ASUS TUF DASH F15 (2022)

Hardware
PCI/USB ID
Working?
Touchpad
Yes
Keyboard
Yes
GPU (Intel)
8086:46a3
Yes
GPU (NVIDIA)
10de:25a0
Yes
Webcam
322e:202c
Yes
Ethernet
8086:1a1e
Yes
Bluetooth
8087:0026
Yes
Audio
8086:51c8
Yes
Wi-Fi
8086:51f0
Yes
TPM
Yes
This page contains instructions and tips for configuring Arch Linux on the ASUS TUF DASH F15 Laptop.
Note
This page covers the 2022 DASH F15 with model numbers FX517ZC, FX517ZE, FX517ZM, FX517ZR. It
does not
cover the 2021 DASH F15 (11th Gen CPU & RTX3070) with model numbers FX516PC, FX516PE, FX516PM, FX516PR. See
ASUS TUF DASH F15 (2021)
for more information on those older models since hardware differences are considerably high.
Accessibility
This laptop uses the standard American Megatrends UEFI interface, it is very bright and has both simple and advanced mode (
F7
to swap between them). It has touchpad support in both modes though scrolling does not work in advanced mode meaning you need to use the keyboard to navigate the longer menus.
Simple mode provides basic functions in a visual manner using defined box areas the user can click to open a sub menu. Most normal operations can be done here using either the keyboard or touchpad. This mode should not be difficult for visually impaired users to navigate.
Advanced mode is a more traditional menu driven layout. It is simply text on a coloured background and while the touchpad does work, scrolling does not so the keyboard must be used for most menus. This mode might be difficult for users with a visual impairment to navigate.
Installation
This section contains instructions for installing and configuring Arch Linux
ASUS Linux
The
ASUS Linux
stack provides users of this laptop with a great many ASUS specific functions, to name a few:
Battery Charge Limit,
Multiplexer (GPU) Controls,
Panel Overdrive,
Much more.
It is highly recommended to install these tools for the optimal experience on these laptops.
Keyboard RGB control
The keyboard does not have RGB support, as is stated on
ASUS' support website
. It does, however, have support for simple lighting effects such as strobing.
The patches for controlling the backlight effects have been submitted and are available for inclusion with
Kernel
version 6.10 and after, no custom kernels needed.
The support of keyboard effects manipulation is available through the
asusctl package
.
Dedicated GPU mode
While
asusctl bios -D 0
is able to set this laptop into Dedicated(Ultimate) mode, doing this will make video output unavailable even on bios screen, ASUS logo, until you reach a X session. If you have any extra input configuration like
luks
you will have to touch type your passphrase in. There is an ongoing issue at
https://gitlab.com/asus-linux/asusctl/-/issues/404
Firmware
Other than changing the boot device order, no firmware changes are required for this laptop.
fwupd
supports this device.
Secure Boot
Warning
Grub users must first reinstall grub with the
tpm
module included and the shim module disabled before enabling Secure Boot. Failure to do so will likely render the system unbootable until you disable secure boot in firmware. For this laptop you should follow the instructions in the
ca keys
section of
GRUB#Secure Boot support
.
Manual Setup
Firmware will allow you to easily put
Secure Boot
into Setup/Custom mode so you can deploy your own keys with
keytool
.
There is no need to reset the TPM state to put firmware into setup mode, and also, if you have a usb thumbdrive with your CA files, or they are placed inside your ESP, you can deploy these certificates directly from the firmware as well.
Also, right after deploying your CA information, this laptop firmware will delete any additional EFI external drive boot entry it might have configured(USB, CD, PXE).
Automated Setup
If you do not want the hassle of manually handling keys then
sbctl
fully supports this laptop. See
Secure Boot#Assisted process with sbctl
for instructions.
Warning
Model
FX517ZR
will prompt a warning that permanent damage might happen if you deploy your CA files using
sbctl enroll-keys
. You can proceed by enrolling your CA through the ASUS firmware directly and copying the files from
/var/lib/sbctl
or your currently configured directory that holds those to a safe disk that you will
keytool
the files after the deploy
Standalone Firmware Update Files Availability
Some UEFI upgrades were not be available directly from ASUS website and required Windows 10 or 11 to fetch them because those are only provided through the "MyASUS" Windows Store app only (versions
FX517ZR.318
and
FX517ZR.319
specifically).
ASUS provides firmware version
FX517ZR.320
on
its website
, and an ASUS EZ Flash version of the file is available for users to flash from within the Setup interface.
Warning
Be aware that you have to disable Secure Boot or the Setup Interface will tell you it is an "Invalid Secure Boot EFI file" for this, and that some configurations like NVME VDM mode are reverted to the defaults after the upgrade which can be misleading and interpreted as unavailable disks or wrong
UUID
during boot making the boot process to fail.
It is confirmed that the
S3
suspend-to-ram issue highlighted on the next topic still persists, and the laptop does a "hard reboot" after back from suspension and configuring
s2idle
is the available workaround.
D-Bus notifications
Notifications provide feedback when a setting is changed using
asusctl
, they used to rely on a systemd service but have since been integrated into
asusctl
and should now work with no user intervention.
Tips and tricks
To maximize the battery life, follow the general tips at
power management
.
Battery charge limit
Setting a limit to the battery charge can be useful to preserve its longevity when the laptop is used as a static workstation for long period of times. Set your preferred limit (in percent, from 20 to 100) using:
# asusctl -c 60
60% is usually considered a stable charge state for lithium-based batteries.
Power profile
The power profile controls three settings: CPU scaling (only on Intel CPUs), Boost mode and fans speed. By default, three profiles are provided:
quiet
,
balanced
and
performance
. Custom profiles can be defined.
