Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

jlucas · 2020-08-09 10:53:35

Occasionally, my screen goes black for about 5 seconds, and most of the times I have no idea what's causing it.

It happens every time when I switch between two X sessions and between an X session and a tty (in both ways), but doesn't when switching between ttys.
Sometimes I open a web page on a new tab and when I switch to it, the screen goes black. This doesn't happen every time and I have no idea what's causing it. It has happened on youtube, reddit, even the arch forums.
Sometimes it randomly happens when gaming.

I'm here looking for some advice on how I can troubleshoot it.

I'm teeing the output of startx to a file and it doesn't seem to report any errors when the screen goes black
The only error showing on /var/log/Xorg.0.log is:
(EE) Failed to load module "nv" (module does not exist, 0)
but it also shows that on my laptop also running Arch, and it doesn't have the screen problem.

I'm using the proprietary nvidia drivers. I just noticed that I have nouveau installed, but it's not in use.

The problem is not related to the monitor, I ran Arch Linux ARM on a raspberry pi and it worked fine.

V1del · 2020-08-09 11:19:45

Add nvidia-drm.modeset=1 to your kernel parameters if it isn't there yet.

jlucas · 2020-08-09 12:12:19

V1del wrote:

Add nvidia-drm.modeset=1 to your kernel parameters if it isn't there yet.

Thanks for replying but it didn't solve it.
I only checked the black screen when switching from X to tty, since I don't know what triggers the others

edit: I don't know if it's related to setting that kernel parameter, but I left my computer for like less than 5 minutes and when I came back it was completely frozen, couldn't switch to tty, no blinking lights on the keyboard, I had to hold the power button.

Last edited by jlucas (2020-08-09 12:28:54)

jlucas · 2020-09-02 12:38:09

seth, here is the output of "sudo journalctl -b": http://ix.io/2vXe
I didn't run it right after the screen went black, but it did black out after I opened my browser (brave btw) and restore the tabs, as it wasn't closed properly due to a crash.

seth · 2020-09-02 13:49:35

There's nothing in that log to explain this. No GPU, CPU or IO errors. No recorded stalls.
If it was for VT changes, I'd say the output goes into DPMS for a mode change, but that doesn't fit the browser situation…

There're 3 journalctl calls, I assume the problem happened between the last two?

Sep 02 13:13:22 hp dbus-daemon[382]: [system] Activating via systemd: service name='org.freedesktop.home1' unit='dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service' requested by ':1.45' (uid=0 pid=2142 comm="sudo journalctl -b ")
Sep 02 13:13:22 hp dbus-daemon[382]: [system] Activation via systemd failed for unit 'dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service': Unit dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service not found.
Sep 02 13:13:22 hp sudo[2142]: pam_systemd_home(sudo:account): systemd-homed is not available: Unit dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service not found.
Sep 02 13:13:22 hp sudo[2142]:       jl : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jl ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/journalctl -b
Sep 02 13:13:22 hp sudo[2142]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root(uid=0) by (uid=0)
Sep 02 13:13:30 hp audit[2142]: USER_END pid=2142 uid=0 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:session_close grantors=pam_limits,pam_unix,pam_permit acct="root" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:30 hp audit[2142]: CRED_DISP pid=2142 uid=0 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:setcred grantors=pam_faillock,pam_permit,pam_faillock acct="root" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:30 hp sudo[2142]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session closed for user root
Sep 02 13:13:30 hp kernel: audit: type=1106 audit(1599048810.120:52): pid=2142 uid=0 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:session_close grantors=pam_limits,pam_unix,pam_permit acct="root" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:30 hp kernel: audit: type=1104 audit(1599048810.120:53): pid=2142 uid=0 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:setcred grantors=pam_faillock,pam_permit,pam_faillock acct="root" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp dbus-daemon[382]: [system] Activating via systemd: service name='org.freedesktop.home1' unit='dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service' requested by ':1.46' (uid=0 pid=2165 comm="sudo journalctl -b ")
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp dbus-daemon[382]: [system] Activation via systemd failed for unit 'dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service': Unit dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service not found.
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp sudo[2165]: pam_systemd_home(sudo:account): systemd-homed is not available: Unit dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service not found.
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp audit[2165]: USER_ACCT pid=2165 uid=1000 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:accounting grantors=pam_permit,pam_time acct="jl" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp audit[2165]: CRED_REFR pid=2165 uid=0 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:setcred grantors=pam_faillock,pam_permit,pam_env,pam_faillock acct="root" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp audit[2165]: USER_START pid=2165 uid=0 auid=1000 ses=1 msg='op=PAM:session_open grantors=pam_limits,pam_unix,pam_permit acct="root" exe="/usr/bin/sudo" hostname=? addr=? terminal=/dev/pts/0 res=success'
Sep 02 13:13:32 hp sudo[2165]:       jl : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/jl ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/usr/bin/journalctl -b

jlucas · 2020-09-02 14:41:54

seth wrote:

There's nothing in that log to explain this. No GPU, CPU or IO errors. No recorded stalls.
If it was for VT changes, I'd say the output goes into DPMS for a mode change, but that doesn't fit the browser situation…

Any idea how I could fix it if it were that dpms thing?

