Re: Ubuntu on Dell Xps 15 9550 new Infinity display (i7 6gen 16gbr UHD 4k touch

[jchedstrom]

Haven't heard of anyone else doing this so I took the risk and purchased the Dell XPS 15 (9550) with the FHD 1920x1080 matt display, Intel Skylake i7-6700HQ, 512GB PCIe SSD, 16GB DDR4, 84Wh battery. My experience is that usually Dell's have pretty good Ubuntu support, though Optimus can be a pain. The summary is that it does NOT automatically work with Ubuntu 15.10. Some tweaking is necessary but not too bad. Here are my experiences and instructions to get it to work with a UEFI install.

0) Might not be necessary but did the following:

BIOS > Secure Boot > Disabled

1) The PCIe hard drive won't be recognized by live Ubuntu 15.10 by default. Change RAID to AHCI. When it works it will appear as /dev/nvme0n1.

BIOS>System Configuration>SATA Operation> switch RAID to AHCI

2) Random freezes will happen with the live Ubuntu 15.10. Symptoms are random freezes and infinite errors, something like the following: nouveau PFIFO SCHED_ERROR. Fix by pressing 'e' on grub menu during boot and add "nouveau.modeset=0" to the end of the line starting with "linux". Now boot live disk by pressing F10.

3) Touchpad might not work. For some reason it worked for me the first time and then never again. Easiest is to use a USB mouse temporarily. There's a fix for after install is finished.

4) Install should now work smoothly.

5) Reboot. Dell SupportAssist reports a failing component. "Error Code 2000-0151, Validation 106575, Hard Drive 1 incorrect status = 8000000000000003". Ignore this. Go into bios and setup the correct boot option.

There might be an automatically provided option to select under boot options. Otherwise manually set it up. BIOS>General>Boot Sequence > Add Boot Option > ubuntu > shimx64.efi (\EFI\ubuntu\shimx64.efi)

6) Try booting, but make sure you press SHIFT repeatedly during boot to get to grub menu. Repeat step (2) above.

7) On first successful boot edit /etc/default/grub, GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash nouveau.modeset=0". Then run "sudo update-grub". Now won't need to manually change grub settings on every boot.

8) Fix touchpad problem. Apparently the wrong kernel module (driver) is loaded. It's loading i2c_hid instead of i2c_designware_*.

lsmod | grep i2c #check what's loaded
echo "blacklist i2c_hid" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
#apparently just blacklisting isn't good enough, for me it was also hiding in initramfs
sudo depmod -a
sudo update-initramfs -u
reboot

9) Graphics will be weird and flaky. The Nvidia drivers in the standard repositories are also a bit too old and will be flaky. I found that the new graphics-driver PPA worked well. Didn't try downloading from Nvidia directly. Bumblebee didn't work for me, giving a black screen, so Nvidia PRIME is recommended.

sudo apt-get purge nvida-*
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:graphics-drivers/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install nvidia-355 nvidia-prime
sudo service lightdm restart


10) Add an indicator so you can tell whether Intel or Nvidia is being used.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install prime-indicator
prime-indicator

Tested and working:

- webcam works seemlessly, good color and resolution, but HORRIBLE un-useable placement at bottom of screen
- Cheese and Skype worked with webcam, Google Chrome PPA with Google Hangeouts didn't work
- speakers are a big step up from my Lenovo T430s

Remaining weird behavior not solved yet:

- HDMI output not always detected with Intel or Nvidia, hopefully small bug that will be fixed soon (VGA dongle working fine)
- laptop mic not detected by system, my headphone mic doesn't work either, probably a minor Ubuntu 15.10 bug and not a laptop driver issue
---- seems to work with Kernel v4.3
- bluetooth doesn't detect my external speaker, driver bug that should be fixed soon, I think it's related to this: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...z/+bug/1448566
- suspend/resume results in black screen
---- @parallelo fixed by installing kernel v4.3
- occasionally touchpad cursor jumps down/left because of using thumb for left-clicks, this shouldn't happen, probably some manual tweaks can fix this
- slow touchpad acceleration, system settings insufficient, need some manual tweaks
- login screen hangs until wifi connects
- both Intel and Nvidia are tearing, system is useable though, hopefully will improve over time with driver updates
- Sometimes switching graphics with 'nvidia-settings' doesn't work. Sometimes 'nvidia-select' works. My guess is that there is a minor Nvidia bug that will soon be fixed
- boot takes a long time, 20 seconds (old Lenovo 430s only took 10 seconds), i think this is just the slow Dell post

Otherwise the system seems to be woraking well. No crashing/freezing issues which is great. Hopefully this guide will save others a few hours (or days!) of pain. Please post your improvements/updates to this procedure to help us all out!

