Change Screen Brightness with Fn key in Ubuntu 11.04/10.10

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If you’re running Ubuntu 10.10 or 11.04 on laptop, you might get a problem that fn key combination to change screen brightness is not working. Here’s a solution for nvidia laptop with this problem:

First edit xorg.conf in terminal with the command:

sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

And then find the Section “Device” and add the bold line.

Section “Device”
Identifier “Default Device”
Option “NoLogo” “True”
Option “RegistryDwords” “EnableBrightnessControl=1″
EndSection

And now your brightness control is working in next login!

Thanks to Guskuma who posted it on http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1751333&page=2

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25 users responded in " Change Screen Brightness with Fn key in Ubuntu 11.04/10.10 "

Rebecca F said, in May 25th, 2011 at 11:38 pm

Ok, cool! So… How about making something like this happen on my Samsung R540 with AMD graphics and the fglrx driver

I’ve tried almost everything to no avail

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Bryce said, in July 15th, 2011 at 9:04 am

I have a Lenovo T510 with an Nvidia NVS 3100M

I had this same problem (keys didn’t work to adjust screen brightness). This worked. Below is the section from my xorg.conf (xorg.conf was missing somehow, and that might explain why this suddenly happened) with my edit (the “Option” line).

Just another example of something working

Section “Device”
Identifier “Device0″
Driver “nvidia”
VendorName “NVIDIA Corporation”
BoardName “NVS 3100M”
Option “RegistryDwords” “Enable BrightnessControl=1″
EndSection

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Bryce said, in July 15th, 2011 at 9:15 am

Just another example of where this works, in case it helps anyone

had a similar problem on my Lenovo T510, with an
Nvidia NVS 3100M

my xorg.conf was missing somehow.

I created a new one with the nvidia-settings tool, and
added the “Option” line to the section below. After X restart, brigtness keys (Fn Home/End on this machine) work great.

Thanks for the help!

Section “Device”
Identifier “Device0″
Driver “nvidia”
VendorName “NVIDIA Corporation”
BoardName “NVS 3100M”
Option “RegistryDwords” “Enable BrightnessControl=1″
EndSection

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Nachiappan said, in September 4th, 2011 at 8:35 am

Hi All,

I have a Lenovo V570 and installed Ubuntu Natty recently, the Fn key is not working so I am not able to change the brightness, and xorg.conf file is also missing in /etx/X11 folder, how should i create a new xorg.conf file ?

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JiangHongTiao Reply:
November 2nd, 2011 at 3:29 am

Hi Nachiappan,
please, can I ask You how did you install Ubuntu on Lenovo v570 notebook? Because I have troubles to install it there. When I install it, then I cannot boot it. I read, there is some BIOS problem, but I’m afraid to flash BIOS, because of my warranty. Unfortunately, I formated whole my drive also with windows. Please, how did you install it?

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Liam Reply:
February 26th, 2012 at 8:21 pm

it is /etc/X11 you put etx

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Tomek Reply:
March 19th, 2012 at 7:21 pm

Try with
sudo nvidia-xconfig
it creates a new file for me, and backuped the old one.
To restart X
1. press ctrl+alt+f1,
2. login as root (sudo su from your user)
3. stop x with service kdm stop
4, start x with service kdm start
Be careful with copy paste, some characters may be not recognized when kde starts. If You get some problems check the log file (/vat/log/kdm.log)

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Nachiappan said, in September 4th, 2011 at 4:34 pm

I am using Ubuntu Natty and my xorg.conf file is missing, should i manually create one ?

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Liam Jones Reply:
February 26th, 2012 at 8:22 pm

Did you make sure to use uppercase X in X11?

