I found some really old instructions, followed them and it sure LOOKED like it worked!
But it's still not an option in my menus...
Is this not even a thing ..?
1 Like
With that fingerprint reader plugged in, could you provide the report from
inxi -Fazy
That should tell us what you are working with and all the specs for hardware and interactions.
There was an earlier instance of someone trying to use such a reader for login. You may find something useful in that article:
You may also wish to review the articles at
4 Likes
I will read the rest later but I ran the command for now:
System:
Kernel: 6.14.0-15-generic arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 14.2.0
clocksource: tsc avail: acpi_pm
parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-6.14.0-15-generic
root=UUID=c5f17df2-31fa-4b97-8408-7647ca19e158 ro quiet splash
vt.handoff=7
Desktop: MATE v: 1.26.2 wm: marco v: 1.26.2 with: mate-panel
tools: mate-screensaver vt: 7 dm: LightDM v: 1.32.0 Distro: Ubuntu 25.04
(Plucky Puffin)
Machine:
Type: Laptop System: Dell product: Inspiron 16 7640 2-in-1 v: N/A
serial: <superuser required> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <superuser required>
Mobo: Dell model: 0506WF v: A00 serial: <superuser required> part-nu: 0C96
uuid: <superuser required> UEFI: Dell v: 1.11.0 date: 03/05/2025
Battery:
ID-1: BAT0 charge: 44.1 Wh (69.6%) condition: 63.4/63.4 Wh (100.0%)
volts: 16.1 min: 15.2 model: SMP DELL N9XX1457 type: Li-poly serial: <filter>
status: discharging cycles: 36
CPU:
Info: model: Intel Core Ultra 5 125U bits: 64 type: MST AMCP
arch: Meteor Lake level: v3 note: check built: 2023+ process: Intel 4 (7nm)
family: 6 model-id: 0xAA (170) stepping: 4 microcode: 0x20
Topology: cpus: 1x dies: 1 clusters: 5 cores: 12 threads: 14 mt: 2 tpc: 2
st: 10 smt: enabled cache: L1: 1.2 MiB desc: d-10x32 KiB, 2x48 KiB; i-12x64
KiB L2: 10 MiB desc: 5x2 MiB L3: 12 MiB desc: 1x12 MiB
Speed (MHz): avg: 400 min/max: 400/4300:3600:2100 scaling:
driver: intel_pstate governor: powersave cores: 1: 400 2: 400 3: 400 4: 400
5: 400 6: 400 7: 400 8: 400 9: 400 10: 400 11: 400 12: 400 13: 400 14: 400
bogomips: 75264
Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Vulnerabilities:
Type: gather_data_sampling status: Not affected
Type: ghostwrite status: Not affected
Type: itlb_multihit status: Not affected
Type: l1tf status: Not affected
Type: mds status: Not affected
Type: meltdown status: Not affected
Type: mmio_stale_data status: Not affected
Type: reg_file_data_sampling status: Not affected
Type: retbleed status: Not affected
Type: spec_rstack_overflow status: Not affected
Type: spec_store_bypass mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via
prctl
Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer
sanitization
Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Enhanced / Automatic IBRS; IBPB: conditional;
RSB filling; PBRSB-eIBRS: Not affected; BHI: BHI_DIS_S
Type: srbds status: Not affected
Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected
Graphics:
Device-1: Intel Meteor Lake-P [Intel Graphics] vendor: Dell driver: i915
v: kernel alternate: xe arch: Xe-LPG process: Intel 4 (7nm+) built: 2023+
ports: active: eDP-1 empty: DP-1, DP-2, DP-3, DP-4, HDMI-A-1
bus-ID: 0000:00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:7d45 class-ID: 0300
Device-2: Realtek Integrated_Webcam_FHD driver: uvcvideo type: USB rev: 2.0
speed: 480 Mb/s lanes: 1 mode: 2.0 bus-ID: 3-7:3 chip-ID: 0bda:5583
class-ID: fe01 serial: <filter>
Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.16 with: Xwayland v: 24.1.6
compositor: marco v: 1.26.2 driver: X: loaded: modesetting
unloaded: fbdev,vesa dri: iris gpu: i915 display-ID: :0 screens: 1
Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1200 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x317mm (20.00x12.48")
s-diag: 599mm (23.57")
Monitor-1: eDP-1 model: BOE Display 0x0a59 built: 2021 res: mode: 1920x1200
hz: 60 scale: 100% (1) dpi: 141 gamma: 1.2 size: 345x215mm (13.58x8.46")
diag: 407mm (16") ratio: 16:10 modes: 1920x1200
API: EGL v: 1.5 hw: drv: intel iris platforms: device: 0 drv: iris
