Getting DisplayLink to work with StarTech adapter on Wayland

Support Graphics & Display
1

I have a StarTech.com USB-to-dual-HDMI adapter.

Isn’t it supposed to work with: DisplayLink - ArchWiki ?

I have Manjaro up to date with KDE and Wayland.

I followed the instructions up to 1.2.
Then it says

for Wayland no configuration is necessary.

and everything after that is specific to X. So I assume I should be able to just plug in the monitors and have them work.

I have this:

$ systemctl status displaylink.service   
● displaylink.service - DisplayLink Manager Service
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/displaylink.service; enabled; preset: disabled)
     Active: active (running) since Sat 2025-05-24 16:41:31 CEST; 2min 43s ago
 Invocation: f0b2b4afd88d4e51a5b7c36b16597882
    Process: 544 ExecStartPre=/sbin/modprobe evdi (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Main PID: 545 (DisplayLinkMana)
      Tasks: 14 (limit: 13949)
     Memory: 8.7M (peak: 9.3M)
        CPU: 104ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/displaylink.service
             └─545 /usr/lib/displaylink/DisplayLinkManager

may 24 16:41:31 teo-bmax systemd[1]: Starting DisplayLink Manager Service...
may 24 16:41:31 teo-bmax systemd[1]: Started DisplayLink Manager Service.

and this:

$ lsusb     
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 046d:c542 Logitech, Inc. M185 compact wireless mouse
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 058f:5608 Alcor Micro Corp. USB 2.0 Camera
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 0bda:c821 Realtek Semiconductor Corp. Bluetooth Radio 
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 0711:5601 Magic Control Technology Corp. T6 USB Station

I connected the adapter to the USB 3 port, and the monitors to the adapter’s HDMI ports. I rebooted.
I right-click on the Desktop background and go to “Display Configuration” but none of the external monitors shows up.

Am I missing something?

System Information:

Operating System: Manjaro Linux 
KDE Plasma Version: 6.3.5
KDE Frameworks Version: 6.14.0
Qt Version: 6.9.0
Kernel Version: 6.12.28-1-MANJARO (64-bit)
Graphics Platform: X11
Processors: 4 × Intel® Celeron® N5095 @ 2.00GHz
Memory: 11,5 GiB of RAM
Graphics Processor: Intel® UHD Graphics
Manufacturer: AMI
Product Name: Intel
2

Hi @php4fan,

I was just on the website and they have so many adapters I couldn’t find one/it. Please send a link to the product page, not the vendor/manufacturer.

3

As noted on the Arch Linux wiki page

  1. Install evdiAUR for the kernel module (after configuring DKMS). As stated on the DKMS page, don’t forget to install either linux-headers or another relevant package otherwise nothing will happen. If you encounter issues, there is the development version.

→ [root tip] [How To] Kernel - Headers - DKMS

Did you remeber the linuXY-headers package?

→ Porting the DisplayLink Ubuntu driver to other Linux distributions – DisplayLink Support

4

Did you remeber the linuXY-headers package?

Yes I did. I don’t think the DisplayLink service could be running otherwise. But anyway, yes I did install the kerner headers and build evdi properly.

I have no idea what the second link (“Porting the ubuntu driver to other linux distributions”) is for. That is not mentioned in the ArchWiki DisplayLink page.

I was just on the website and they have so many adapters I couldn’t find one/it. Please send a link to the product page, not the vendor/manufacturer.

5

So, no ideas?
Is it supposed to work out of the box?

The wiki page does not mention the “displaylink-connect” package, but I did try to install it. However, the package itself is broken and installation fails.

As far as I understand, display-connect should only be needed for the displays to be automatically detected when plugged, so if I reboot with the device and displays already connected, as I did, I would expect them to work, which they don’t.

Are there commands to “scan” for displays, or anything I can run to try and debug what’s going on?

6

I linked to the Porting … page before you provided a link to the actual product.

On the product page you linked to, the very first bullet point states (emphasized by me)

Deducing from the above → the answer to your question

  • :white_check_mark: Windows
  • :x: Manjaro Linux
1 Like
7

I’ll add that StarTech is one of many very cheap brands, and their focus is the Windows market. It’s recommended to perform sufficient research before buying any product, to verify that it will work with an intended OS.

Regards.

8

I actually own a least one StartTech products - the CrashCart adapter - it work with Linux as well - a least my version does :grin: and it is not cheap - not now - not then - it has been a long time since I used it - cannot remember if it is 01 or 02 version I have.

→ KVM Console to USB 2.0 Portable Laptop Crash Cart Adapter - TAA

(the quality of the devices was not ‘cheap’ either)

9

It depends on the product. Of course, some are so basic that they “just work” with anything; and that applies to every brand. I bought a few StarTech branded items myself (maybe 5 years ago) - the SDD caddy wasn’t great, but it served its purpose - the external (USB) enclosure was rubbish, and… (there was something else, but I forget).

Ah, yes, a USB soundcard that was DOA.

Cheap doesn’t necessarily mean inexpensive. :wink:

10

Thanks everybody, I wrongly assumed that all devices of this kind were DisplayLink-compatible.

I just purchased a new one which is (a Fairikabe with the DL9650 chip) and indeed it works.

3 Likes
11

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