quite straightforward providing the instructions are followed precisely. See #Installing Debian.

Each time you boot once Debian is installed you need to press Ctrl-L when presented with the white warning screen by coreboot. SeaBIOS will then be loaded, which will load Grub. This is unavoidable (without flashing a modified version of coreboot, which requires opening the machine).

The 2015 Pixel does not have the bug in the original model where a flat battery would cause the developer mode setting to be lost along with your data.

Installing Debian

To install Debian onto the Pixel, it first must be put in Developer Mode.

After that, installation of jessie is straightforward using a USB stick. When booting the installer will complain about the video mode not being detected, chose #7 (1280x850x16 VESA). Unfortunately it won't persist this setting so you'll need to add the following lines to /etc/default/grub: 

GRUB_GFXMODE=1280x850
GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=1280x850x16

and then run update-grub before rebooting the installer. Otherwise you'll have corrupted graphics on boot.

Configuration

Display

The size of the screen isn't automatically detected, which leads to incorrect DPI assumptions. To fix that create a file called /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/90-monitor.conf containing this: 

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier  "<default monitor>"
    DisplaySize 270 180 # millimeters
EndSection

Touchpad and touchscreen

The touchpad and touchscreen both work well with the 3.12 kernel. However the driver doesn't load properly when booting, and needs to be reloaded once everything else has finished. You can automate this by adding these two lines to /etc/rc.local: 

modprobe -r chromeos_laptop
modprobe chromeos_laptop

This seems to be caused by this kernel bug, which is fixed in newer kernels.

Tap to click

If you want tap to click, you need to tell the synaptics driver about it. There will be graphical ways to do that in desktop environments, but an alternative is just to run these commands (e.g. from .xinitrc): 

synclient TapButton1=1 # one finger tap is left click
synclient TapButton2=2 # two finger tap is middle click
synclient TapButton3=3 # three finger tap is right click

Keyboard

The keyboard works fine, but Google left out some useful keys (like delete and page up, page down, home and end), and made the key that is usually caps lock into a big "search" key (that reports itself as Super_L). One way to reassign them is with xmodmap, by adding something like the following to ~/.xmodmap and running 'xmodmap ~/.xmodmap' (e.g. from .xinitrc): 

! Set Super_L (Search) key to be a Control key
remove Mod4 = Super_L
add Control = Super_L

! Set Left Control key to Mode Switch
keycode 37 = Mode_switch

! Set PgUp / PgDown / Home / End to Mode Switch (Left Control) + arrow keys
keycode 113 = Left Left Home
keycode 114 = Right Right End
keycode 111 = Up Up Prior
keycode 116 = Down Down Next

! Set Mode Switch (Left Control) + Backspace to Delete
keycode 22 = BackSpace BackSpace Delete

System Summary

lspci

lspci -nn 

00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor DRAM Controller [8086:0154] (rev 09)
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller [8086:0166] (rev 09)
00:1a.0 USB controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller #2 [8086:1e2d] (rev 04)
00:1b.0 Audio device [0403]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family High Definition Audio Controller [8086:1e20] (rev 04)
00:1c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 3 [8086:1e14] (rev c4)
00:1d.0 USB controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family USB Enhanced Host Controller #1 [8086:1e26] (rev 04)
00:1f.0 ISA bridge [0601]: Intel Corporation HM75 Express Chipset LPC Controller [8086:1e5d] (rev 04)
00:1f.2 SATA controller [0106]: Intel Corporation 7 Series Chipset Family 6-port SATA Controller [AHCI mode] [8086:1e03] (rev 04)
00:1f.3 SMBus [0c05]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family SMBus Controller [8086:1e22] (rev 04)
00:1f.6 Signal processing controller [1180]: Intel Corporation 7 Series/C210 Series Chipset Family Thermal Management Controller [8086:1e24] (rev 04)
01:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Atheros Communications Inc. AR9462 Wireless Network Adapter [168c:0034] (rev 01)

lsusb

lsusb -v | grep -E '\<(Bus|iProduct|bDeviceClass|bDeviceProtocol)' 2>/dev/null 

Bus 001 Device 002: ID 8087:0024 Intel Corp. Integrated Rate Matching Hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Single TT
  iProduct                0 
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 8087:0024 Intel Corp. Integrated Rate Matching Hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Single TT
  iProduct                0 
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
  iProduct                2 EHCI Host Controller
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
  bDeviceClass            9 Hub
  bDeviceProtocol         0 Full speed (or root) hub
  iProduct                2 EHCI Host Controller
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 2232:1033  
  bDeviceClass          239 Miscellaneous Device
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Interface Association
  iProduct                2 Chromebook HD WebCam
      (Bus Powered)
  bDeviceClass          239 Miscellaneous Device
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Interface Association
  (Bus Powered)
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 0489:e057 Foxconn / Hon Hai 
  bDeviceClass          224 Wireless
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Bluetooth
  iProduct                2 
Bus 002 Device 003: ID 05e3:0727 Genesys Logic, Inc. microSD Reader/Writer
  bDeviceClass            0 (Defined at Interface level)
  bDeviceProtocol         0 
  iProduct                4 USB Storage
      (Bus Powered)
  bDeviceClass            0 (Defined at Interface level)
  bDeviceProtocol         0 
  (Bus Powered)
Bus 002 Device 004: ID 1410:9010 Novatel Wireless 
  bDeviceClass          239 Miscellaneous Device
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Interface Association
  iProduct                3 Novatel Wireless 4G
  bDeviceClass          239 Miscellaneous Device
  bDeviceProtocol         1 Interface Association

USB Host controllers entries (without OHCI, UHCI, EHCI) are removed too.

Resources

Attachments

Some configuration files and sample outputs.

Credits

CategoryLaptopComputer