[andrewmatta]

@jchedstrom - registered just to thank you This is exactly what I was looking for before deciding if I should buy that machine - exactly the configuration I'd go with too. Thank you for going through the work to figure things out - should be a real time saver.

If it's not too much trouble, do you have any information on battery life, and does the laptop seem to run cool and quiet enough in Linux? I used to have a dual-graphics laptop before that ran cool in Windows, but would burn up in Linux no matter what power/processor/video settings I tried, but that those were AMD cards.

[Scott Deagan]

Many thanks jchedstrom. I'm still undecided. I currently have the Dell M3800 and can install Linux in around 30 minutes without any problems. I'm still leaning toward this XPS 9550 as I haven't seen any other Skylake laptops out there that are viable options.

[astroman3001gt]

Thanks for the fantastic info jchedstrom. It is really helpful. I am also still undecided. Did you try to connect the laptop to an external monitor / projector?

Edit: BTW, did you have any problems with the wifi card?

[l1fe]

I've been having a terrible time trying to get Dual Boot up and running. What I've done so far:

1. Reinstalled Windows 10 using an OEM disk and resized partitions
2. Set SATA mode to ACHI
3. Turned off SecureBoot (but kept UEFI mode)
4. Started the install of Xubuntu with nomodeset option
5. sudo gparted /dev/nvme0n1 my partitions for custom /, /home, /var, etc (had to use GParted because the install would freeze when trying to format /home)
6. Finally clicked install and it's stuck on "Saving installed packages..."

Did you have to do anything special? How long did the install take? I'm waiting on 25 minutes and it's still just chilling. Running a separate terminal and nothing is really running in top...

[UPDATE]
It looks like a lot of this is related to https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...ty/+bug/875343

I did NOT mount a separate /var directory and I was able to move on. Just as an FYI, I had to set the Install Bootloader path to /dev/nvme0n1 since there's a known bug about the Ubuntu install not selecting the correct partition.

[shamil.si]

Hi @jchedstrom

Thanks for nice guide. I'm facing 2 problems right now.
- Suspend doesn't work
- If I reboot the computer the BIOS doesn't detect the SSD drive. Only If I do full power-off and power-on the SSD got detected

Did you experience similar problems?

[parallelo]

@jchedstrom and friends - Thanks to all for the very useful tips. Much appreciated!

After going through those steps in a UEFI dual-boot setup, I'm hitting a couple issues. The main one is this:

After the install, Ubuntu booted perfectly, once. But, every successive boot has given the "Dell SupportAssist Error Code: 2000-0151" that you mentioned in your post. I'm not able to ignore this error because it forces an immediate reboot after pressing "Continue." So, I have not been able to get back into Ubuntu.

• Any idea what causes this?
• Did it only happen to you once?
• How did you get around it?

Thanks again!

[parallelo]

Just a quick update.. My guess is that the Dell error message simply means is that it couldn't find the .efi path that was specified in the BIOS. I just took another look and I can no longer find any \EFI\ubuntu\shimx64.efi. Still investigating...

[parallelo]

Just wanted to thank @jchedstrom again for the really useful tips! Well done!

I had to use boot-repair to get a functioning system, but now I'm writing this post from a Ubuntu 15.10 partition on a new XPS 15

[rocco5]

I purchased this exact system with the only intention of installing either ubuntu or opensuse leap. Your post is 100% the reason why I have linux running after days of bashing my face on the desk. I wanted to add to your awesome post a few extras that gave me a working trackpad and video immediately. I'll start by confirming what exactly worked for me.

1. BIOS SETTINGS
-AHCI was a must.
-Under Performance - C-STATEs - OFF
-Virtualization Support - Disabled both options
-System Configuration - USB/Thunderbolt Configuration - Always Allow Dell Docks - Disabled (unchecked)
-I also disabled the webcam.
-Auto OS Recovery Threshold - OFF
-Bios recover from hard drive and downgrade both unchecked
-Fastboot set to minimal

2. To install from live disk the setting nouveau.modeset=0 was a must.

3. I installed kbuntu via live disk. I chose kbuntu for plasma 5 and my familiarity to opensuse using plasma 5. Using kbuntu I had exactly the same issues as the instructions for ubuntu. However, by making more changes int he bios I was able to both break the track-pad and fix it.
4. I tried adding the nouvea.modeset=0 to the grub file, however sudo update-grub yielded an error. Luckily, I'm able to boot without issue after a serious of updates, one of which was the system detected a better nvidia driver, occurred.

So far, system is working perfectly for the last 5 hours. Power management is working, even though I disabled C-States. I never received any hard drive erros, slowness, screen tearing, or trouble with the above settings (I did run sudo apt-get update somewhere in the mix).


I apologize for not putting together the cleanest post. However, I wanted to get my thoughts out before I forgot them and also further help anyone make the decision to purchase this awesome Dell XPS 9550 and run ubuntu on it.

