Hi guys!
So…I bought a Latitude 7350 detachable laptop, as a replacement for a Surface where the cams don’t work on Linux. This laptop seemed rather powerful and compatible, while still keeping the weight constrained (something the Minisforum V3 isn’t as successful in). Also, I prefer the rear being a stand thingy like on the Surface, and not some detachable flap you need to turn about 150 degrees to turn it into a mandatory stand (because when closed…it blocks the intake fans).
Anyway…Seems that while the camera module IPU6 is meant to be supported on Linux…I don’t seem to be able to get any image. Any ideas what I might be doing wrong? I installed KDE Neon (I’d prefer a KDE-based distro) and installed intel-ipu6-dkms and intel-usbio-dkms. But the camera doesn’t seem to work. Any ideas how could I troubleshoot this?
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Run a scan to share what does and doesn’t work on your machine so that others can see. Don’t worry about it. This is a good thing for everyone and not some exploit. Check if others have scanned with the same hardware. Look at what kernel they are running and if it has the same problem or notes. You may see the hardware label and find other machines with the same that may or may not be working.
Thanks…this is my report. But I can’t find much useful info, other than the camera seems to be listed as intel_ipu6. https://linux-hardware.org/?probe=600d5fdf40
The important part is the hardware id of the camera, you have to search for this, drivers and kernel modules use this number to check if they are needed:
8086:7d19I found a documented laptop with this camera: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Dell_XPS_16_(9640)#Webcam
They link to some patches there, it may work with that
As I see the date of the patch is this year March, I guess simply the laptop is too new. If you don’t want to fiddle, just switch to some rolling release distro, and the patches will be merged upstream soon. After a kernel update your camera will magically start working. This would be the easiest solution if you can live some more months without the camera.
firmware
Actually…I found some interesting info in this other thread’s response: https://askubuntu.com/questions/1532051/webcam-on-dell-latitude-7320-detachable-mipi-ipu6-tigerlake This unrelated dell shows the repo where to download the firmware for the cam. Mine is slightly different, but changing the address according to the filename worked, and got my firwmare downloaded. I’m now trying to add the Dell repo. But I’m…kinda stuck. THe one he mentions no longer seems to exist for Ubuntu Noble, and I actually have no idea which one to choose from this list: https://dell.archive.canonical.com/updates/dists
I reckon it might be noble-somerville-…something. But No idea and no clue on how to figure what each one means.
Thanks…I’m afraid I don’t even know how to compile the original driver myself, much less apply a patch to it :(
Reboot than read dmesg. Start a camera app than read dmesg, journalctl. Reload the camera module with modprobe
Which camera app would you suggest for troubleshooting?
Kamoso seems like the default one in KDE: https://apps.kde.org/kamoso/
I use
cheese.
So…dmesg got me an interesting entry:
intel-ipu6 0000:00:05.0: Direct firmware load for intel/ipu6epmtl_fw.bin failed with error -2This has led me here, but after installing a bunch of modules from the additional repo…I’m still getting not much at all. https://github.com/intel/ipu6-drivers/issues/223
The gh thread is about the same laptop I linked in my other comment, on the arch wiki they link to some patches, maybe they work
Might be that that failure is caused by not having the firmware file on your system? I have seen that happen before with a GPU. Probably not the case, but at least it’s easy to check for.
It looks like a bunch of unhappy Windows users have also been having trouble with that particular laptop and camera, from a quick search, so I don’t know how solid the driver work is for that particular camera:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/1fw1icj/latitude_7350_webcams_dont_work/
Could be that the development is underfunded or other problems are going on. Intel had a huge number of layoffs recently.
I don’t have familiarity with that camera, but I will suggest a fallback plan if you don’t get it ironed out: grab yourself a clip-on USB webcam. More to lug around, but you’ll also be able to get better image quality, so…shrugs
Yeah…I really hope I don’t have to do that. This is a detachable laptop. Plenty of storage, CPU and RAM…and absolutely barebones on everything else. That means, no USB-A for example. So if I were to get a camera, I’d need to connect it to a damn dongle, too. I’d need a whole bag of cables to lug around. I’m pissed because I got this laptop thinking being all intel, with an intel chipset, and being a Dell, it would have stellar Linux support. I might have to consider reselling it.
Regarding the reddit thread, I think that’s related to a bungled CU release from MS from earlier this year? I think that’s…unrelated to Linux, and fixed by now. But yeah…A bit frustrating how the camera modules are meant to be open in this case…but they don’t work. I think the firings might have had something to do with this indeed.
