Keyboard not working on Lenovo Ideapad Slim

Question

About half the time when entering Ubuntu or resuming from sleep, my built-in laptop keyboard doesn't register any inputs or show up in xinput even though my keyboard always works on GRUB and Windows. Repeatedly unplugging and replugging some USB peripherals (USB hub, mouse, external hard drive) eventually reactivates the keyboard and makes it appear in xinput (as "AT Translated Set 2 keyboard" always with id=15, even if something else was id=15 previously). The keyboard still lights up even when inputs aren't being registered. I've been having this issue since first installing Ubuntu a week or two ago.

All of my drivers are up to date, and I'm on the latest version of Ubuntu. Disabling intel_vbtn as outlined here: https://askubuntu.com/a/1282269/558457 also didn't fix the issue. Does anyone know about a possible cause or fix?

Answer 1

This issue can generally be fixed by installing the xserver-xorg-input-all package, which will include better support for a number of keyboards (and other input devices). You can install it like this:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install xserver-xorg-input-all

Once this is done, reboot the notebook and you should be good to go 👍🏻

Answer 2

I've had my Lenovo Ideapad for a few months and struggled with this with a new install of Ubuntu. I believe the problem lies in the touchscreen hardware layer of Lenovo and not intercepting control of keyboard input. Here's some things I do to make it work. It's not guaranteed but so far I think I've gotten it working more often than not by following these steps.

First, change the keybinding in Ubuntu for Fn+Spacebar. The Lenovo has this bound for turning on your keyboard, but Ubuntu has the same keys bound for changing input.

When I first boot into Ubuntu (after grub) the keyboard is in a disabled state. In grub it works fine, but after that no. I have my ubuntu start screen do auto-login, so I get to my desktop just fine without using the keyboard.

In desktop, I open a terminal. You should see the blinking cursor. I hit Fn+Spacebar to make sure Lenovo knows I want to use the keyboard (you will see your keyboard light up if it isn't already). Maybe in a minute or two without any additional steps it would let me type. I usually see the cursor turn solid. If it doesn't (or if I'm impatient) I hit Fn+Spacebar again and again. As an additional measure, I'll use the touchscreen to highlight text in my terminal to get that process to start thinking, then hit Fn+Spacebar again to let Lenovo know I want keyboard control. That usually does it and the cursor goes solid and I can start typing.

If this doesn't work I reboot and try again.