Laptop backlight stays always on

Same problem here with a radeon mobility 9700 with both radeon and fglrx driver.

Here is workaround. http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=297316

Suspect this is more general than just package 'xserver-xorg-video-ati (Ubuntu)' - I have a Toshiba Portege with S3 Savage and the LCD backlight never turns off.

This may be related to the general X.org 7.1 ACPI bug found recently - more details here:

https://launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/+source/xorg/+bug/72231

Changed to the xorg package

Any news of a fix for this?

As with bug 37364, 'xset dpms force off' clears the display but does not turn it off.

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-i810/+bug/37364/

I have to use 'sudo vbetool dpms off' to actually switch off the backlight.

This is troublesome, because on both Edgy & Feisty at the time of writing xscreensaver never disables the backlight in accordance with your power management settings.

I am thus forced to either close the lid or suspend to RAM before going away for any length of time if I don't want the backlight to carry on burning.

Should be solved with 7.2

Still a problem after suspend/resume. Works from initial boot until before suspend/resume (S3).

This is still not fixed for me, now on Gutsy (having reinstalled from scratch several times along the way) and backlight still does not switch off when Xscreensaver tries to trigger it or when I run xset.

Confirmed, bug not fixed. Workaround posted here: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=297316

Thanks for the fix Sascha, but I just tried it and it doesn't work for me.

My problem is slightly different to yours in that my backlight *always* stays on - it never turns off, even for a few seconds. When it should turn off it actually gets pretty bright white in a weird kind of grid pattern which I guess is something to do with the TFT array in the LCD itself.

Try typing the following command in a terminal:

xgamma -gamma 0.75

If that doesn't work you need to install xgamma from the repos.

I have posted my own solution here on setting it up:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=4168042#post4168042

Thanks for the tip but xgamma doesn't work for me. - it does absolutely nothing. I tried many different values and nothing worked.

Confirmed with two HP laptops with X600 and X1600. Both running xorg-driver-fglrx 1:7.1.0-8-02+2.6.24.9-8.25.

This seems to be fixed now?

Nope, with fglrx 8.09 the backlight goes off perfectly. With radeon (xserver-xorg-video-ati 1.6.8.0-1 on ubuntu Hardy) the backlight does not go off. I can simulate it by pressing the lid button of my laptop. What happens is that my screen goes off (backlight is off for a sec or so and I don't see my desktop) for a second, then completely comes completely alive (i.e. I see my desktop etc) for less than half a second and then goes completely blank, but with the backlight on. After browsing a bit, I found a clue that there is something related to acpid.

Snippet of /var/log/acpid starting with pressing the button and releasing 5 seconds later:
****
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:02 2008] received event "button/lid LID 00000080 00000025"
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:02 2008] notifying client 5109[0:0]
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:02 2008] notifying client 5995[107:116]
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:02 2008] executing action "/etc/acpi/lid.sh"
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:02 2008] BEGIN HANDLER MESSAGES
ERROR: Couldn't attach to DCOP server!
ERROR: Couldn't attach to DCOP server!
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:03 2008] END HANDLER MESSAGES
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:03 2008] action exited with status 1
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:03 2008] completed event "button/lid LID 00000080 00000025"
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:08 2008] received event "button/lid LID 00000080 00000026"
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:08 2008] notifying client 5109[0:0]
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:08 2008] notifying client 5995[107:116]
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:08 2008] executing action "/etc/acpi/lid.sh"
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:08 2008] BEGIN HANDLER MESSAGES
ERROR: Couldn't attach to DCOP server!
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:09 2008] END HANDLER MESSAGES
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:09 2008] action exited with status 1
[Fri Oct 10 23:43:09 2008] completed event "button/lid LID 00000080 00000026"
****

This was solved by installing the ATI Drivers 9.6 from ATI and installing using the link and choosing the one for your situation.
http://wiki.cchtml.com/index.php/Ubuntu_Jaunty_Installation_Guide

Regards
Ian Lester

This bug seems to affect me in 10.10 (I have not tried to reproduce it yet in natty but I can in a few minutes). "xset dpms force off" will stay off for 30-60s before coming on again. "sudo radeontool light off" fails without an error. If I let the backlight turn off on it's own, it seems to stay off (will test this shortly).

Are any workarounds confirmed? Is this the right place to post comments?

hardware: HP Pavilion dm3

xset -q (don't know why to post this, doing so for sake of completeness)
Keyboard Control:
  auto repeat: on key click percent: 0 LED mask: 00000000
  XKB indicators:
    00: Caps Lock: off 01: Num Lock: off 02: Scroll Lock: off
    03: Compose: off 04: Kana: off 05: Sleep: off
    06: Suspend: off 07: Mute: off 08: Misc: off
    09: Mail: off 10: Charging: off 11: Shift Lock: off
    12: Group 2: off 13: Mouse Keys: off
  auto repeat delay: 500 repeat rate: 30
  auto repeating keys: 00ffffffdffffbbf
                        fadfffefffedffff
                        9fffffffffffffff
                        fff7ffffffffffff
  bell percent: 0 bell pitch: 400 bell duration: 100
Pointer Control:
  acceleration: 2/1 threshold: 4
Screen Saver:
  prefer blanking: yes allow exposures: yes
  timeout: 0 cycle: 0
Colors:
  default colormap: 0x20 BlackPixel: 0 WhitePixel: 16777215
Font Path:
  /usr/share/fonts/X11/misc,/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi/:unscaled,/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi/:unscaled,/usr/share/fonts/X11/Type1,/usr/share/fonts/X11/100dpi,/usr/share/fonts/X11/75dpi,/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf.d/dirs/TrueType,built-ins
DPMS (Energy Star):
  Standby: 0 Suspend: 0 Off: 0
  DPMS is Enabled
  Monitor is On