Last month Dell upstreamed the firmware needed for their XPS 13 935 Snapdragon X1 Elite laptop. This makes the Linux outlook for this ARM-based Dell XPS laptop much better than before in not having to worry about extracting necessary firmware blobs from Windows 11. Now another step forward for the Dell XPS 13 9345 is being made with a new EC driver being posted to enhance the hardware support.
Open-source developer Aleksandrs Vinarskis worked on a new embedded controller (EC) driver for the Dell XPS 13 9345 to better support this Snapdragon X Elite laptop and address various power and themral issues currently encountered.
This driver doesn’t appear to have been sanctioned by Dell directly but developed via analyzing the ACPI DSDT dumps from the device during different stages of operation.
Having this dell-xps-ec Linux driver should address a number of issues as explained by Vinarskis:
“With EC driver in place, the following issues are addressed:
1. Fans were not properly cooling the laptop, would kick in late and spin lazily, resulting in heavy throttling. With EC driver fans start sooner and hit high RPM under heavy load.
2. Fans were not stopping once SoC temperature dropped, they would keep slowly spinning irrespective of suspend and/or closed lid until the next powercycle. With EC driver shortly after SoC temperature drops, thermistors temperature drops, and fans ramp-down.
3. Keyboard and touch row backlight were not turning off during suspend – only lid close would power off the touch row. With EC driver behavior matches that of Windows, suspending device with lid open powers off the peripherals.”
A big improvement for the Dell XPS 9345 on Linux to avoid various thermal/power issues plaguing different Snapdragon X laptops. Paired with the now-upstream Dell firmware, the XPS 13 9345 joins the Snapdragon X Lenovo ThinkPad as among the few better-supported ARM laptops on Linux.
The Dell-XPS-EC driver is currently out for review on the kernel mailing list.
