Samsung laptops have a variety of firmware issues

intothegutters

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Distribution​

Mint 21.2 Victoria, LTS

Package version​

5.8.4

Graphics hardware in use​

Integrated Intel i5 iris xe

Frequency​

Always

Bug description​

Issues:

  1. Can't have a charger inserted or removed while in use or will enter perpetual sleep cycle
  2. Occasionally, trackpad becomes unusable as it won't let the cursor to move. Two finger zoom however is never usable (edit: just found out you need to hold ctrl, this should be an option in mouse and touchpad, regardless it is very inconsistent and janky and still 'malfunctioning')
  3. Encryption of storage at the start of installation causes a perpetual sleep cycle which somehow even prevented BIOS from being opened(?) Required me to restart video drivers. (Ctrl + Super key + Shift + B) (Or maybe I pressed those buttons and it just worked, coincidences happen)
  4. Can't login without perpetual sleep cycle, this occurs about ten seconds into the login screen, issue goes away once your past it.
Exact model:
Manufacturer: SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS CO., LTD.
Product Name: 750XED
Version: P13CFG

Steps to reproduce​

First:

  1. Remove or insert charger
Second:

  1. Truly random, does not happen midsession, only if PC just booted
Third:

  1. Encrypt at install of LM
  2. Try to boot, occasionally will get to the enter encryption password part but will enter infinite sleep cycle
  3. Baffling prevents BIOS entering(?) (possibly, needs to be tested)
Fourth:

  1. Boot PC
  2. After about ten seconds of the login screen, you will enter a sleep cycle boot loop which inifinitely causes the PC to wake and sleep over and over (the wake is too short to do anything)
I feel like Linux Mint install should detect the PC a user is installing to and warn them that this model is marked as 'unstable' and list off its known issues

Expected behavior​

.

Additional information​

Interestingly, for the last issue, if a user does Ctrl + Alt + L after past the login screen for the first time of a session, they will never enter boot loop and it will function as intended
 
Last edited:


this is why I do not purchase samsung equipment. it is crap.
 
actually besides this hiccup it's a pretty respectable piece of kit. they even do ifixit official guides!
I work in the industry and samsung is ok except for laptops. If you ever open them up you will see what i mean. Not very much to work on and most times they have embedded memory instead of removable drive.
 
I work in the industry and samsung is ok except for laptops. If you ever open them up you will see what i mean. Not very much to work on and most times they have embedded memory instead of removable drive.
thoughts on the galaxy book2? i wouldve got a thinkpad or framework but this was just convenient as it was in the family
 
thoughts on the galaxy book2? i wouldve got a thinkpad or framework but this was just convenient as it was in the family
if it is free or very very cheap and does what you want then it is good. But find out what is in it. samsung is notorious for making disposable stuff. That means if it goes out, so does everything you have on it. Unless they use an actual SSD or M.2 for storage. I used to love toshiba as they could not be killed but they are not producing. I have had to switch to HP laptops such as elitebook, stay away from the consumer stuff it is crap. Stick to the commercial grade stuff. Just like dell, I wouldn't touch a dimension if you paid me. But the optiplex from dell is amazing.
 
if it is free or very very cheap and does what you want then it is good. But find out what is in it. samsung is notorious for making disposable stuff. That means if it goes out, so does everything you have on it. Unless they use an actual SSD or M.2 for storage. I used to love toshiba as they could not be killed but they are not producing. I have had to switch to HP laptops such as elitebook, stay away from the consumer stuff it is crap. Stick to the commercial grade stuff. Just like dell, I wouldn't touch a dimension if you paid me. But the optiplex from dell is amazing.

heres it here if you want to check specs. it has USB C charging which was a must for me
 

heres it here if you want to check specs. it has USB C charging which was a must for me
doesn't look too bad. I have seen much worse from them. It uses an M.2 which is good as it means you can remove storage if something goes really wrong. That seems to be one of the better ones from them.
 
Thanks for sharing that information.

New hardware sometimes has issues with Linux, or the other way around I suppose. Drivers aren't yet ready, are buggy, etc...

The first thing I'd do is look for a BIOS update.

The second thing I'd do is try a distro with a more modern kernel, specifically just the live version. I'm not sure which to recommend, so hopefully someone will suggest a specific distro with a newer kernel., the newer the better in this case. That's to see if it's worthwhile keeping Mint and upgrading the kernel. It's easy enough to do so, but I'd try a live USB first, assuming I could.
 
I suggest Fedora 39 but I am biased there. I know they keep up with that one very well. Even supports raspberry pi 4B perfectly
 
Also, I shouldn't have assumed. I did. I assumed you went through the report.

If you did, you'd see that there's all sorts of reports about the battery having problems. One of the reports has a note, but it doesn't match your complaint. That's fine. There are a bunch of other reports of it not working with Linux properly.

You could also try disabling sleep and hibernation.
 
You'd start with reporting the bug not to the kernel but to the distro's maintainers. In your case, that's Linux Mint. The last time I looked, they made it a bit of a task to report a bug. I'll look it up.

Yeah, you can ignore the bit about Cinnamon, as this isn't a DE issue:

 
You'd start with reporting the bug not to the kernel but to the distro's maintainers. In your case, that's Linux Mint. The last time I looked, they made it a bit of a task to report a bug. I'll look it up.

Yeah, you can ignore the bit about Cinnamon, as this isn't a DE issue:

ive already posted to their github but this isnt a distro issue right? shouldnt i contact firmware people?
 

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