Linux compatibility

[iabiab]

I'm considering getting a G750JX in the very near future, with the intent to make it dual boot WIndows and linux (probably ubuntu, maybe arch). As I was searching for a new laptop, I came across the MSI GT60/70 lines, and was surprised to find they feature ethernet and wifi cards that apparently have no linux driver (bigfoot killers). This, of course, wouldn't do.

Before I commit myself to the G750JX, I was wondering if anyone has successfully installed linux on it, and if everything works as expected. Since linux will be my main OS, with Windows just for gaming, I don't want to have a nasty surprise after purchase...

Thanks for the feedback!

[Zygomorphic]

For changing the display brightness, that is an issue with the nouveau/nVidia driver. Most versions of the nVidia driver are targetted at the desktop market, and so do not support (At least until recently) the ability to change the display brightness.

For the WiFi and Ethernet issues, please post the output of the following command (run at the terminal):
"lspci"

[iabiab]

tannerml wrote:
I have a G750JW. I installed Ubuntu 13.04 64 bit but I had to load the "Run Linux without installing" option first and then install from there. When I tried to install it directly X crashed and dumped me to a black screen. Once install I had to look for a Wifi driver that worked as the 3rd party driver did not. Trying to install the 3rd party driver during the Ubuntu install caused it to get stuck. I was able to get the Wifi working afterward by folliowing the instructions at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1173761/comments/29.

I have 2 remaining issues... I cannot change the display brightness and I cannot use the right mouse button. I think I'll be able to overcome these eventually though.

Ok, so I ended up getting the G750JX, and I've installed Ubuntu 13.04 64bit as well, and had the same experience you did. It was my first time dealing with UEFI, and Windows 8, and they were both worse than expected.
Ubuntu install was a little more complicated than usual, since unetbootin (which I usually use to make a live usb stick) did not actually work (grub prompt on boot), although something called Rufus got me a usable media.
All in all, booting the laptop first on Win8 convinced me that a dual boot was the only healthy thing to do. Before, I gave Microsoft the benefit of the doubt, and thought all the bad feedback was because of people reacting negatively to change. It turns out Win8 actually is surprisingly bad. It feels like they were trying to do something, then remembered they had some old stuff to keep, then decided to stop everything and just get it out.
So, really glad I got Ubuntu installed, thanks for all the feedback!

[Nemros]

iabiab wrote:
Ok, so I ended up getting the G750JX, and I've installed Ubuntu 13.04 64bit as well, and had the same experience you did. It was my first time dealing with UEFI, and Windows 8, and they were both worse than expected.
Ubuntu install was a little more complicated than usual, since unetbootin (which I usually use to make a live usb stick) did not actually work (grub prompt on boot), although something called Rufus got me a usable media.
All in all, booting the laptop first on Win8 convinced me that a dual boot was the only healthy thing to do. Before, I gave Microsoft the benefit of the doubt, and thought all the bad feedback was because of people reacting negatively to change. It turns out Win8 actually is surprisingly bad. It feels like they were trying to do something, then remembered they had some old stuff to keep, then decided to stop everything and just get it out.
So, really glad I got Ubuntu installed, thanks for all the feedback!

I concur with you. Getting Windows + Linux was a hassle (EFI boot). I'm running Fedora 19 and I've had wifi problems (fixed with the link someone gave i a previous post, refixed in kernel 3.10).

To list problems for people to know:
- LAN driver - Fixed in kernel 3.10
- Wifi driver (Broadcom) - Use the above code, look for changes for kernel 3.10 (i manually modified the code as it did not compile)
- Screen brightness - with NVIDIA drivers nothing happens
- Keyboard backlight - Sometimes it's on, mostly it's off (doesn't work)
- Touchpad - left click behaves randomly as either left or right click. Right doesn't work at all. I don't use tapping as I type a lot and i can "missclick"

Windows 8 problems:
- Wifi driver - through installed (no problems shown) it did not work until I got it to update stuff

The good about linux:
- Most things work out of the box
- Suspend works
- Opening the screen gets you out of suspend (nice!)

Hope it helps you guys.

[Zygomorphic]

Fedora has always been bleeding-edge, hence some stuff doesn't always work. I will say that the NVIDIA drivers not support backlight brightness adjustment has been around for a long time, and was fixed in the latest version of the drivers. If Fedora isn't running the latest version (or one older), it won't work. At least, that's when I noticed that the brightness started working.

I'm still trying to get Gentoo working on my laptop (when I have the time to mess around...not much right now :(). I'm planning on trying a precompiled version of it (Sabayon) and seeing if that allows me to get the X server configured properly.

[DukeWellington]

tannerml wrote:
I have a G750JW. I installed Ubuntu 13.04 64 bit but I had to load the "Run Linux without installing" option first and then install from there. When I tried to install it directly X crashed and dumped me to a black screen. Once install I had to look for a Wifi driver that worked as the 3rd party driver did not. Trying to install the 3rd party driver during the Ubuntu install caused it to get stuck. I was able to get the Wifi working afterward by folliowing the instructions at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1173761/comments/29.

I have 2 remaining issues... I cannot change the display brightness and I cannot use the right mouse button. I think I'll be able to overcome these eventually though.

Was this under CSM or were you able to load it with UEFI enabled?

Edit: Nevermind.

Was able to install 12.04.3 over UEFI with secure boot enabled. But now I can't launch Windows 8 from GRUB because of secure boot and disabling doesnt help because of a device map error (device.map didn't even exist in /boot/grub/). Also, I can't change actions for the laptop lid in power options (because I have an external monitor and I'd like to keep the laptop closed), and the listing for power manager isn't there in gconf editor. Oh, and for some reason my USB peripherals have to be disconnected, then reconnected after a reboot. It's very annoying.

I guess I'll just have to wait for support to propagate for the ASUS G750JX gaming laptop before I try installing ubuntu again. Shame.

[back2back2015]

hi t have a new G550J.

still haveing your problems.

ill be happy to get help grom you!!

10x

[tannerml]

The elantech touchpad responds to a two-fingered click as a right click. I can live with that.

[tului]

Intel Dude wrote:
But to install another OS won't you have to disable secure boot and enable CMS? wouldn't that kill the current Windows 8 installation and you would also have to go through the headache of doing a clean install for Windows 8 and embedding the built in product key in the bIOS via a PID.txt file?

I disabled secure and enabled CSM. My default install(still using the same install it came out of the box with) of Windows is still running fine. Even with the 3.9 kernel from SystemRescueCD, the wifi and ethernet were not working. I did't look into fixing them. I was just seeing how it worked.

[nocturnal]

Installed Archlinux on my G750jx. I wanted to keep secure boot, which may work out of the box on Fedora, Ubuntu and Mint (as they now come with signed boot loaders). Arch is however the only viable distro for me, and it now runs great. Using the Linux Foundation's Preloader + Gummiboot it was not so hard to get working. You can also use Shim, but then you need to sign your own files (and was just a bigger hassle imo).



BACKLIGHT:

Many have problems with this. I first tried nvidiabl but it did not work with this machine out of the box. I changed the source code, and got it working fine. However, I ended up using xbacklight instead, which works even better imo. It will not work with the Fn keys, but that is really no issue for me. The key backlight can be set manually as well (a kernel module can be loaded, and ten the fn-3+4 will work, but the increment is all wrong, and opposite).

[Zygomorphic]

Interesting. On my G53SX with LINUX Mint 14 (or 15), The Fn combinations work perfectly - and in the right direction. I have noticed that if the keyboard backlight goes off (computer sleeping), you have to decrement the backlight one step for it to come back on. You can then increment it back up to the maximum.