This will serve as a note to myself as I found myself really looking for it every time I redid the device.

The Lenovo X220 has audio control buttons above the keyboard and they are nice to have working when using the device. I use i3-wm myself and I have a old version of my i3 config in my Github, yes it’s time to update it as well so I don’t have to do this every time.

Anyway, this time the writing is for Debian, I’m using the testing version but I would assume this works in any of them. First and foremost, I am using the kernel module thinkpad_acpi and alsa, if you are using pulseaudio you need to look for the commands for that.

In my i3-config I have the following

Audio setting

bindsym XF86AudioRaiseVolume exec “amixer -q sset Master,0 1+ unmute”
bindsym XF86AudioLowerVolume exec “amixer -q sset Master,0 1- unmute”
bindsym XF86AudioMute exec “amixer -q sset Master,0 toggle”

Reload your i3 config and you should see the mute led turn on and of as you press it. Volume up and down works as well.