ASUS x205ta

This article or section does not follow the Laptop page guidelines.

Reason: Stub (Discuss in Talk:ASUS x205ta)

The ASUS X205TA is an Intel Bay Trail device with a 64-bit CPU and a 32-bit UEFI.

Hardware	PCI/USB ID	Working?
Keyboard	`0b05:8585`	Yes
Touchpad	`04f3:0026`	Yes
GPU	`8086:0f31`	Yes
Wireless		Yes
Bluetooth		No
Webcam	`04f2:b483`	Yes
SD-card reader		Yes
Speakers		Yes
Microphone		No

Installation

Booting Arch installation medium

The ASUS X205TA has an exclusively 32-bit UEFI that does not support BIOS booting via CSM. Archiso, which uses systemd-boot on UEFI machines, currently does not support booting 64-bit kernels on 32-bit UEFI. To boot the Arch official installation media on the X205TA, you need a bootloader that supports booting 64-bit kernels on 32-bit UEFI such as GRUB (details here).

There are two methods of booting the official Arch installation medium (this procedure may work for other exclusively 32-bit UEFI machines):

Install GRUB to an Arch USB installation medium
Create a multiboot USB drive that contains the Arch official installation ISO

Install GRUB to an Arch installer USB drive

Create an Arch USB flash installation medium using standard methods (e.g. Rufus on Windows).
Download a prebuilt bootia32.efi from any source you trust (e.g. https://github.com/jfwells/linux-asus-t100ta/blob/master/boot/bootia32.efi) and copy it to /EFI/boot on the USB drive.
Open your favorite text editor and create a custom grub.cfg with the contents:

menuentry "Arch Linux install" {
   linux /arch/boot/x86_64/vmlinuz-linux add_efi_memmap archisobasedir=arch archisolabel=<LABEL>
   initrd /arch/boot/intel-ucode.img /arch/boot/x86_64/initramfs-linux.img
}

Replace <LABEL> above with the correct label for your USB drive (e.g. ARCH_202205).
Save the custom grub.cfg file to the root directory of the USB drive.
Boot the X205TA from the USB drive (see #Firmware below), which should enter a GRUB console.
Type the following command in the GRUB console:

$ configfile /grub.cfg

Proceed with installation.
During installation, in the bootloader step, choose to #Install GRUB 32-bit.

Create a multiboot USB drive

Follow the steps here to create a multiboot USB drive containing the Arch official installation media.

Alternatively, you may use a dedicated app to create a multiboot USB drive (e.g. ventoy-bin^AUR or YUMI UEFI on Windows).

Install GRUB 32-bit

During the installation process, when installing the bootloader, install GRUB 32-bit by issuing the following commands:

# grub-install --target=i386-efi --efi-directory=<ESP> --bootloader-id=GRUB
# grub-mkconfig

Where <ESP> is the mount point of your EFI system partition (typically /boot).

For users using archinstall, be sure to choose GRUB as your bootloader. By default, archinstall will install GRUB 64-bit UEFI binaries, which will render your machine unbootable. To fix this, after archinstall has completed all tasks, chroot into your new system and issue the two commands listed above.

Accessibility

The firmware setup uses traditional BIOS color scheme, so it might work with OCR software. Navigation is controlled by the arrow keys on the keyboard.

Note: Blind users should request the help of a sighted person to change BIOS settings

Firmware

Enter firmware setup by pressing F2 after turning on the X205TA.

Secure Boot must be turned off to boot Arch:

Enter firmware setup
Navigate to the Security tab
Enter the Secure Boot menu
For Secure Boot Control, choose the option Disabled
Save changes and exit

To boot from your USB installation medium:

Enter firmware setup
Navigate to the Save & Exit tab
Select your USB installation medium from the Boot Override section of the menu

WiFi breaks after hibernation

Use the following script:

/usr/lib/systemd/system-sleep/hibernate.sh

#!/bin/sh

case $1 in
    pre)
        rmmod brcmfmac
        ;;
    post)
        modprobe brcmfmac
        ;;
esac

exit 0

and make it the script executable.

Bluetooth

Install a correct firmware file (e.g. BCM43341B0_002.001.014.0122.0176.hcd from Windows 10 driver) as /lib/firmware/brcm/BCM43341B0.hcd. See this page for more information on the hcd file.

In order to get bluetooth working create a systemd unit

/etc/systemd/system/btattach.service

[Unit]
Description=Btattach

[Service]
Type=simple
ExecStart=/usr/bin/btattach --bredr /dev/ttyS1 -P bcm
ExecStop=/usr/bin/killall btattach

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

and enable the service.

Next, follow the normal steps to activate bluetooth.

Microphone

There has recently been some success in getting the x205ta's Realtek RT5648 sound card working, including microphone support. Updated Alsa-lib's UCM files are available in alsa-lib-x205ta^AUR.

Kernel patch history

This section is being considered for removal.

Reason: This is probably no longer relevant since years have passed. In particular the recommendation of linux-x205ta^AUR should go if nothing else, since the package is unmaintained since 2020. (Discuss in Talk:ASUS x205ta)

Three very elaborate threads contain the history of patches for the kernel for the x205ta: kernel bug for baytrail power states, kernel bug for chtrt5645 and most important a Ubuntu forum thread with a patched kernel provided by harryharryharry. kernel bug for more info. AUR package linux-x205ta^AUR applies what seems to be the most effective patch. Setting kernel argument intel_idle.max_cstate=1 solves the problem on a patched kernel without affecting performance. Power saving functionalities should in theory be impeded using this patch and kernel parameter, but the laptop's battery life remains impressive and freezes are not frequent. The Kernel parameters page may help with adding to the kernel parameters.