Kernel 6.17 — Lenovo Legion WMI Gaming Series Driver Causes KDE Power Mode & Battery Widget Issues

Help
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Hi, I’m on a Lenovo Legion laptop (Legion Pro 5 but likely affects other Legion models too) and just upgraded to Linux kernel 6.17, which introduced the new Lenovo WMI Gaming Series drivers. So, I found out this new kernel update finally allows KDE’s power profiles to correctly control the Legion’s hardware modes (Silent, Balance, Performance, Custom). I know this because the LED ring on the power button now changes as expected.

However, after upgrading I noticed a couple of issues:

  1. There seem to be a bug when using balance mode so like when switching to Balance mode, the power/battery widget disappears from the KDE panel.
  2. Selecting Performance mode in KDE turns the LED purple (Custom mode) instead of red (Performance mode).

For reference, Legion modes & LED colors:

  • Silent = Blue
  • Balance = White
  • Performance = Red
  • Custom = Purple

On kernels before 6.17, KDE’s power mode selector didn’t change the Legion modes at all (LED stayed the same). Now it does, though these 2 issues appeared. This is my first time posting here, so I’m not sure if I should make a formal bug report. but here it is the issue that I am faced with. Thank you and looking forward for the help.

Oh, forgot to add my system info:

  • Operating System: EndeavourOS
  • KDE Plasma Version: 6.4.5
  • Kernel Version: 6.17.1-arch1-1 (64-bit)
  • Laptop Model: Legion Pro 5 16IRX8
  • GPU: NVIDIA RTX 4070
  • CPU: Intel i9-13900HX
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I’m using a Legion 5 16IRX9 and seeing the same behavior for the icon and power LED color. My battery icon also disappeared when switching to the performance power profile, but setting the visibility of the Power and Battery entry in the system tray settings from “Shown when relevant” to “Always shown” fixed that. It seems like an intentional change and it works fine, probably not a bug but still a jarring change.

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Yea, I tried the always shown too and it’s working now. Forgot to mention that perf is down a lot using this new kernel. But I believe it’s because of power-profiles-daemon (ppd). Changing to TLP, and manually configure the power config works. Performance is equal to custom and the balance-performance is performance for legion laptops (surprising to me). So, it explains why ppd when set to performance its making the led purple. I don’t know how to manually configure ppd to fix it, tho I hope it will be fixed in the next version (check the repo and it’s been awhile).

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Same happened on my Lenovo LOQ 15ARP9 but performance mode changes to custom mode idk why

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