Black screen with mouse pointer after login window

chameau · 28 August 2025 09:26

Doing a search in this forum - that seems to be a frequent occurrence! but I think my is different enough to warrant a new post.
First point of difference is: I use the Cinnamon edition
I first had a black screen (after entering my password) on my laptop (Lenovo thinkpad x230) It occurred randomly, most days I login ok - same days I get the black screen. ‘ctrl+alt+del’ gets the login screen back and second usually works.
Until today I did not have this issue on my Desktop (same vintage as the laptop)
The way it started is as follow:
I was investigating why my file icons (for example the pdf symbol for pdf files) did not display correctly? One suggestion was to change the theme. I did that and restarted the system and that’s when I got the black screen! However ctrl+alt+del did not fix the issue. I found some suggestions online and I try the following:
First I TTY to get a promt.

sudo systemctl restart lightdm

I tried that a few times, but always back to black screen
I tried restarting a few times - but no good
I then tried to re-install lightdm

sudo pacman -S lightdm

That worked I’m login again, but it concerns me that
a) It happened in the first place because I changed the theme? (I change themes in the past with no issues)
b) It’s only a temporary fix - something is not right with the system?
I checked the announcement, but there is no issue with the last update.

Anything else I could try to figure out the issue?

Philline00 · 28 August 2025 12:46

HI …
Trying to re-boot with "proprietary drivers " … maybe …

doombaby · 28 August 2025 13:59

I encountered a similar issue with XFCE edition. After adjusting power settings, replacing the compositor, swapping between KMS (modesetting) and proprietary (Nvidia) graphics drivers, loading kernel modules, adjusting the display driver settings in Xorg.conf, and replacing the lightdm greeter, I resolved the issue by disabling the feature to restore a saved session in xfce4-session-settings, or if the display manager fails to load, by deleting the session config file ~/.config/xfce4/xfconf/xfce-perchannel-xml/xfce4-session.xml from the command line. Here is a guide that may help you disable the session save and restore feature in Cinnamon.

chameau · 29 August 2025 17:49

Dconf-editor is already installed. And the ‘auto-save-session’ was already un-ticked.
I don’t think it has any relevance, but just in case: I have been tying to setup samba sharing over the past 6/8 weeks. I got the ‘Home’ folder shared with not too much problems, but I just could not get sharing from the root “/some folder/share” working until I found that ‘AppArmor’ was the problem. After I removed it from ‘grub’ sharing worked. As I said initially, the black screen issue started after I changed a setting in “System Setting/Themes/Desktop” from ‘Mint-X-Dark’ to ‘Mint-Y-Dark’ and I later change it back to ‘Mint-X-Dark’
I have not been able to fix the issue! Each time I switch-on the pc, I end up with the black screen.
Restarting doesn’t help
Restarting in software mode doesn’t help
The only way I manage to get back into the Cinnamon desktop after I TTY in is:

sudo pacman -S lightdm lightdm-slick-greater 
sudo systemctl enable lightdm 
sudo systemctl start lightdm
sudo shutdown -r now

But when I switch-off, next time I switch back on, I have to do it all over again!
I don’t know what the fault is I’m hoping for some guidance!
here are the system specs, let me know what other files/logs to post