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Abhishek said, in September 5th, 2011 at 8:46 pm

Use this option with caution. It messed up my system. Due this change after reboot it always logged into terminal prompt instead of GUI

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panicd7 said, in September 12th, 2011 at 11:32 am

first of all man setpci

sudo setpci -s 00:02.0 F4.B=number
0 almost black
20-60 for night
70-90 for day
FF full brightness

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Nat Reply:
July 14th, 2012 at 3:29 pm

Thank you! This worked on my Samsung N145+ netbook. Finally I can type in a dark room without searing my eyes in screen glare. And now I have a better understanding of PCI devices too.

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Filipo Rviz said, in September 28th, 2011 at 8:39 pm

Hi!

I have an Acer Aspire 4750 running Ubuntu 11.04. The installation was normal, whitout issues but the brightness control.

I’ve tried modifying the grub whit commands like “acpi=off noapic nolapic” whitout effective ressults.

After four weeks, I found that patch to the linux kernel: linux-kamal-mjgbacklight

by terminal type:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kamalmostafa/linux-kamal-mjgbacklight
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade

And it was fixed.

Source:
http://askubuntu.com/questions/57236/unable-to-change-brightness-in-a-lenovo-laptop

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bob Reply:
February 16th, 2012 at 6:51 pm

Thank you, it worked!!! I’ve been searching for a solution for months… Finally, it worked!!! Thanks a lot!!!

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Georgios said, in October 21st, 2011 at 12:05 pm

after updating from 11.04 to 11.10 brightness control with fn f5 and fn f6 didn’t work.
my problem solved with this:
sudo apt-get install acpi

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Abz said, in November 7th, 2011 at 7:38 am

Hey people,i am in serious crap right now, quite new to ubuntu. I did this,and my system wont boot now. I can get into root and everything,but i dont know how to change it back to normal using it. Any help would be appreciated!

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realbezo Reply:
February 14th, 2012 at 9:36 pm

Do not copy and paste above line
Option “RegistryDwords” “EnableBrightnessControl=1″
because the double quotes are not regular double quotes and they are unrecognizable character for the system.
i ended up like ABZ and could not boot my system. i had to drop to shell as root, opened xorg.conf with vi and changed the unrecognizable double quotes with the regular ones. vi is also hard for newbies just google how to edit a file and save changes…

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Liam Reply:
February 26th, 2012 at 8:38 pm

Thanks for that, i wish i had read this first. It screwed up my system, i had to install lynx to look up where xorg.conf was, then remove the lines in nano.

Working now.

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shahibul said, in November 30th, 2011 at 12:25 pm

i install ubuntu 10.4 at my linovo g460 laptop but now my tuch pad does not work properly in ubuntu,proper work at w7..

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Albert said, in January 1st, 2012 at 8:49 pm

This works great! I was stuck for a long time trying to change the brightness so I wouldn’t have to wear sunglasses to use the computer. Thanks a lot!

Worked on:
Asus G74sx-bbk7
Nvidia 560m graphics card
Xubuntu

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Ktsos said, in April 3rd, 2012 at 7:33 am

Section “Device” is not in /etc/X11/xorg.conf when i open it…what should i do?

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Olivia said, in April 14th, 2012 at 11:32 pm

I have a Samsung NC110 notebook, and although the brightness bit on the computer goes up and down, it doesn’t change the brightness of the screen.

I’m not really a computer person, i understand to a certain extent, but I don’t really get what /etc/X11/xorg.conf this means an editing it or something? can anyone help me?

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cruel0r said, in May 11th, 2012 at 12:17 am

Very neat, worked for me:
Lenovo T410s, nvidia card with official drivers. Ubuntu 12.04.
Your Trick did it.

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Navi said, in June 13th, 2012 at 2:16 am

Hi guys. i have the same problem as you. my laptop : dell vostro nvidia 310M. I put the command in termial :

sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf

then it open empty window. there is no text. what can i do ? i want my brightness and fn keys working. Please help me

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rock_cloud said, in June 25th, 2012 at 3:58 am

This is Great! It works well on my g74sx, ubuntu 11.04 nvidia card GTX 560M.

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