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#1 2012-11-06 20:14:22

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

[not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

Hello,

I am trying to get my second display working, but until now it is only displaying black.
Furthermore, when connected to my laptop it is rendered unresponsive, meaning that no OSD buttons (including the standby button) trigger any action at all.
my xrandr -q output:

 Screen 0: minimum 320 x 200, current 1366 x 768, maximum 8192 x 8192
LVDS1 connected 1366x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 277mm x 156mm
   1366x768       60.0*+
   1024x768       60.0
   800x600        60.3     56.2
   640x480        59.9
VGA1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
HDMI1 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DP1 connected 1366x768+0+0 (normal left inverted right x axis y axis) 510mm x 287mm
   1920x1080      60.0 +
   1680x1050      60.0
   1680x945       60.0
   1400x1050      60.0
   1600x900       60.0
   1280x1024      60.0
   1440x900       59.9
   1280x960       60.0
   1366x768       60.0*
   1360x768       60.0
   1280x800       59.8
   1280x768       59.9
   1280x720       60.0
   1024x768       60.0
   1024x576       60.0
   800x600        60.3
   848x480        60.0
   720x480        59.9
   640x480        60.0     59.9     59.9
   720x400        70.1
HDMI2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
HDMI3 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DP2 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)
DP3 disconnected (normal left inverted right x axis y axis)

Setting different resolutions, frequencies etc. did not provoke any result yet. Also I tried turning it off with xrandr, on again, but it does not work.
My windowmanager is awesome wm with nearly the default configuration (added a few widgets for battery etc.), and it actually seems as if it is somehow recognising the second display. That is, if I enable the display I am able to move my cursor further than the right side of the edge of my laptop's monitor. However, any attempt, to display information on the second screen fails, such as sending windows to it or opening them on the second monitor.

I am using a Lenovo X220 running Arch Linux with Kernel 3.6.6, fully up-to-date. Also, I am using an Eizo EV2333 as a second display.
The display works perfectly fine when running Win7 and also worked with Arch some time ago (approx. 3months). It is connected via Displayport.

If anyone has an idea or suggestion on what I might be doing wrong, I very much appreciate your help!
Also, I would be pleased to post more debug information, depending on what would help!
Thank you very much for your time.

Also, if this the the wrong section in the forum for this post, I apologise. Might be a laptop specific issue after all...

Last edited by replax (2013-01-22 17:45:23)

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#2 2012-11-06 23:35:09

nomorewindows
Member
Registered: 2010-04-03
Posts: 3,362

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

Move your mouse over to the other monitor...unless the monitor isn't even on.


I may have to CONSOLE you about your usage of ridiculously easy graphical interfaces...
Look ma, no mouse.

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#3 2012-11-07 06:06:28

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

I did that, the result is, that the cursor correctly disappears from my laptop's monitor, but will not appear on my second monitor. However, it will move further than the border away from my Laptop's screen.
The second monitor is displaying black, it is not turned off. The backlight is on, as if it is trying to display black on fullscreen.

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#4 2012-11-07 08:27:22

fixje
Member
From: Germany
Registered: 2010-02-13
Posts: 9

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

I'm having nearly the same setup (newest packages, awesome, X220), but connect via VGA, because my Display Port Adapter did not arrive, yet.
I experience the same issue when I change the monitor setup while awesome is running. Restarting awesome (Mod + Ctrl + r  in the default config) solves the issue for me.
If that doesn't help: What happens if you just enable the external monitor, namely turn LVDS1 off?

Last edited by fixje (2012-11-07 08:29:37)

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#5 2012-11-07 09:17:17

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

Thanks for your response!
I can try disabling the LVDS1 screen when I get home today!
I have also not yet tried restarting awesome, as I start awesome with the second screen already connected (I manually type startx, no login manager...)
Did you run into that problem before, too did it only start to occur recently?

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#6 2012-11-07 09:23:31

fixje
Member
From: Germany
Registered: 2010-02-13
Posts: 9

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

As far as I can remember, I was always unable to move windows between monitors when I connected the external one during a running session.
In case you are interested: Here is a snippet which you can include in your .xinitrc to set up the monitor for you at startup

#!/bin/bash
# set up displays when connected to external monitor

num_connected=$(xrandr -q | grep -E "^.* connected .*$" | wc -l)
echo $num_connected

if [ $num_connected -gt 1 ]
then
        echo "Setting display..."
        xrandr --output LVDS1 --auto --output VGA1 --auto
        xrandr --output LVDS1 --below VGA1
        xset -dpms
        xset s off
fi

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#7 2012-11-07 19:14:07

nomorewindows
Member
Registered: 2010-04-03
Posts: 3,362

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

I can connect and disconnect using xrandr.
xrandr --output LVDS1 --auto --output VGA1 --auto --right-of LVDS1


I may have to CONSOLE you about your usage of ridiculously easy graphical interfaces...
Look ma, no mouse.

