KDE Plasma (*) Display Complications

Hey there OpenSUSE Community,

I hope you are all well.

I wanted to reach out to you all for some advice on how I could best handle a recent issue started on my lab box with KDE.

Today, when logging into the system I noticed that my screens (I have two) had changed from 1 / 2 (left to right) to 2 / 1 (right then leading into left). I went into display and changed them proper and then clicked apply - that’s when things got really interesting.

From there, my left screen was reaching into my right screen. Too, my right screen started to have a sort of rapid and slight space vibration to anything on that screen. I started to pull things over just to check and windows were fine in the left monitor but shaking in the right. While they were not shaking in the left monitor, the two did share something similar: they each had really huge icons and task bars.

I wasn’t sure what was wrong, so I figured a good restart might do the trick. It did not. So, I tried a full power down, turn off the power, and restore power and turn on (I came from Windows… can you tell? lol).

These steps did not resolve the issue. So, I went further and started a next test by downloading XFCE (just picking a random DE) and seeing if the system would react the same (I wasn’t sure if this was a video card issue). Upon logging into XFCE, I noticed a dramatic and stable change; there were no issues – at all.

I logged out to XFCE session and started Plasma (vanilla) and found the display issues were unchanged. Then, I tried Wayland and Full Wayland with poorer experiences than Vanilla Plasma.

Next, I reopened XFCE and did a DE removal of KDE Plamsa and reinstall. I attempted a new session start of KDE and the issues persisted.

To this point, I haven’t been able to decide other options I could try and resolve this issue. I’m not stuck to using KDE Plasma but I do really enjoy fixing and learning from experiences like this. So, I wanted to reach out to the community and ask for some suggestions, please.

Thank you!

I note that you’ve reported using openSUSE Leap 15.3. That is still in beta AFAIU. Anyway, some general advice follows:

Can you start by sharing your graphics hardware details?

inxi -Gxx

*You may need to install the inxi package first.

This may be useful as well…

xrandr

I’m not surprised that re-installing KDE Plasma 5 didn’t make a difference. The user’s display configuration would have persisted. The display layout is located at ~/.local/share/kscreen/ and can safely be removed if desired.

rm -rf ~/.local/share/kscreen/

Then logout and back in again.

https://community.kde.org/Solid/Projects/ScreenManagement

ISTR it might not be kscreen, but kscreen2. I disable kscreen in systemsettings startup & shutdown background services, and configure screens as necessary globally (variously in /etc/X11/) so that my configuration applies regardless what session type I log into. Thus, checking to be sure of the need or not for the “2” would be more work than I’m up for ATM.

I bring this up because something else I’ve never tested is trying to remove it while Plasma is running. I suspect it stays in RAM and is rewritten when Plasma is closed. That would make it necessary to be logged out of Plasma for removal to have the desired effect.

The problem might not be limited to whatever .local/share/kscreen/ contains, but also, or possibly instead of, Plasma’s on-disk cache. It may be necessary to do

rm -rf ~/.cache/*

while logged out of Plasma.

I’ve only ever needed to remove the kscreen config and restart the DE, or logout and back in again.

Good evening,

Thanks to both of your responses on this.

I’d like to return and provide an update (and I apologize that it took me near a full day, it’s been a long weekend lol).

While I started this off saying this was a KDE Plasma related issue, I’d like to start updating that by sharing that I am no longer confident this is a specific DE related issue. I come to this conclusion so easily because upon logging into XFCE’s DE, the system is acting extremely poor. The background is no longer able to be activated (just black on both screens), the tool bars are there and interactive, but the terminal window is unresponsive to all clicks or typing. Additionally, I have found that the drop down GUI related interfaces where I could type is also not responding.

So, now I have a poor running system in general no matter the DE which makes this pretty difficult for me to try and add new entries in from the list provided above (thank you each for your ideas and inputs, btw).

I’m started to question if I somehow broke the display options but not sure what I would have done since I haven’t really been changing much in the way the OpenSUSE 15.3 Beta configurations go.