Fn+F5
is automatically bound to switch power profile. This will imitate the way the original ASUS service works on Windows.
Notifications
should be enabled in order to know which profile is selected each time the shortcut is pressed. A specific profile can be manually selected using:
# asusctl profile -P quiet
Disabling turbo boost
While not necessarily saving power, some user prefer to disable turbo boost for smoother power delivery and less heat. To temporarily disable boost, execute the following:
# echo 0 > /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpufreq/boost
Or use the power profiles from
asusctl
to handle this automatically, as explained in
#Power profile
.
DisplayPort
At the left side of the laptop (from the user's point of view) where the DC jack is located, there are two USB type C connectors, where the first one is a Thunderbolt 4 port and the other one is a USB 3.2 + DP 1.4 combo port.
If you are using more than one external monitor, use the Thunderbolt port to connect your DisplayPort to USB-C cable that leads to your secondary monitor.
After some testing, it was
proved
that using this combo port instead of the Thunderbolt port somehow limits the other two monitors (built-in and HDMI) that are configured as 144hz but will not be able to deliver more than 60 frames per second on games.
Function keys
These is the list of functions keys and how they are handled by the system. Some of them like
Fn+F2
are not visible to
libinput debug-events
meaning they are hardwired or lack of additional implementation to better handle them since they behave differently on Windows.
The first four keys on the following table are the dedicate buttons located right above
F1
to
F4
and since they are dedicated multimedia keys,
Fn
combination is not needed.
Key
Visible?
Marked?
Effect
Volume Down
Yes
Yes
XF86AudioLowerVolume
.
Volume Up
Yes
Yes
XF86AudioRaiseVolume
.
Mic Mute
Yes
Yes
F20
Function key.
ASUS Key
Yes
No
KEY_PROG3
code
202
. This key has a generic stamp on it which is bound to ASUS internal design.
Fn+F1
Yes
Yes
XF86AudioMute
.
Fn+F2
No
Yes
Lower keyboard brightness directly through hardware.
Fn+F3
No
Yes
Raise keyboard brightness directly through hardware. These two keyboard brightness behave differently on Windows, changing also led style/patterns.
Fn+F4
Yes
No
KEY_PROG4
code
203
. Function named "Aura", on Windows it cycles keyboard backlight effects, on Linux it does nothing
Fn+F5
No
No
A key with a Fan icon on it, cycles though available power profiles
Fn+F6
Yes
Yes
Shortcut to
Super
+
Shift
+
s
, which is the screenshot crop hotkey for Windows. Keycap logo makes sense in some way.
Fn+F7
Yes
Yes
XF86MonBrightnessDown
.
Fn+F8
Yes
Yes
XF86MonBrightnessUp
.
Fn+F9
Yes
Yes
Shortcut to
Super
+
p
, which is the external monitor tool for Windows. Keycap logo makes sense.
Fn+F10
Yes
No
Key maps to
F20
(press and release) and after that a sequence of
AltGr
+
KEY_ZENKAKUHANKAKU
code
85
keystroke. Logo seems to be a crossed touchpad but prints out this unusual sequence.
Fn+F11
Yes
Yes
KEY_SLEEP
code
142
. Little Zzz on key makes it meaningful.
Fn+F12
No
No
Key should be Airplane mode but does not show on libinput nor disables network interfaces.
Fn+Down
Yes
Yes
KEY_PAGEDOWN
code
109
.
Fn+Up
Yes
Yes
KEY_PAGEUP
code
104
.
Fn+Left
Yes
Yes
KEY_HOME
code
102
. This laptop has a dedicated Home key at the top of the numpad, and this key combination for it as well.
Fn+Right
Yes
Yes
KEY_END
code
107
.
Fn+Del
Yes
Yes
KEY_INSERT
code
110
. This laptop has these dual keys around the numpad, some of them repeating keys that are elsewhere.
Fn+Pause
Yes
Yes
No effect so all. Pressing
Fn+Pause
or
Pause
it will issue
KEY_PAUSE
code
119
on both cases
Fn+PrtSc
Yes
Yes
It will send BOTH keys,
PrtSc
and
SysRq
in that sequence, no matter if using
Fn+PrtSc
or
PrtSc
. Really weird.
Fn+Home
Yes
Yes
KEY_END
code
107
.
Fn+Numpad Enter
Yes
Yes
XF86Calculator
.
Fn+Right Ctrl
Yes
Yes
KEY_COMPOSE
code
127
.
Fn+Super
Yes
No
Issuing this key combination will lock
Super
into sending
KEY_UNKNOWN
code
240
, until you issue
Fn+Super
again to change this behavior.
Suspend and resume
This model is known for two outstanding firmware bugs that were not fixed by ASUS yet, and maybe they will not be fixed since the last BIOS update (v317) dates back from 2023-08-24. These bugs are:
When the laptop resumes from S3 sleep mode (
deep
at
/sys/power/mem_sleep
), it will work for about one minute and reset the laptop without logs or indications that the operating system did something: it just power cycles the laptop. Multiple reports can be found over the internet:
[1]
,
[2]
.
If
VMD
is enabled in firmware for Raid Mode disks(Intel RST), when memory sleep is configured for modern standby (
s2idle
at
/sys/power/mem_sleep
), there will be a significant power drain during the sleep, in magnitudes of 10% each 4 to 6 hours depending on the amount of software loaded.
This means that the user will have to configure
s2idle
instead of relying on firmware S3 suspend-to-ram, and also disable Intel RST for a decent suspend and resume configuration.
See also
Hardware Probe - i5 + RTX3060 version
Hardware Probe - i7 + RTX3070 version (additional Sabrent drive not included with base model)
Official ASUS TUF Dash F15(2022) page
TUF Dash F15 Online PDF manuals