Linux Mint Debian Edition 64-bit (Cinnamon) on Asus UX32VD

In this page I collect some useful resources I have found and that have helped me install Mint on this Ultrabook and fix some of the issues.

Installation (under construction)

I used this site as a guide How to dual-boot Linux Mint 13 Cinnamon/MATE and Windows 7, but sadly it didn't work completey as planned.

Fixes

Use Liquorix kernel

I had read elsewhere that the UX31 models kept randomly freezing and I experienced the same. Installation of the liquorix kernel fixed this.

Function keys

After much searching, it seems that fixing most of the Fn keys is not so difficult, but the F5 and F6 keys (monitor brightness) still don't work. My workaround was simply to have the Brightness and Lock "app" in my taskbar.

To make the rest of the Fn keys work:

  1. add the xorg-edgers repository
  2. download and install a patch of the asus-wmi module asus-wmi-dkms_0.2_all.deb

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:xorg-edgers/ppa
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install dkms
sudo dpkg -i asus-wmi-dkms_0.2_all.deb
sudo reboot

The instructions from the Ubuntu Community tell us to use the 3.4.7 kernel, but everything works fine with the 3.4.0-8.dmz.1-liquorix-amd64 kernel, which apparently is a modified 3.4.8 kernel.

Touchpad

Out-of-the-box situation is pretty bad. No right-clicking, no middule button, no left-click and drag... Installing liquorix also allowed for left-click and drag, which was not enabled before, but the rest remains unusable.

Middle button

Create a file "/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/99-middle-mouse-button.conf" and copy into it:

Section "InputClass"
Identifier "My Synaptics options"
MatchDriver "synaptics"
Option "ClickPad" "true"
Option "EmulateMidButtonTime" "0"
Option "SoftButtonAreas" "66% 0 82% 0 33% 65% 82% 0"
EndSection

Fully functional touchpad

To get everything to work properly, xorg-edgers comes to the rescue again! Once the repository has been added (see Function keys, above) just install one more packed

sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-input-synaptics

Done!

Ressources