Too, on my personal laptop which also have OpenSUSE 15.3, the system there is running stable without any complications. It’s only with this lab box.

I’m not going to attempt an extreme step which is to do a full system reinstall until you both have a moment to read this latest entry and provide further ideas or instructions that I could do and learn from.

Thank you both and I hope you are both well :slight_smile:

***UPDATE


Taking the advice from a friend, I did a simple useradd for a new users call test; logged out and back in and the DE experience was positive for both KDE Plasma and XFCE.

While I want to conclude that this the user account as the issue, I can’t be confident in that yet since XFCE was working perfectly last night and then broke today (for the main account). I’m going to let this sit for a day and see if the “test” user account (most recent built) has any breaks tomorrow. If not, then I believe it might be related to the main user’s account.

Also, on the positive side, I was able to run inxi -Gxx on the main user’s account and the read out is provided below:


mainuser@localhost:~> inxi -Gxx
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA GP106 [GeForce GTX 1060 6GB] driver: nouveau v: kernel 
  bus ID: 01:00.0 chip ID: 10de:1c03 
  Display: x11 server: X.org 1.20.3 driver: nouveau 
  unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,vesa alternate: nv,nvidia 
  resolution: <xdpyinfo missing> 
  OpenGL: renderer: NV136 v: 4.3 Mesa 20.2.4 direct render: Yes 

Thanks for the help with this and learning opportunity. :slight_smile:

I note that the Xorg nouveau DDX driver is in use, but in general the modesetting DDX driver should be preferred. Remove ‘xf86-video-nouveau’, and see if that improves things for you.

I agree not using xf86-video-nouveau might help. Package removal is the simpler way, but it is not terribly difficult to specify the alternative, modesetting, via /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/*.conf, an optional file you would create if desired with a Device section specifying the desired driver. Once set up, it’s simple to try one for a while, then a bit more quickly switch to the other if any difference between them seems hard to discern.

Limitation to one user screams bad cache! Try removing the content of ~/.cache/, while logged out of the GUI. It’s just a cache. Nothing is lost by its removal except a bit of time on first subsequent GUI login. The cache gets regenerated automatically if and when needed.

I’ve never needed to do this (apart from when clawing back wasted space on occaision), but I agree that it doesn’t hurt, and I also concur that it is telling that a new user account is not affected.

Good evening everyone,

Thanks for the replies and assistance. Please excuse me if I have overlooked something in my work to creating a solution while I implement the information shared in the post provided.

So far, this is where I am at now after implementing the above recommendations (it has improved but not fully).

While in XFCE, since it was the only DE that would respond for me, I was able to open Yast Software Management to help in the removal of the package: xf86-video-nouveau. This method was successful. Following this step, I wasn’t sure if the system needed a restart so I moved forward with doing that procedure as a thought it might be required.

Upon logging back in, I noticed the experience with both DE’s (XFCE and KDE) were the same as before without any improvement. To make sure I followed the correct understanding, I opened Yast Software Management again to verify that this package had been removed (xf86-video-nouveau) and it showed as no longer an active system package. While in there, I did a full search on nouveau and noticed that the 3D piece was active, so I went ahead and removed that since I remember hearing it could create issues with systems.

Seeing that the change of system desktop experience hadn’t changed, I moved forward with the next suggestion of ~/.cache/ & rm -rf * the full contents within the directory. Following the previous system activation change, I did a simple sudo init 6 and let the system restart with the changes.

Positive side, this did make a vast improvement with XFCE but KDE is still very odd with sizing issues and the right screen still persist with a shaking experience.

I’m looking into possible further solutions but nothing more positive to report to you all just yet.

Thanks again and I hope to further this discussion with some positive improvements on my part. We’ll see by tomorrow, I hope lol :slight_smile:

Reads like some progress. Please the output from

xrandr

Thinking about your comments re image shaking…

From there, my left screen was reaching into my right screen. Too, my right screen started to have a sort of rapid and slight space vibration to anything on that screen. I started to pull things over just to check and windows were fine in the left monitor but shaking in the right. While they were not shaking in the left monitor, the two did share something similar: they each had really huge icons and task bars.