**** Special thanks to jchedstrom **** because without your post I would still be bashing my face on the desk, and by now on the walls and floor. The nouveau.modeset=0 was the exact piece of information that saved the next week of my life. Thank you!

Haven't heard of anyone else doing this so I took the risk and purchased the Dell XPS 15 (9550) with the FHD 1920x1080 matt display, Intel Skylake i7-6700HQ, 512GB PCIe SSD, 16GB DDR4, 84Wh battery. My experience is that usually Dell's have pretty good Ubuntu support, though Optimus can be a pain. The summary is that it does NOT automatically work with Ubuntu 15.10. Some tweaking is necessary but not too bad. Here are my experiences and instructions to get it to work with a UEFI install.

0) Might not be necessary but did the following:

BIOS > Secure Boot > Disabled

1) The PCIe hard drive won't be recognized by live Ubuntu 15.10 by default. Change RAID to AHCI. When it works it will appear as /dev/nvme0n1.

BIOS>System Configuration>SATA Operation> switch RAID to AHCI

2) Random freezes will happen with the live Ubuntu 15.10. Symptoms are random freezes and infinite errors, something like the following: nouveau PFIFO SCHED_ERROR. Fix by pressing 'e' on grub menu during boot and add "nouveau.modeset=0" to the end of the line starting with "linux". Now boot live disk by pressing F10.

3) Touchpad might not work. For some reason it worked for me the first time and then never again. Easiest is to use a USB mouse temporarily. There's a fix for after install is finished.

4) Install should now work smoothly.

5) Reboot. Dell SupportAssist reports a failing component. "Error Code 2000-0151, Validation 106575, Hard Drive 1 incorrect status = 8000000000000003". Ignore this. Go into bios and setup the correct boot option.

There might be an automatically provided option to select under boot options. Otherwise manually set it up. BIOS>General>Boot Sequence > Add Boot Option > ubuntu > shimx64.efi (\EFI\ubuntu\shimx64.efi)

6) Try booting, but make sure you press SHIFT repeatedly during boot to get to grub menu. Repeat step (2) above.

7) On first successful boot edit /etc/default/grub, GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash nouveau.modeset=0". Then run "sudo update-grub". Now won't need to manually change grub settings on every boot.

8) Fix touchpad problem. Apparently the wrong kernel module (driver) is loaded. It's loading i2c_hid instead of i2c_designware_*.

lsmod | grep i2c #check what's loaded
echo "blacklist i2c_hid" | sudo tee -a /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf
#apparently just blacklisting isn't good enough, for me it was also hiding in initramfs
sudo depmod -a
sudo update-initramfs -u
reboot

9) Graphics will be weird and flaky. The Nvidia drivers in the standard repositories are also a bit too old and will be flaky. I found that the new graphics-driver PPA worked well. Didn't try downloading from Nvidia directly. Bumblebee didn't work for me, giving a black screen, so Nvidia PRIME is recommended.

sudo apt-get purge nvida-*
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:graphics-drivers/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install nvidia-355 nvidia-prime
sudo service lightdm restart


10) Add an indicator so you can tell whether Intel or Nvidia is being used.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/webupd8
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install prime-indicator
prime-indicator

Tested and working:

- webcam works seemlessly, good color and resolution, but HORRIBLE un-useable placement at bottom of screen
- Cheese and Skype worked with webcam, Google Chrome PPA with Google Hangeouts didn't work
- speakers are a big step up from my Lenovo T430s

Remaining weird behavior not solved yet:

- HDMI output not always detected with Intel or Nvidia, hopefully small bug that will be fixed soon (VGA dongle working fine)
- laptop mic not detected by system, my headphone mic doesn't work either, probably a minor Ubuntu 15.10 bug and not a laptop driver issue
---- seems to work with Kernel v4.3
- bluetooth doesn't detect my external speaker, driver bug that should be fixed soon, I think it's related to this: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+s...z/+bug/1448566
- suspend/resume results in black screen
---- @parallelo fixed by installing kernel v4.3
- occasionally touchpad cursor jumps down/left because of using thumb for left-clicks, this shouldn't happen, probably some manual tweaks can fix this
- slow touchpad acceleration, system settings insufficient, need some manual tweaks
- login screen hangs until wifi connects
- both Intel and Nvidia are tearing, system is useable though, hopefully will improve over time with driver updates
- Sometimes switching graphics with 'nvidia-settings' doesn't work. Sometimes 'nvidia-select' works. My guess is that there is a minor Nvidia bug that will soon be fixed
- boot takes a long time, 20 seconds (old Lenovo 430s only took 10 seconds), i think this is just the slow Dell post

Otherwise the system seems to be woraking well. No crashing/freezing issues which is great. Hopefully this guide will save others a few hours (or days!) of pain. Please post your improvements/updates to this procedure to help us all out!