ASUS Zenbook UX534 - ArchWiki

# ASUS Zenbook UX534

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Device | Status
Intel | Working
Nvidia | Working
HDMI | Working
Ethernet (USB cable) | Working
Wireless | Working
Audio | Not Working
Touchpad | Working
Camera | Working
Card Reader | Working
Bluetooth | Working
Function keys | Working
Face recognition sensor | working
Battery autonomy | 6.5-10+ hours
Battery charge threshold | Working

ASUS UX334, UX434 and UX534 models with ScreenPad™ 2.0. These models most probably share almost the same hardware (the only difference is screen size and discrete NVidia GPU, and missing Display Port Alt-Mode on some models, even 15 inch seems to not include USB-C DP Altmode -), this article covers hardware specific configuration for all ZenBook 13 (UX334), ZenBook 14 (UX434) and ZenBook 15 (UX534).

However the first author is testing on an UX534FTC Full HD (no 4K), with NVidia GTX1650 Max-Q and a 10th generation 10510U Core I7.

## Configuration

### Secure Boot (option)

In order to boot any Linux operating system, navigate to BIOS, then hit F7 (or ESC) or click on "Advanced Menu", then the "Security" tab and set "Secure Boot" to `Off`.

If the aforementioned "Secure Boot" option is a menu rather than an on-or-off option, click on "Secure Boot", "Key Management", then "Reset to Setup Mode" and confirm in the dialog.

You may need to authorize entering the BIOS from the pre-installed Windows system.

### Video

See Intel Graphics and Hardware Acceleration. For models with discrete Nvidia graphics card, also see NVIDIA Optimus.

The Screenpad is working as a secondary display (brightness is kept from the last windows setting), it can be easly deactivated using Gnome settings for example (thus lowering power consumption). It requires a 'Rotation Portrait Left' and it's most usefull with a scale factor of 200% (Wayland allows to set a different scale factor of 100% if your main screen in only the Full HD version). The screenpad and touchpad functionnality are totally separated under linux (you just has a 2nd screen under your fingers).

### Audio

There is a bug affecting multiple Asus Zenbook models from 2019-2020 era that uses `Realtek ALC294` chip. This includes all `UX33*`, `UX43*` and `UX53*` models. There is no sound through integrated speakers, microphone is not capturing any sound, only headphones crackling at 100%. Bug references:

- https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1850439
- https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1784485
- https://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=206289

At the moment, there is no fix or workaround, but one can use the following alternatives:

- External USB audio card
- Bluetooth headphones

See PulseAudio.

### Touchpad

See Libinput. See Screenpad in "Video"

### Facerecognition login

This computer has built-in face recognition sensor. You can use it with the project Howdy [1]. See the howdy page for further informations.

### Battery charge threshold

This article or section is a candidate for merging with Laptop.

Notes: Not specific to this model. (Discuss in Talk:ASUS Zenbook UX534#)

Kernel 5.4 brought the ability to set the battery charge threshold for Asus laptops by modifying the `charge_control_end_threshold` variable exposed under `/sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/`[2]. By default, this value is set to `100`[3].

The effect of its change can be demonstrated as follows:

    $ cat /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/status
    Charging
    $ cat /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/capacity
    74
    # echo 60 > /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/charge_control_end_threshold
    $ cat /sys/class/power_supply/BAT0/status
    Not charging

In order to make this change permanent, create a corresponding udev rule such as:

    /etc/udev/rules.d/99-battery-charge-threshold.rules

    KERNEL=="BAT0", SUBSYSTEM=="power_supply", ATTR{charge_control_end_threshold}="60"

(source)

## Troubleshooting

### Suspend

Suspend is working out of the box, with the last version of Archlinux Linux 5.6.3-arch1-1 #1 SMP PREEMPT Wed, 08 Apr 2020 07:47:16 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Linux (4.17 at least) default to suspend-to-idle which is not very power effective. This is probably due to this change in 4.14-rc1. For better power effective you can use suspend-to-ram by adding `mem_sleep_default=deep` to the kernel cmdline.

## Tips and tricks

### Power saving and performance

As advertised by ASUS, these laptops are capable to last up to 9 hours on battery. In order to achieve this, see:

- BIOS update - It is generally recommended to update BIOS, as it usually brings performance, power-saving and security features.

- Power Saving - List of general recommendations to increase battery life.

- Improving performance - List of general recommendations to increase performance.

- SSD - Tips and tricks for Solid State Drives. These three laptops ship M.2 SSD by default.

- Undervolting CPU - Decrease voltage for Intel CPU (reduce battery drain, reduce heat and therefore - reduce fan speed)

- Bumblebee - If using bumbleblee and optimus, install 'bbswitch' to allow a good shutdown of NVidia Card ('nvidia-smi' return error if NVidia is power off, or information if it's in use)

UX534FT FHD perfom perfectly with Gnome 3, Bumblebee (bbswitch activated), Konkor (Gnome-extension) with Governor 'Power Save' does :

- 10h+ (more than 10 hours probably arround 12h or more) watching a video from network using VLC with bluetooth audio, low brightness (not lowest)

- 7.5h+ with brightness arround 60% watching a Youtube Video and using Firefox

- ? h (TODO) in heavy duty task (for example 'optirun' task using discrete Nvidia GPU

Category:

- ASUS

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