…FWIW, here’s a similar thread where turning off and on the compositor was tried, and changing HDMI cables to no avail.
https://forum.kde.org/viewtopic.php?f=309&t=165294

The OP there found that changing the refresh rate (via xrandr) helped. Display mode changes can be done on the fly, and if found to work can be added to an “autostart” script (or other similar approach) to make the desired changes persistent. YMMV.

Along with input/output from xrandr, please provide input/output from the last of running the following commands

sudo zypper in xdpyinfo
susepaste /var/log/Xorg.0.log
sudo inxi -U
inxi -Gay

and provide the URL provided by the susepaste command.

Good evening,

Thanks to both of you for sticking with me and helping me progress this further.

Just to report before I provide the outputs requested: XFCE is still stable on the next day but, sadly, yes, KDE Plasma is still having the expanded screen issues and shaking on the right monitor. To help with the outputs provided below, the right monitor is assigned as - Display 2 and I believe that in the xrandr this means it is HDMI 2.

**Here is the outputs requested (xrandr first):
**

USERNAME@localhost:~> xrandrScreen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 3840 x 1080, maximum 16384 x 16384
DVI-D-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DP-1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DP-2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
HDMI-1 connected 1920x1080+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 527mm x 296mm
   1920x1080     60.00*+  74.97    59.96    50.00    59.94    59.93  
   1920x1080i    60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1680x1050     59.95    59.88  
   1400x1050     74.76    59.98  
   1600x900      59.94    59.95    59.82  
   1280x1024     75.02    60.02  
   1440x900      59.90  
   1400x900      59.96    59.88  
   1280x960      60.00  
   1440x810      60.00    59.97  
   1368x768      59.88    59.85  
   1280x800      59.99    59.97    59.81    59.91  
   1152x864      75.00  
   1280x720      60.00    59.99    59.86    60.00    50.00    59.94    59.74  
   1024x768      75.05    60.04    75.03    70.07    60.00  
   960x720       75.00    60.00  
   928x696       75.00    60.05  
   896x672       75.05    60.01  
   1024x576      59.95    59.96    59.90    59.82  
   960x600       59.93    60.00  
   832x624       74.55  
   960x540       59.96    59.99    59.63    59.82  
   800x600       75.00    70.00    65.00    60.00    72.19    75.00    60.32    56.25  
   840x525       60.01    59.88  
   864x486       59.92    59.57  
   720x576       50.00  
   700x525       74.76    59.98  
   800x450       59.95    59.82  
   720x480       60.00    59.94  
   640x512       75.02    60.02  
   700x450       59.96    59.88  
   640x480       60.00    75.00    72.81    75.00    66.67    60.00    59.94  
   720x405       59.51    58.99  
   720x400       70.08  
   684x384       59.88    59.85  
   640x400       59.88    59.98  
   576x432       75.00  
   640x360       59.86    59.83    59.84    59.32  
   512x384       75.03    70.07    60.00  
   512x288       60.00    59.92  
   416x312       74.66  
   480x270       59.63    59.82  
   400x300       72.19    75.12    60.32    56.34  
   432x243       59.92    59.57  
   320x240       72.81    75.00    60.05  
   360x202       59.51    59.13  
   320x180       59.84    59.32  
HDMI-2 connected 1920x1080+1920+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 527mm x 296mm
   1920x1080     60.00*+  74.97    59.96    50.00    59.94    59.93  
   1920x1080i    60.00    50.00    59.94  
   1680x1050     59.95    59.88  
   1400x1050     74.76    59.98  
   1600x900      59.94    59.95    59.82  
   1280x1024     75.02    60.02  
   1440x900      59.90  
   1400x900      59.96    59.88  
   1280x960      60.00  
   1440x810      60.00    59.97  
   1368x768      59.88    59.85  
   1280x800      59.99    59.97    59.81    59.91  
   1152x864      75.00  
   1280x720      60.00    59.99    59.86    60.00    50.00    59.94    59.74  
   1024x768      75.05    60.04    75.03    70.07    60.00  
   960x720       75.00    60.00  
   928x696       75.00    60.05  
   896x672       75.05    60.01  
   1024x576      59.95    59.96    59.90    59.82  
   960x600       59.93    60.00  
   832x624       74.55  
   960x540       59.96    59.99    59.63    59.82  
   800x600       75.00    70.00    65.00    60.00    72.19    75.00    60.32    56.25  
   840x525       60.01    59.88  
   864x486       59.92    59.57  
   720x576       50.00  
   700x525       74.76    59.98  
   800x450       59.95    59.82  
   720x480       60.00    59.94  
   640x512       75.02    60.02  
   700x450       59.96    59.88  
   640x480       60.00    75.00    72.81    75.00    66.67    60.00    59.94  
   720x405       59.51    58.99  
   720x400       70.08  
   684x384       59.88    59.85  
   640x400       59.88    59.98  
   576x432       75.00  
   640x360       59.86    59.83    59.84    59.32  
   512x384       75.03    70.07    60.00  
   512x288       60.00    59.92  
   416x312       74.66  
   480x270       59.63    59.82  
   400x300       72.19    75.12    60.32    56.34  
   432x243       59.92    59.57  
   320x240       72.81    75.00    60.05  
   360x202       59.51    59.13  
   320x180       59.84    59.32  