device: 1 drv: swrast gbm: drv: iris surfaceless: drv: iris x11: drv: iris
inactive: wayland
API: OpenGL v: 4.6 compat-v: 4.5 vendor: intel mesa v: 25.0.3-1ubuntu2
glx-v: 1.4 direct-render: yes renderer: Mesa Intel Graphics (MTL)
device-ID: 8086:7d45 memory: 7.36 GiB unified: yes
Info: Tools: api: eglinfo,glxinfo x11: xdriinfo, xdpyinfo, xprop, xrandr
Audio:
Device-1: Intel Meteor Lake-P HD Audio vendor: Dell
driver: sof-audio-pci-intel-mtl
alternate: snd_hda_intel,snd_sof_pci_intel_mtl bus-ID: 0000:00:1f.3
chip-ID: 8086:7e28 class-ID: 0401
API: ALSA v: k6.14.0-15-generic status: kernel-api
tools: alsactl,alsamixer,amixer
Server-1: PipeWire v: 1.2.7 status: active with: 1: pipewire-pulse
status: active 2: wireplumber status: active 3: pipewire-alsa type: plugin
tools: pw-cat,pw-cli,wpctl
Network:
Device-1: Intel Meteor Lake PCH CNVi WiFi driver: iwlwifi v: kernel
bus-ID: 0000:00:14.3 chip-ID: 8086:7e40 class-ID: 0280
IF: wlp0s20f3 state: up mac: <filter>
IF-ID-1: ipv6leakintrf0 state: unknown speed: N/A duplex: N/A mac: <filter>
IF-ID-2: proton0 state: unknown speed: N/A duplex: N/A mac: N/A
Info: services: NetworkManager, systemd-timesyncd, wpa_supplicant
Bluetooth:
Device-1: Intel AX211 Bluetooth driver: btusb v: 0.8 type: USB rev: 2.0
speed: 12 Mb/s lanes: 1 mode: 1.1 bus-ID: 3-10:4 chip-ID: 8087:0033
class-ID: e001
Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 0 state: up address: <filter> bt-v: 5.3
lmp-v: 12 sub-v: 3e14 hci-v: 12 rev: 3e14 class-ID: 7c010c
Info: acl-mtu: 1021:4 sco-mtu: 96:6 link-policy: rswitch sniff
link-mode: peripheral accept service-classes: rendering, capturing, object
transfer, audio, telephony
RAID:
Hardware-1: Intel Volume Management Device NVMe RAID Controller Intel
driver: vmd v: 0.6 port: N/A bus-ID: 0000:00:0e.0 chip-ID: 8086:7d0b rev:
class-ID: 0104
Drives:
Local Storage: total: 1.82 TiB used: 93.03 GiB (5.0%)
SMART Message: Required tool smartctl not installed. Check --recommends
ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 maj-min: 259:0 vendor: Crucial model: CT2000P3PSSD8
size: 1.82 TiB block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 63.2 Gb/s
lanes: 4 tech: SSD serial: <filter> fw-rev: P9CR40A temp: 21.9 C
scheme: GPT
Partition:
ID-1: / raw-size: 474.3 GiB size: 465.78 GiB (98.20%) used: 54.97 GiB (11.8%)
fs: ext4 dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2 maj-min: 259:2
ID-2: /boot/efi raw-size: 1.05 GiB size: 1.05 GiB (99.80%)
used: 6.1 MiB (0.6%) fs: vfat dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1 maj-min: 259:1
Swap:
Kernel: swappiness: 60 (default) cache-pressure: 100 (default) zswap: no
ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 4 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2
file: /swap.img
Sensors:
System Temperatures: cpu: 30.0 C mobo: 27.0 C
Fan Speeds (rpm): cpu: 0
Info:
Memory: total: 16 GiB note: est. available: 15.08 GiB used: 6.88 GiB (45.6%)
Processes: 486 Power: uptime: 1d 6h 24m states: freeze,mem,disk
suspend: s2idle wakeups: 11 hibernate: platform avail: shutdown, reboot,
suspend, test_resume image: 6 GiB services: mate-power-manager,
power-profiles-daemon, thermald, upowerd Init: systemd v: 257
default: graphical tool: systemctl
Packages: 2388 pm: dpkg pkgs: 2357 libs: 1228 tools: apt,apt-get pm: snap
pkgs: 31 Compilers: gcc: 14.2.0 Shell: Bash v: 5.2.37
running-in: mate-terminal inxi: 3.3.37
Weird! I neither see nor recognize the device info for the fingerprint reader. 
1 Like
lol. well, i don't recognize that command. 
The instructions I used are here: Fingerprint Login Ubuntu MATE
I honestly expected it to fail, it's an onboard fingerprint reader not a USB, but It didn't. It even allowed me to scan my fingerprint, accepted and rejected various finger positions as one would expect from a functional fingerprint scan.
So..it's clearly IN There. But I can't figure out how to use it, not to log into the computer as I'd hoped, or any other way. it's odd.
THIS. This was the answer.
I did it, I remember typing the command, but it clearly didn't save. I just did it again and now it works!! Woohoo!! 
3 Likes
Very happy to hear that worked for you!
2 Likes