I just remembered that 2 or 3 times, the screen blacked out for longer than usual and my monitor showed a message - kinda like the message it shows when it can't find any input signal - saying something that I cant remember and I couldn't write it down or photograph it as it started working a few seconds later.
As I said before, I didn't think it was a monitor problem since I didn't get that problem with a raspberry pi connected to the same monitor, but I guess I'll try another monitor just to be sure.

Also, I don't know much about driver stuff so I just installed anything that had nvidia on the name. Here's the output of "pacman -Qs nvidia":

$ pacman -Qs nvidia
local/egl-wayland 1.1.5-1
    EGLStream-based Wayland external platform
local/lib32-nvidia-utils 450.66-1
    NVIDIA drivers utilities (32-bit)
local/libvdpau 1.4-1
    Nvidia VDPAU library
local/libxnvctrl 450.66-1
    NVIDIA NV-CONTROL X extension
local/nvidia 450.66-16
    NVIDIA drivers for linux
local/nvidia-dkms 450.66-1
    NVIDIA drivers - module sources
local/nvidia-settings 450.66-1
    Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
local/nvidia-utils 450.66-1
    NVIDIA drivers utilities
local/xf86-video-nouveau 1.0.16-2 (xorg-drivers)
    Open Source 3D acceleration driver for nVidia cards

Is it possible that I installed any unnecessary / conflicting packages?

jlucas · 2020-09-03 20:38:17

It's definitely an nvidia problem. I uninstalled nvidia and the screen no longer goes black, but I wouldn't call that a solution...
Right now I'm using nouveau and it painfully lags when I scroll on my web browser. I'm probably missing something.

EDIT: oops never mind, the black screen when switching between X and tty is gone, but it just whent black after I opened my browser. However the duration of the black screen was shorter. That didn't happen before I added some kernel and mkinitcpio stuff for nouveau.

Last edited by jlucas (2020-09-03 21:05:38)

seth · 2020-09-03 21:02:59

Undervoltage?
Can you force the GPU to stay on a low clockrate or "desktop mode" in nvidia-settings?
Does it happen nevertheless?

jlucas · 2020-09-03 23:02:22

seth wrote:

Undervoltage?
Can you force the GPU to stay on a low clockrate or "desktop mode" in nvidia-settings?
Does it happen nevertheless?

Either I'm missing something or that's not possible. Under "PowerMizer" I see "Graphics Clock: 139 Mhz". "Adaptive Clocking" is always set to Enabled. I cannot change those. The only thing I can change there is "Preferred Mode", and it gives me 3 options: "Auto", "Adaptive" and "Prefer Maximum Performance".
Is there any way to change those that I missed? Is this "Graphics Clock" what you were talking about? Thanks

seth · 2020-09-04 06:26:51

Edit your nvidia xorg configlet to contain sth. like

Section "Device"
    Identifier "Default nvidia Device"
    Driver      "nvidia"
#…
        Option  "CoolBits"                              "24"
#…
EndSection

Do you get the ability to edit a power mode (the performance level one)?

jlucas · 2020-09-04 20:23:42

seth wrote:

Edit your nvidia xorg configlet to contain sth. like
Section "Device"
    Identifier "Default nvidia Device"
    Driver      "nvidia"
#…
        Option  "CoolBits"                              "24"
#…
EndSection
Do you get the ability to edit a power mode (the performance level one)?

Now I get the ability to change the "Graphics Clock Offset" and the "Memory Transfer Rate Offset".
It says it changes all the levels but I only see it changing Performance Level 2. If I set the "Preferred Mode" to "Prefer Maximum Performance", it seems to always stay on level 2.
I set both values to the minimum allowed, and nothing changed. Then, I set them to the maximum allowed and, I believe it was when I changed the "Memory Transfer Offset" and the screen went black until I forced the computer to power off. I tried blindly setting it back to 0 and I tried switching to the tty and it didn't solve it. I pressed the power button multiple times and it didn't power off. After some time I had to hold down the power button to force it.

seth · 2020-09-04 20:48:32

You might want to try to reproduce it to ensure this wasn't a fluke.

If it is, this sounds like some sort of HW issue and the best suggestion I could make was to limit the memory clock - the actual safe level will be some sort of TAE. You probably want to start out low and if the issue doesn't occur any longer, raise the value a bit, wait and see, raise the value a bit, wait and see …

Arch Linux

#1 2020-08-09 10:53:35

Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#2 2020-08-09 11:19:45

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#3 2020-08-09 12:12:19

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#4 2020-09-02 12:38:09

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#5 2020-09-02 13:49:35

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#6 2020-09-02 14:41:54

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#7 2020-09-03 20:38:17

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#8 2020-09-03 21:02:59

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#9 2020-09-03 23:02:22

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#10 2020-09-04 06:26:51

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#11 2020-09-04 20:23:42

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

#12 2020-09-04 20:48:32

Re: Screen goes black when browsing, gaming, switching between X and tty

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