Make MX Linux charge your phone

[seasoned_geek]

I was shocked when, after installing MX Linux on my HP Z2G4 desktop that my phone would no longer charge from any USB port. Tried different cable, nothing worked. Plugged into a different machine and all was well. There are two things you need to do, though the first should have worked by itself.

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sudo nano /etc/default/grub

add usbcore.autosuspend=-1 to the end of this line, inside the quotes.

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GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash usbcore.autosuspend=-1"

Rumor has it the parameter name will change in future releases, but that is the name for now.

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sudo update-grub

Next identify your phone.

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sudo lsusb

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Bus 002 Device 002: ID 1058:259f Western Digital Technologies, Inc. My Passport Ultra (WD10JMVW)
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 18d1:4ee1 Google Inc. Nexus/Pixel Device (MTP)
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 051d:0002 American Power Conversion Uninterruptible Power Supply
Bus 001 Device 007: ID 1267:0103 Logic3 / SpectraVideo plc G-720 Keyboard
Bus 001 Device 006: ID 046d:c077 Logitech, Inc. Mouse
Bus 001 Device 005: ID 10d5:1234 Uni Class Technology Co., Ltd 
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 05e3:0608 Genesys Logic, Inc. Hub
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

One can only hope they will one day add a rule of some kind where MTP devices always get power.

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sudo nano /etc/udev/rules.d/91-usb-power.rules

paste in the following line using your own vediro and product ids. In case it isn't obvious it is vendor:id in the list above.

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ACTION=="add", SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="18d1", ATTR{idProduct}=="4ee1", ATTR{power/control}="auto"

save and exit.

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sudo udevadm control --reload-rules

just for good measure, reboot. Your phone should now charge.

[wdscharff]

I often connect my smartphones and tablets to one of the USB ports, both for charging and for data transfer.
The last time (smartphone) was yesterday.
Never had a problem, although I only use the USB2 ports (the others are all in use).

[Eadwine Rose]

I have had my phone on my usb port of this system and it charging and doing the data thing just fine, nothing special was needed to make it do that. Other than plug a cable in between the two.

[chrispop99]

I can only imagine the OP wanted to use a USB port for charging that stays alive when the computer is in standby.

The machines I have with that capability work as expected, but not all do on Linux.

Chris

[Michael-IDA]

I was shocked when, after installing MX Linux on my HP Z2G4 desktop that my phone would no longer charge from any USB port.

The kernel is trying to save you money

Seriously though, saving a few watts and creating a pita situation for the end user....

@seasoned_geek thanks for this, it helped me 'fix' a USB hub that kept dropping connections to plugged in components.

Thanks again,
Michael

If anyone cares (and I found the right doc?):
https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/v4.16/d ... ement.html

[seasoned_geek]

I can only imagine the OP wanted to use a USB port for charging that stays alive when the computer is in standby.

The machines I have with that capability work as expected, but not all do on Linux.

Chris

No. This is in a desktop where I turn off (as best I can) power management because I run BOINC for my idle time, helping to cure cancer, HIV, and many other projects. Fresh MXLinux install would not charge the phone from either USB-2 or USB-3 ports. Front or rear did not matter. Made these tweaks, and now my phone charges. It has been a fairly recent change to the Linux kernel from what I find. The bug does not exist in Debian 12, but it does in MX Linux.

[seasoned_geek]

I have had my phone on my usb port of this system and it charging and doing the data thing just fine, nothing special was needed to make it do that. Other than plug a cable in between the two.

Just to round this out, most/many/possibly-all newer motherboards have a BIOS setting under either Advanced or Power (not all have a top level Power menu) worded something like OS Power management. If that is turned off, or your motherboard is so old it does not provide OS power management capabilities, then you can never be burned by this bug.

Some, most likely well-meaning, individual hacked this change into the kernel because all they had was a laptop and who wouldn't want another 5 minutes of battery life on their laptop? What they didn't hack in was

if ! plugged-into-wall

in front of the USB power management stuff.

Once again, a change for laptop users trashed desktops.

I'm just waiting for the "only touchscreen input supported" kernel mod to well and truly hose us all just to make tablet users happy.

[dreamer]

Fresh MXLinux install would not charge the phone from either USB-2 or USB-3 ports. Front or rear did not matter. Made these tweaks, and now my phone charges. It has been a fairly recent change to the Linux kernel from what I find. The bug does not exist in Debian 12, but it does in MX Linux.

I appreciate your general Linux knowledge. I don't know how long you have used MX Linux, but I have used it long enough to know some of its pitfalls (which are few compared to vanilla Debian). The bug you describe is called TLP. It is installed by default in MX-23, but not in Debian 12. TLP is what enables usb_autosuspend by default. If you have a desktop you can uninstall the tlp package and reboot. If you want to explore all the functionality that tlp provides you can install tlpui which is a GUI for tlp. I usually install tlpui, disable usb_autosuspend and then I'm done.

[seasoned_geek]

Fresh MXLinux install would not charge the phone from either USB-2 or USB-3 ports. Front or rear did not matter. Made these tweaks, and now my phone charges. It has been a fairly recent change to the Linux kernel from what I find. The bug does not exist in Debian 12, but it does in MX Linux.

I appreciate your general Linux knowledge. I don't know how long you have used MX Linux, but I have used it long enough to know some of its pitfalls (which are few compared to vanilla Debian). The bug you describe is called TLP. It is installed by default in MX-23, but not in Debian 12. TLP is what enables usb_autosuspend by default. If you have a desktop you can uninstall the tlp package and reboot. If you want to explore all the functionality that tlp provides you can install tlpui which is a GUI for tlp. I usually install tlpui, disable usb_autosuspend and then I'm done.

Thanks for the info.

40 years in IT. First two decades on real computers with real operating systems (RSTS/E, RSX-11, RT-11, VMS, MVS, OS/400) designed to handle hundreds of users at once while running massive batch jobs. Slowly transitioned to the little ones with OS/2 and SuSE when it came with printed books and floppies. Spent the past decade creating embedded systems and doing yocto builds. I've used a lot of different Linux distros. Even do Debian and RPM packaging for my OpenSource projects.

Only first few days with MX Linux because Ubuntu's nag-o-grams about updating to Ubuntu-Pro finally honked me off enough to look for something else where I could, at least semi-easily cross compile for ARM iMX8Plus (and other) targets without having to work inside a docker container.

Most of my posts on here this past week or so has been trying to get back to good. I'm almost there.