**

Here are the readouts for mrmazda’s request:
**
sudo zypper in xdpyinfo:

Resolving package dependencies...


The following 2 NEW packages are going to be installed:
  libXxf86dga1 xdpyinfo


2 new packages to install.

susepaste /var/log/Xorg.0.log:

USERNAME@localhost:~> susepaste /var/log/Xorg.0.logPasted as:
   https://susepaste.org/91767244
   https://paste.opensuse.org/91767244
Link is also in your clipboard.

sudo inxi -U:

gargarr@localhost:~> sudo inxi -U
[sudo] password for root: 
Starting inxi self updater.
Using tiny as downloader.
Currently running inxi version number: 3.1.00
Current version patch number: 00
Current version release date: 2020-04-22
Updating inxi in /usr/bin using main branch as download source...
Successfully updated to main branch version: 3.3.03
New main branch version patch number: 00
New main branch version release date: 2021-03-17
To run the new version, just start inxi again.
----------------------------------------


Starting download of man page file now.
Downloading Man page file...
Download successful. Compressing file...
Download and install of man page successful.
Check to make sure it works: man inxi

inxi -Gay:

gargarr@localhost:~> inxi -Gay
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA GP106 [GeForce GTX 1060 6GB] driver: nouveau v: kernel 
  bus-ID: 01:00.0 chip-ID: 10de:1c03 class-ID: 0300 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.3 driver: loaded: modesetting 
  unloaded: fbdev,vesa alternate: nouveau,nv,nvidia display-ID: :0.0 
  screens: 1 
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 3840x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 1016x285mm (40.0x11.2") 
  s-diag: 1055mm (41.5") 
  Monitor-1: HDMI-1 res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 93 size: 527x296mm (20.7x11.7") 
  diag: 604mm (23.8") 
  Monitor-2: HDMI-2 res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 93 size: 527x296mm (20.7x11.7") 
  diag: 604mm (23.8") 
  OpenGL: renderer: llvmpipe (LLVM 11.0.1 256 bits) v: 4.5 Mesa 20.2.4 
  compat-v: 3.1 direct render: Yes 

Thanks to both of you! I owe you each a coffee :slight_smile: I mean, it’s kind of the best (or tea… sure, that’s ok too :smiley: )

Thanks for supplying that info. If you swap the monitor connections, does the fault move with the change? Do the monitors have more than one HDMI input available to try? Are the monitor settings identical?

FWIW, here’s a recent Manjaro thread where a slight vertical shake was observed…one user reported changing the refresh rate and back again was enough to resolve the issue. It could be a subtle timing issue.