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#8 2012-11-07 19:28:22

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

Just tried restarting awesome after connecting the screen through xrandr and also turned LVDS1 off, to no avail. The screen still stays black... I am not sure how to continue troubleshooting the issue, I would appreciate any input on how to continue investigating this.
I tried to command which nomorewindows posted too, unfortunately it did not properly connect the second monitor either.
Also, I will try to get hold of a VGA cable and try to connect an extern monitor through that. However, I am more or less sure that the problem has to be somewhere in Linux as everything works just fine running Win7.

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#9 2012-11-11 21:50:55

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

I tried to play around some more with the xrandr settings and came to the conclusion, that the problem is most probably somewhere else. Does anyone have any idea where/how I could try to find/debug a problem?

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#10 2012-11-15 16:56:09

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

I discovered something new today. If I boot my laptop while the lid is closed, the bios will be displayed on my second monitor. Also, the arch linux bootup screen will be displayed, just until I could log on. The console prompting me to log on (I am not using any logon manager) will not be displayed anymore, so I figured it has to do with something that loads through that period and gets "activated" just in the moment of or in order to be able to log on.

Has anybody maybe an idea what that could be?

Thank you very much for your time, I really appreciate it!

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#11 2012-11-20 21:14:09

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

Update: Now, after reversing to Linux 3.5 an updating a few packages (incl. mesa and intel-dri), I actually get some output beyond the boot screen on my second monitor. However, it is not readable. Only a small resolution is being displayed and text is displayed as a kind of dotted line, without any obvious pattern behind that.
When I start X and therefore awesome, I can make out some of the background (i.e. i know that it is my background but not more, really). If I then launch a terminal window fullscreen the screen however correctly turns completely white (except for the text, which is still an unreadable dotted line).

I try to get hold of a camera to post a picture of it, maybe then someone might have any clue as to how to further investigate the issue.

Thank you for your time!

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#12 2012-11-27 20:51:29

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

So, with a rather long delay, here are some pictures of my problem which I hope might help identify the source of the problem.
Straight after booting up, my screen looks like:
one.jpg

after starting awesome wm with the somewhat recognisable defaul background:
two.jpg

launching a terminal in awesome wm:
three.jpg

and after quitting awesome wm / the x server:
four.jpg

does anyone have any idea what might be going on?

Thank you for your time!!

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#13 2013-01-07 21:57:04

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

So suspecting that this problem was caused by a maybe misconfigured arch install, I did a reinstall from scratch. Still, the problem persists.
However, the monitor connects fine when using the VGA Output and still continues to work perfectly through displayport on Windows 7 / Windows 8!
Also, it still displays everything fine up unto the loginscreen....!

Anyone got any idea how / where to gather further information on the problem?
Thank you for your time!

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#14 2013-01-17 22:02:55

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

For some reason unknown to me, it just worked perfectly from a few days on. Unfortunately I did not track the updates which might have led to this smile
Thanks! smile

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#15 2013-01-18 00:14:38

Mektub
Member
From: Lisbon /Portugal
Registered: 2008-01-02
Posts: 647

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

The updates you did through pacman are in:

/var/log/pacman.log

Mektub


Follow me on twitter: https://twitter.com/johnbina

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#16 2013-01-21 20:31:15

replax
Member
Registered: 2011-02-12
Posts: 90

Re: [not really SOLVED] Second Monitor only displaying unreadable output,

Actually, I don't really think that it is solved alltogether.
I just had the problem occour again! Last time before I powered down, I installed some updates (systemd 197, xf86-video-intel 2.20.18 and more, which seem unlikely to be related).
So first thing I did now, was to check for new updates, saw that there was xf86-video-intel 2.20.19 and upgraded to that. Did not solve my problem. Downgraded to 2.20.17 and my problem stil persisted. So I downgraded systemd to 196 and it worked again!
Put systemd on ignore in pacman.conf and did a full system upgrade. Still worked. Then upgraded systemd again, just to try, and now it is working again!
(Between all pkg upgrades I did reboot)

Not sure what caused this behaviour! And nor do I have to seem found the package which caused this error? I am not sure...

Edit: @Mektub: I was not able to connect to the monitor throughout the week before the 17th, I'll look through the updates I did now but with a quick glance I could not make out any connected to the occourence of the error again, today.
Thanks for your tip though, I'll dig further into it.

Last edited by replax (2013-01-21 20:34:23)

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