 [jp@jpmanjarohome ~]$ inxi -Fxz
System:
  Kernel: 6.1.147-2-MANJARO arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 15.1.1
  Desktop: Cinnamon v: 6.4.10 Distro: Manjaro base: Arch Linux
Machine:
  Type: Desktop System: Gigabyte product: Z68A-D3-B3 v: N/A
    serial: <superuser required>
  Mobo: Gigabyte model: Z68A-D3-B3 v: x.x serial: <superuser required>
    BIOS: Award v: F11 date: 03/21/2012
Battery:
  Device-1: hidpp_battery_0 model: Logitech Wireless Keyboard
    charge: 55% (should be ignored) status: discharging
  Device-2: hidpp_battery_1 model: Logitech Wireless Mouse
    charge: 55% (should be ignored) status: discharging
CPU:
  Info: quad core model: Intel Core i5-3470 bits: 64 type: MCP
    arch: Ivy Bridge rev: 9 cache: L1: 256 KiB L2: 1024 KiB L3: 6 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1597 min/max: 1600/3600 cores: 1: 1597 2: 1597 3: 1597
    4: 1597 bogomips: 25555
  Flags: avx ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
  Device-1: NVIDIA GF116 [GeForce GTX 550 Ti] driver: nvidia v: 390.157
    arch: Fermi bus-ID: 01:00.0
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 21.1.18 with: Xwayland v: 24.1.8 driver: X:
    loaded: nvidia gpu: nvidia resolution: 1920x1200~60Hz
  API: OpenGL Message: Unable to show GL data. glxinfo is missing.
  Info: Tools: gpu: nvidia-settings,nvidia-smi x11: xdpyinfo, xprop, xrandr
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel 6 Series/C200 Series Family High Definition Audio
    vendor: Gigabyte driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1b.0
  Device-2: NVIDIA GF116 High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel
    v: kernel bus-ID: 01:00.1
  API: ALSA v: k6.1.147-2-MANJARO status: kernel-api
  Server-1: JACK v: 1.9.22 status: off
  Server-2: PipeWire v: 1.4.7 status: off
  Server-3: PulseAudio v: 17.0-43-g3e2bb status: active
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8211/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet
    vendor: Gigabyte driver: r8169 v: kernel port: de00 bus-ID: 04:00.0
  IF: enp4s0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 1.36 TiB used: 152.07 GiB (10.9%)
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Crucial model: CT1000MX500SSD1 size: 931.51 GiB
  ID-2: /dev/sdb vendor: Seagate model: ST3500413AS size: 465.76 GiB
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 93.93 GiB used: 27.48 GiB (29.3%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda3
  ID-2: /home size: 250.92 GiB used: 124.6 GiB (49.7%) fs: ext4
    dev: /dev/sda4
Swap:
  ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 512 MiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) file: /swapfile
  ID-2: swap-2 type: partition size: 7.85 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%)
    dev: /dev/sda2
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 32.0 C mobo: 25.0 C gpu: nvidia temp: 31 C
  Fan Speeds (rpm): cpu: 2257 fan-2: 0 fan-3: 0 fan-4: 0 gpu: nvidia
    fan: 40%
  Power: 12v: N/A 5v: N/A 3.3v: N/A vbat: 3.07
Info:
  Memory: total: 16 GiB available: 15.61 GiB used: 3.36 GiB (21.6%)
  Processes: 230 Uptime: 10h 45m Init: systemd
  Packages: 1472 Compilers: clang: 20.1.8 gcc: 15.1.1 Shell: Bash v: 5.3.3
    inxi: 3.3.38
[jp@jpmanjarohome ~]$

thanks

chameau · 31 August 2025 08:38

chameau:

The only way I manage to get back into the Cinnamon desktop after I TTY in is:
sudo pacman -S lightdm lightdm-slick-greater 
sudo systemctl enable lightdm 
sudo systemctl start lightdm
sudo shutdown -r now

Alas this doesn’t work any more! I’m at a loss at what else to do…
I know it’s just a ‘display’ issue - the desktop gui is up (I can tell by moving the mouse and hitting a ‘tooltip’ I also could see a notification for a few seconds ‘Updates Available’ and I can access the ‘home’ share through samba from a laptop).

From a tty session I tried a few things. I took photos and then type them here - so it’s possible there maybe the odd typo - sorry (I know there is way to upload them and just post a link, but I forgot how to do it’)

When I check the status of lightdm it’s always ‘enabled’ and ‘active (running)’ which makes sense since the login windows works!?

journalctl -b -p err
date hostname kernel: ACPI error: AE_not_found, while resolving a named reference package element - \_SD_.PCI0.LINK9 (20220331/dsp)
                                    7 times more the same below 
date hostname lightdm[1035]: gkr-pam: unable to locate daemon control file

From what I read the apci errors are probably because my pc hardware is old (assembled 2012) and harmless, same with gkr-pam They’re unlikely to cause my black screen.

cinnamon-looking-glass
/usr/share/cinnamon/cinnamon-looking-glass/cinnamon-looking-glass.py:336: DeprecationWarning: Gio.DBusConnection.register_object is deprecated
(cinnamon-looking-glass.py:2733): Gtk-Warning ***: 11:05:09:765: cannot open display:

That one could be a cause?
Can anyone help? Access any logs that could provide clues? Something else to re-install? If all else fails, I may have to either re-install Manjaro from scratch, or restore ‘rescuezilla’ image (it is about 4 month old and prior to installing samba)
Thank you for any help you can provide

philm · 31 August 2025 13:39

Some claim that the mesa update on older hardware created some regressions. You may want to try to downgrade to 25.1.x series to see if that helps. See also comments on the stable branch announcements from several users …

chameau · 31 August 2025 17:32

Thanks I managed to get past the ‘black screen’ It’s probably just a fluke
I have 2 kernel installed 6.1.149-2 and 5.15.190-2
Normally I use 6.1 but I just tried 5.15 to see if it makes a difference - but no I still got the black screen.
I then rebooted and changed back to 6.1 and to my surprise - it worked.
Of course I’m not sure I will be able to login tomorrow - will see.
I haven’t applied the latest update, so my version of ‘mesa’ is still 1.25.1.7-1
but do I actually use it? as I use Nvidia driver?
So I see there are a few ‘black screen’ issues following the 11 and 29 August updates although they all slightly different from my
maybe I should wait for the next update!

chameau · 1 September 2025 09:59

This morning on switch on I got a ‘black screen’ again. After a few restart changing from standard boot to initramfs boot and from 6.1 to 5.15, I eventually got past the black screen on 6.1 initramfs
So what ever is causing my ‘black screen’ seems to be intermittent?
While in the computer, I did not install the updates (because of mesa), but I installed a new kernel 6.6.103-2
I switched off the computer after an hour or so because it’s not recommended to run on initramfs.
When I switched back on in the afternoon I got the same ‘black screen’ again! I tried my restart with different kernels, but it did not work until I used the new 6.6 kernel. I got in on a ‘normal’ boot with 6.6 (not initramfs) I did not yet reboot, so not sure if permanently fix? but next time I get in I like to update or still better to do it from a tty session.
How can I do a full update, but not update ‘mesa’? what to add to the standard command?

sudo pacman -Syu

Thanks

papa33 · 2 September 2025 08:41

Just to say, I have the exact same problem on garuda linux (sorry, this is the only thread I found about this issue so far).
I created a brand new user though, and could login right away without restarting lightdm. But the problem persists with my main user.
My hardware is more recent (2021) doesn’t look like a mesa issue.

Edit: I think I found the culprit (in my case). My Trash was full of deleted files (probably caused by some Insync syncing activity). Something like 100 Gigas. I emptied the Trash, and rebooted and could login normally.

philm · 2 September 2025 14:23

I pushed some more fixes in Kernels, Mesa and firmware. There are several issues which claim to be black screen issues. One was dracut including ALPM hooks. Some had installed that additionally to mkinitcpio. Therefore some kernel images might got generated not working. The hooks are now separated once more.

Other things can be a full disk. XFCE is normally robust, however when you get a black screen there it is mostly getting out of space …

chameau · 2 September 2025 17:27

Hi papa, full disk is not the culprit for me, I have 80G (70%) free in root partition and 130G (50%) free in home partition.
Just for interest if you remember when did the ‘black screen’ issue first appeared? On my desktop it only started about 1 week ago. I was wondering why files did not have the file type logo in front of their name (like the pdf logo) as they used to have? I thought it may have something to do with the themes! so I changed the theme but it made no difference to the file logos, so I changed back to the old theme - when I next switched on the computer, that’s when the ‘black screen’ issue started. But on the laptop, I had intermittent ‘Black screens’ issues probably from about 6 weeks ago, but a simple restart always got the gui back up, and strangely it seems to have fixed it self? it hasn’t happen for about 2 weeks???

Thanks for the update - Does that mean there are new updates to download?
I did not apply the most recent updates (as it was flagged as a possible cause for the ‘black screen’ issue). The last major update I did was on the 13 july 25

chameau · 3 September 2025 07:58

I still get the ‘black screen’ after the login window!
Repeated restarting, changing kernels and alternating between ‘normal boot’ and ‘fallback initramfs’ get it eventually going, but I can’t keep on doing that!
There are a lot of errors and warnings in ‘.xsession-errors-old’ but from what I read online - they are not critical? the file is very long and the same error is repeated 100… time, so I just post a truncated part.

gnome-keyring-daemon: no process capabilities, insecure memory might get used
discover_other_daemon: 1gnome-keyring-daemon: no process capabilities, insecure memory might get used
discover_other_daemon: 1[cinnamon-settings-daemon-smartcard] Failed to start: no suitable smartcard driver could be found
dbus-daemon[1232]: Activating service name='org.a11y.atspi.Registry' requested by ':1.0' (uid=1000 pid=1195 comm="/usr/bin/csd-color")
[cinnamon-settings-daemon-smartcard] Failed to start: no suitable smartcard driver could be found
dbus-daemon[1232]: Successfully activated service 'org.a11y.atspi.Registry'
/usr/bin/cinnamon-launcher:56: DeprecationWarning: This process (pid=1414) is multi-threaded, use of fork() may lead to deadlocks in the child.
  self.cinnamon_pid = os.fork()
Gjs-Message: 10:20:43.711: JS LOG: About to start Cinnamon (X11 backend)
Gjs-Message: 10:20:43.795: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Cinnamon.AppSystem.get_default() started in 0 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:43.798: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] loading user theme: /home/jp/.local/share/themes/Mint-X-Dark/cinnamon/cinnamon.css
Gjs-Message: 10:20:43.813: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] added icon directory: /home/jp/.local/share/themes/Mint-X-Dark/cinnamon
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.045: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] NetworkManager agent: enabled
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.048: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Polkit agent: enabled
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.048: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] SSH agent: enabled
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.066: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] loaded at Wed Sep 03 2025 10:20:44 GMT+0800 (Australian Western Standard Time)
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.066: JS LOG: Cinnamon started at Wed Sep 03 2025 10:20:44 GMT+0800 (Australian Western Standard Time)
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.082: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] ExtensionSystem started in 0 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.082: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] DeskletManager started in 1 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.082: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] SearchProviderManager started in 1 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.270: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet separator@cinnamon.org in 32 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.271: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet separator@cinnamon.org in 1 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.296: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet show-desktop@cinnamon.org in 25 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.307: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet expo@cinnamon.org in 11 ms

** (at-spi2-registryd:1276): WARNING **: 10:20:44.312: Failed to register client: GDBus.Error:org.gnome.SessionManager.AlreadyRegistered: Unable to register client

** (at-spi2-registryd:1276): WARNING **: 10:20:44.312: Unable to register client with session manager
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.322: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Role locked: tray
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.327: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet systray@cinnamon.org in 20 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.334: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet windows-quick-list@cinnamon.org in 7 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.334: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet separator@cinnamon.org in 0 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.335: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet separator@cinnamon.org in 1 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.346: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Role locked: notifications
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.370: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet notifications@cinnamon.org in 35 ms

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.388: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.388: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.388: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",
Cannot register authentication agent: GDBus.Error:org.freedesktop.PolicyKit1.Error.Failed: An authentication agent already exists for the given subject

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.404: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.407: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.408: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.408: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.409: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.409: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.409: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.409: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.409: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.415: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.415: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.415: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.416: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.418: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet user@cinnamon.org in 48 ms

(parcellite:1460): Gtk-WARNING **: 10:20:44.422: Unable to locate theme engine in module_path: "murrine",
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.447: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet workspace-switcher@cinnamon.org in 29 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.464: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet removable-drives@cinnamon.org in 16 ms
Flag 0x0001, status 0, EXIT 1 STAT 0
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.560: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Role locked: panellauncher
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.560: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Role locked: windowattentionhandler
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.565: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Monitor Watch List updated: [0]
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.565: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet grouped-window-list@cinnamon.org in 101 ms
Nemo-Message: 10:20:44.609: nemo-desktop: session is cinnamon, establishing proxy
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.639: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet calendar@cinnamon.org in 74 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.683: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet inhibit@cinnamon.org in 44 ms
Flag 0x0001, status 0, EXIT 1 STAT 0
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.750: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet power@cinnamon.org in 67 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.782: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet sound@cinnamon.org in 32 ms
INFO:root:Plugin 'application-utility' not available.
INFO:root:Plugin 'layoutswitcherlib' not available.
Gjs-Message: 10:20:44.881: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet Sensors@claudiux in 99 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:45.064: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet menu@cinnamon.org in 182 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:45.247: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet SpicesUpdate@claudiux in 183 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:45.262: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Loaded applet network@cinnamon.org in 15 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:45.262: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] AppletManager started in 1195 ms
Gjs-Message: 10:20:45.265: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Cinnamon took 1554 ms to start

(cinnamon:1418): Gjs-CRITICAL **: 10:20:45.332: Attempting to call back into JSAPI during the sweeping phase of GC. This is most likely caused by not destroying a Clutter actor or Gtk+ widget with ::destroy signals connected, but can also be caused by using the destroy(), dispose(), or remove() vfuncs. Because it would crash the application, it has been blocked and the JS callback not invoked.
The offending signal was changed on GInotifyFileMonitor 0x56408431cdd0.
== Stack trace for context 0x5640821e6740 ==

(cinnamon:1418): Gjs-CRITICAL **: 10:20:45.332: Attempting to call back into JSAPI during the sweeping phase of GC. This is most likely caused by not destroying a Clutter actor or Gtk+ widget with ::destroy signals connected, but can also be caused by using the destroy(), dispose(), or remove() vfuncs. Because it would crash the application, it has been blocked and the JS callback not invoked.
The offending signal was changed on GInotifyFileMonitor 0x56408431cdd0.
== Stack trace for context 0x5640821e6740 ==

(cinnamon:1418): Gjs-CRITICAL **: 10:20:45.332: Attempting to call back into JSAPI during the sweeping phase of GC. This is most likely caused by not destroying a Clutter actor or Gtk+ widget with ::destroy signals connected, but can also be caused by using the destroy(), dispose(), or remove() vfuncs. Because it would crash the application, it has been blocked and the JS callback not invoked.
The offending signal was g-signal on GDBusProxy 0x5640841ce830.
== Stack trace for context 0x5640821e6740 ==

(cinnamon:1418): Gjs-CRITICAL **: 10:20:45.332: Attempting to call back into JSAPI during the sweeping phase of GC. This is most likely caused by not destroying a Clutter actor or Gtk+ widget with ::destroy signals connected, but can also be caused by using the destroy(), dispose(), or remove() vfuncs. Because it would crash the application, it has been blocked and the JS callback not invoked.
The offending signal was g-signal on GDBusProxy 0x5640841ce830.
== Stack trace for context 0x5640821e6740 ==

                                                truncated..........

(cinnamon:1418): Gjs-CRITICAL **: 10:20:54.718: Attempting to call back into JSAPI during the sweeping phase of GC. This is most likely caused by not destroying a Clutter actor or Gtk+ widget with ::destroy signals connected, but can also be caused by using the destroy(), dispose(), or remove() vfuncs. Because it would crash the application, it has been blocked and the JS callback not invoked.
== Stack trace for context 0x5640821e6740 ==
Fontconfig warning: using without calling FcInit()

(cinnamon:1418): GLib-CRITICAL **: 10:20:54.804: Source ID 744 was not found when attempting to remove it
Gjs-Message: 10:20:54.804: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Adding systray: psensor (1x1px)
Gjs-Message: 10:20:54.869: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Adding systray: psensor (16x16px)
Fontconfig warning: using without calling FcInit()
Gjs-Message: 10:20:59.815: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Adding systray: pamac-tray (1x1px)
Gjs-Message: 10:20:59.840: JS LOG: [LookingGlass/info] Adding systray: pamac-tray (16x16px)

(xapp-sn-watcher:1440): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: 10:21:14.908: g_object_set: assertion 'G_IS_OBJECT (object)' failed

(xapp-sn-watcher:1440): GLib-GIO-CRITICAL **: 10:21:14.908: g_dbus_interface_skeleton_flush: assertion 'G_IS_DBUS_INTERFACE_SKELETON (interface_)' failed

(xapp-sn-watcher:1440): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: 10:21:14.908: g_object_set: assertion 'G_IS_OBJECT (object)' failed

(xapp-sn-watcher:1440): GLib-GIO-CRITICAL **: 10:21:14.908: g_dbus_interface_skeleton_flush: assertion 'G_IS_DBUS_INTERFACE_SKELETON (interface_)' failed

(xapp-sn-watcher:1440): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: 10:21:14.909: invalid (NULL) pointer instance

(xapp-sn-watcher:1440): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: 10:21:14.909: signal_emit_valist_unlocked: assertion 'G_TYPE_CHECK_INSTANCE (instance)' failed

(csd-print-notifications:1196): GLib-CRITICAL **: 10:21:18.026: Source ID 4 was not found when attempting to remove it
X connection to :0 broken (explicit kill or server shutdown).
parcellite: Fatal IO error 0 (Success) on X server :0.

Can you see anything in that file that would cause a ‘black screen’?
Do the repeated restarts (to get past the ‘black screen’) give any clues as to the cause of the ‘black screen’?

papa33 · 3 September 2025 09:35

chameau:

Attempting to call back into JSAPI during the sweeping phase of GC. This is most likely caused by not destroying a Clutter actor or Gtk+ widget with ::destroy signals connected, but can also be caused by using the destroy(), dispose(), or remove() vfuncs. Because it would crash the application, it has been blocked and the JS callback not invoked.
The offending signal was g-signal on GDBusProxy 0x5640841ce830.

Did you try to remove all applets/extensions in Cinnamon? Maybe there is one that could cause this.

philm · 3 September 2025 10:12

Maybe check if one of the 25.0.8 ISOs is unbootable for your system. If that is the case we know that the complete current update is kinda broken on your system.

Based on your inxi report you have an old Nvidia card using the 390xx driver. So maybe mesa can be the issue here.

You can try to use the 25.1.x series of Mesa via this repo. Simply place it on top of [extra] in your /etc/pacman.conf file and use sudo pacman -Syuu to downgrade.

[mesa-251]
SigLevel = PackageRequired
Server = https://download.manjaro.org/pkgs/mesa

If you have no graphical access to your system you can try it via a TTY by pressing CTRL+ALT+F3 or start directly into a TTY on boot by editing the grub boot entry like this:

Press the ESC key and select the bootloader entry. Press CTRL+E for edit and search for the words quiet and splash. Delete those and add 3 to the line. Then execute CTRL+X to start your session. You will land in a text console TTY. Login with your user.

Edit the /etc/pacman.conf with nano: sudo nano /etc/pacman.conf. Perform the downgrade and reboot.

chameau · 3 September 2025 17:25

Hi Philm, thanks for the suggestion
The most recent iso I have is the cinnamon version: 25.0.3-250609-linux612,iso
I will install it on a thumb-drive tomorrow and see if it works correctly as a live os
As I said, I can get to the login window with no issue. It’s after I enter my user password that I get the ‘black screen’ from there I can open a tty window by pressing CTRL+ALT+F3 (no need to edit the bootloader entries)

I did NOT apply the latest upgrades, so my current version of Mesa is already 1.25.1.7-1 installed on 13/08/25 Should I downgrade that to an earlier version?

Most of them are system apps and can not be removed.

chameau · 9 September 2025 17:31

Update on my ‘black screen’ issue
Since my last post (6 days ago) my system seemed to have healed itself?! I only got 2 black screen event on the fifth of September that got resolved with just a restart (not changing anything) and since then no more black screen?!? I’m happy it works… but I don’t know what fixed it?!?
I’m still have not applied the latest upgrade (30/08/2025) As recommended for maximum safety, I intend to apply the upgrade from a TTY session without the gui working. The commands are as follow, let me know if they are incorrect

From the GUI 
CTRL+ALT+F2 (or F3,F4,F5...)
Enter my login details
Log out of the GUI session
cinnamon-session-quit --logout (maybe also --force?)
Update mirrors lists
sudo pacman-mirrors --fasttrack
then upgrade
sudo pacman -Syu (or should I use -Syyu?)
then restart
sudo shutdown -r now

I know there is an app to check for *.pacnew files (manjaro-pacnew-checker) but if I understand correctly, it runs automatically after an upgrade and it can not be run any other time? Also it does not work if upgrading from a TTY session? Is this correct? if correct, I will just have to search for them after install.

BG405 · 9 September 2025 20:38

You can check for .pacnew files at any time; pacdiff -o. I however am currently unaware of a CLI replacement for meld which I use for managing them. I’ll look in to this.

chameau · 10 September 2025 04:51

In the past, I use ‘nemo’ first to search for .pacnew files, make a list and then open as root the .conf file and the same conf.pacnew file and compare them side by side. If I’m not sure what to merge, I search in google and/or in this forum. I usually rename the existing .conf as ‘old’ and (after merging) rename the .pacnew as the .conf file

I forgot to mention in my previous post that as ‘mesa 1.25.2…’ is suspected of been a possible cause of ‘black screen’ I add them to the exclude list in pacman.conf (my current version of mesa is 1.25.1.7-1)

#
# /etc/pacman.conf
#
# See the pacman.conf(5) manpage for option and repository directives

#
# GENERAL OPTIONS
#
[options]
# The following paths are commented out with their default values listed.
# If you wish to use different paths, uncomment and update the paths.
#RootDir     = /
#DBPath      = /var/lib/pacman/
#CacheDir    = /var/cache/pacman/pkg/
#LogFile     = /var/log/pacman.log
#GPGDir      = /etc/pacman.d/gnupg/
#HookDir     = /etc/pacman.d/hooks/
HoldPkg      = pacman glibc manjaro-system
#XferCommand = /usr/bin/curl -L -C - -f -o %o %u
#XferCommand = /usr/bin/wget --passive-ftp -c -O %o %u
#CleanMethod = KeepInstalled
#UseDelta    = 0.7
Architecture = auto

IgnorePkg   = lib32-mesa mesa
#IgnorePkg   =
#IgnoreGroup =

#NoUpgrade   =
#NoExtract   =

# Misc options
#UseSyslog
Color
#NoProgressBar
# We cannot check disk space from within a chroot environment
CheckSpace
#VerbosePkgLists
#ParallelDownloads = 5

# By default, pacman accepts packages signed by keys that its local keyring
# trusts (see pacman-key and its man page), as well as unsigned packages.
SigLevel    = Required DatabaseOptional
LocalFileSigLevel = Optional
#RemoteFileSigLevel = Required

# NOTE: You must run `pacman-key --init` before first using pacman; the local
# keyring can then be populated with the keys of all official Manjaro Linux
# packagers with `pacman-key --populate archlinux manjaro`.

#
# REPOSITORIES
#   - can be defined here or included from another file
#   - pacman will search repositories in the order defined here
#   - local/custom mirrors can be added here or in separate files
#   - repositories listed first will take precedence when packages
#     have identical names, regardless of version number
#   - URLs will have $repo replaced by the name of the current repo
#   - URLs will have $arch replaced by the name of the architecture
#
# Repository entries are of the format:
#       [repo-name]
#       Server = ServerName
#       Include = IncludePath
#
# The header [repo-name] is crucial - it must be present and
# uncommented to enable the repo.
#

# The testing repositories are disabled by default. To enable, uncomment the
# repo name header and Include lines. You can add preferred servers immediately
# after the header, and they will be used before the default mirrors.

[core]
SigLevel = PackageRequired
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

[extra]
SigLevel = PackageRequired
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

#[community]
#SigLevel = PackageRequired
#Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

# If you want to run 32 bit applications on your x86_64 system,
# enable the multilib repositories as required here.

[multilib]
SigLevel = PackageRequired
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

# An example of a custom package repository.  See the pacman manpage for
# tips on creating your own repositories.
#[custom]
#SigLevel = Optional TrustAll
#Server = file:///home/custompkgs

I will probably remove the exclusion before the next upgrade when ‘mesa’ is fixed. I think I read that ‘mesa’ has already been updated in the ‘unstable branch’ but not yet in the ‘stable branch’

Mod edit: Fixed a few typos.

chameau · 14 September 2025 09:19

I applied the most recent upgrade (minus ‘mesa’) from a TTY session, and I’m happy to report that I had no ‘Black screen’ and all seems to works fine.
Also there are no new *.pacnew files.
In the spirit of ‘Good maintenance’ I was going to clean out the ‘Orphans’ after the upgrade, but the result I got doesn’t look right? Checking for orphans resulted in 4 packages, but removing them displays 40 packages?? I wasn’t sure that is right so I did not yet proceed (typed n) Am I concerned for nothing? better safe than sorry. What’s your opinion?

[jp@jpmanjarohome ~]$ sudo pacman -Qtdq
[sudo] password for jp: 
knewstuff5
kplotting5
kunitconversion5
qt5-script
[jp@jpmanjarohome ~]$ sudo pacman -Rns $(pacman -Qtdq)
checking dependencies...
:: subversion optionally requires kwallet5: for KWallet for auth credentials

Packages (40) attica5-5.116.0-1  karchive5-5.116.0-1  kbookmarks5-5.116.0-1
              kcodecs5-5.116.0-1  kcompletion5-5.116.0-1  kconfig5-5.116.0-1
              kconfigwidgets5-5.116.0-1  kcrash5-5.116.0-1
              kdbusaddons5-5.116.0-1  kdeclarative5-5.116.0-1  kded5-5.116.0-1
              kglobalaccel5-5.116.0-1  kguiaddons5-5.116.0-1  ki18n5-5.116.0-1
              kiconthemes5-5.116.0-1  kio5-5.116.0-2  kirigami2-5.116.0-1
              kitemviews5-5.116.0-1  kjobwidgets5-5.116.0-1
              knotifications5-5.116.0-2  kpackage5-5.116.0-1
              kservice5-5.116.0-1  ktextwidgets5-5.116.0-1  kwallet5-5.116.0-3
              kwidgetsaddons5-5.116.0-1  kwindowsystem5-5.116.0-1
              kxmlgui5-5.116.0-1  libdbusmenu-qt5-0.9.3+16.04.20160218-7
              qca-qt5-2.3.10-3  qt5-graphicaleffects-5.15.17-1
              qt5-quickcontrols-5.15.17-1  qt5-quickcontrols2-5.15.17+kde+r5-1
              qt5-speech-5.15.17+kde+r1-1  solid5-5.116.0-1  sonnet5-5.116.0-1
              syndication5-5.116.0-1  knewstuff5-5.116.0-3
              kplotting5-5.116.0-1  kunitconversion5-5.116.0-1
              qt5-script-5.15.19-2

Total Removed Size:  135.66 MiB

:: Do you want to remove these packages? [Y/n] n

BG405 · 14 September 2025 20:07

Those look to be all QT5 packages so should be safe to remove, but I’d probably wait for a second opinion on that; I don’t know if any of your current programs might still rely on those by now?

If you have e.g. a current Timeshift snapshot I’d say go ahead.

Also, you can save that list to a file and reinstall such package(s) if they turn out to be still needed by something.