The "*+ " indicates use of native display specifications, for you in my estimation making software less suspect than hardware. First thing to try is switching cables between the two displays. Does the corruption stay with the display, or move with the cable? Stay with display explains itself - display problem. Stays with cable could be an NVidia problem, or a cable problem, or a software problem.

Boot to any live KDE or XFCE media and the problem remains reproducible suggests likely hardware trouble.

In Plasma you could try disabling compositing to lessen graphics load.

written close to three hours ago, but interrupted and forgotten, until now. :stuck_out_tongue: ]

deano_ferrari & mrmazda,

While I wanted to come at this subject and attempt the provided ideas you both have shared, I apologize but i won’t be able to attempt them until tomorrow due to work needs.

I do community based IT-Security presentations and had an audio problem with my OpenSUSE Laptop that had to be resolved which distracted me the entire night before the presentation and after :stuck_out_tongue:

However, I didn’t want to be disrespectful by not replying to your messages. I am planning to return to the suggestions and start on them asap tomorrow. Thanks again for each of your time and patience with me.

I hope you each have a great day and next day!

All good. We’re all volunteers. People help when they can, and you can reply when you have free time. :slight_smile:

Good evening deano_ferrari,

Thanks for understanding, and thanks for your volunteer activities here in this community. My goal is to learn so having such a friendly volunteer team of community members patiently open to helping me achieve that goal is very appreciative. (I too am a heavy volunteer; holding three different lead positions in my community at home. :slight_smile: )

I have some positive updates for this thread and I think it’s ready to be closed! (BOOM! :smiley: )

Here are the issues that were raised with this thread and how we have come to resolve them thanks to the help received here:

**Issue: Night Color would quit
**Resolution: While uncertain as to a long term solution, I am starting to think that this is related to KDE caching. During periods of me going into Display Configurations, the Night Color will return to it being no longer aware it was in use even though it was activated. The temporary solution to this is doing a simple restart or sudo init 6. Upon return, the Night Color is active again.

  • Creating a Test user account, I found that this Night Color removal if going into Display Configuration happens too.

Issue: KDE is completely broken and unable to log into Plasma DE session

  • This was when it was broken in KDE and then later bled into XFCE

Solution: I believe the solution here was related to the cleaning of the ~/.cache (rm -rf ~/.cache)

  • My assumption for this solution is based on the memory of my attempt to solve the Night Color issue, I played around a lot with the Nigh Color activation options over and over again. I believe this likely caused some kind of configuration editing issue that caused the full system to be confused later on.
    [LIST]
  • I’m not confident enough in my awareness of Linux to be certain on this. My assumption is based on reaction changes after I ran the cache clearing and then did a sudo init 6.

[/LIST]
**Issue: Right screen is hazy/shaky
**Resolution: Complete! Attempting the recommended further solutions were easy to do and helped me better understand more fault areas on my system. However, the issue still persisted and only in KDE Plasma. It wasn’t until I opened up Display Configurations to look at what could possibly be different with the two monitors… (palms face - I’m embarrassed with myself)

  • Checking the two monitors more closely, I saw the issue: refresh rate. palms face
    [LIST]
  • While I believe you both helped with this suggestion before, I clearly did not do enough thorough review. The left monitor is 75Hz while the right was set at 30Hz. Equaling them out, the shaky/hazy look changed - immediately.

[/LIST]
Thoughts: I believe I must have changed the refresh rate when the caching issue occurred not realizing I made the refresh rate change and also accepted the change.

Thanks for the help on this!

This has been a really fun activity for me; so, thanks to you each for helping me troubleshoot and learn a TON throughout the whole process. While I am sure it had some stressful moments for me, this was really fun all around.

Lesson I have learned from this is that I am going to keep this lab first layer pretty stable (no more playing around) and instead I am going to enable a KVM system to start doing my curious tinkering. :smiley: Also, I am going to be reading the full OpenSUSE documentation that is provided as well as get myself a copy of the UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook 5th Edition.

I hope you each the best going forward and I look forward to being more active in this community. :slight_smile: