Manjaro boots into blank screen (login screen does not show up)

I used Linux Mint for quite some years, after switching to Manjaro on my Lenovo computer today. I already tested Manjaro on an old Dell computer with similar hardware to check if everything works OK, and it did.

How did I install Manjaro? I formatted the original Mint partition and installed Manjaro on it. I kept the /home and the /swap partition from the original Mint installation.

Unfortunately the starting process on the Lenovo is causing some trouble (which I do not have on my old Dell): After booting the Lenovo, it ends up in a blank screen. If I switch e.g. to TTY2 pressing CTRL + ALT + F2 and then – without logging in – press CTRL + ALT + F7 the login manager appears and I just logon normally. However, the login screen of lightdm does not start without intermediately switching to TTY2 or another TTY.

I investigated the status of lightdm for two different cases:

Case 1: Logging on TTY2 before switching to CTRL + ALT + F7:

> systemctl status lightdm.service
lightdm.service - Light Display Manager
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/lightdm.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
     Active: active (running) since Sat 2021-01-30 18:49:45 CET; 3min 1s ago
       Docs: man:lightdm(1)
   Main PID: 426 (lightdm)
      Tasks: 12 (limit: 9403)
     Memory: 50.8M
     CGroup: /system.slice/lightdm.service
             ├─ 426 /usr/bin/lightdm
             ├─ 441 /usr/lib/Xorg :0 -seat seat0 -auth /run/lightdm/root/:0 -nolisten tcp vt7 -novtswitch
             └─1142 lightdm --session-child 12 19

Jan 30 18:49:45 Yogix systemd[1]: Starting Light Display Manager...
Jan 30 18:49:45 Yogix systemd[1]: Started Light Display Manager.
Jan 30 18:49:49 Yogix lightdm[1097]: pam_unix(lightdm-greeter:session): session opened for user lightdm(uid=969) by (uid=0)

Case 2 After switching back with CTRL + ALT+ F7 and logging in with lightdm

> systemctl status lightdm.service
��� lightdm.service - Light Display Manager
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/lightdm.service; enabled; vendor preset: disabled)
     Active: active (running) since Sat 2021-01-30 18:49:45 CET; 20min ago
       Docs: man:lightdm(1)
   Main PID: 426 (lightdm)
      Tasks: 11 (limit: 9403)
     Memory: 180.9M
     CGroup: /system.slice/lightdm.service
             ������426 /usr/bin/lightdm
             ������441 /usr/lib/Xorg :0 -seat seat0 -auth /run/lightdm/root/:0 -nolisten tcp vt7 -novtswitch

Jan 30 18:49:45 Yogix systemd[1]: Starting Light Display Manager...
Jan 30 18:49:45 Yogix systemd[1]: Started Light Display Manager.
Jan 30 18:49:49 Yogix lightdm[1097]: pam_unix(lightdm-greeter:session): session opened for user lightdm(uid=969) by (uid=0)
Jan 30 18:52:52 Yogix lightdm[1142]: gkr-pam: unable to locate daemon control file
Jan 30 18:52:52 Yogix lightdm[1142]: gkr-pam: stashed password to try later in open session
Jan 30 18:52:52 Yogix lightdm[1142]: pam_systemd_home(lightdm:account): systemd-homed is not available: Unit dbus-org.freedesktop.home1.service not found.
Jan 30 18:52:52 Yogix lightdm[1142]: pam_unix(lightdm:session): session opened for user christian(uid=1000) by (uid=0)
Jan 30 18:52:53 Yogix lightdm[1142]: pam_env(lightdm:session): deprecated reading of user environment enabled
Jan 30 18:52:53 Yogix lightdm[1142]: gkr-pam: gnome-keyring-daemon started properly and unlocked keyring

There is one message written in RED color: gkr-pam: unable to locate daemon control file

Additional information

After some warnings on locale settings which I think are not relevant, inxi -Gazy shows:

Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel UHD Graphics 620 vendor: Lenovo driver: i915 v: kernel 
  bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:5917 
  Device-2: Lite-On Integrated Camera type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus ID: 1-5:3 
  chip ID: 04ca:7070 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.10 driver: loaded: intel 
  unloaded: modesetting alternate: fbdev,vesa display ID: :0.0 screens: 1 
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x285mm (20.0x11.2") 
  s-diag: 582mm (22.9") 
  Monitor-1: eDP1 res: 1920x1080 dpi: 168 size: 290x170mm (11.4x6.7") 
  diag: 336mm (13.2") 
  OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel UHD Graphics 620 (KBL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 20.3.3 
  direct render: Yes 

I am using Kernel 5.10.7-3-MANJARO as some forum entries with similar issues recommended to upgrade to 5.10 from 5.9. So it did not work in 5.9 either.

Please help.

I did install Manjaro without having my external Monitor connected. However, after writing the original forum issue, I tried to boot the Lenovo with having my USB-C docking station connected, to which the external monitor is connected.

In this case the CTRL + ALT + F2 and CTRL + ALT + F7 trick did NOT work. In this case only the mouse cursor appears on the screen but the login dialog does not show up.

I noticed, that inxi -Gazy showed a monitor setting even though the computer was not connected to the docking station when performing this command in the terminal. I connected the docking station (and the monitor) after writing the initial forum issue. It is interesting, that there already is a monitor entry – might that be from my previous Linux Mint installation. In this case these settings must be stored on the /home partition (which I did not touch).

I installed Kernel 5.4 and the login screen works just fine after booting.

Then Kernel 5.4 was not a permanent solution unfortunately. But now I have a solution that really works under Kernel 5.10 and 5.11 (and possibly others):

Create the file /etc/lightdm/display_setup.sh as superuser:

sudo nano /etc/lightdm/display_setup.sh

This file contains a xrandr command to enable the computer screen. So the file shall contains in my case:

#!/bin/sh
xrandr --output eDP1 --primary --mode 1920x1080 --pos 0x0 --rotate normal 

The file /etc/lightdm/display_setup.sh may have to adapted according to your actual screen configuration. I picked the maximum resolution 1920x1080 on my notebook and eDP1 is the internal notebook screen; run xrandr -q in your terminal to check what screens and resolutions are supported.

Exit Editor nano by pressing CTRL+O and CTRL+X (confirm saving the file). Then make the created script executable:

sudo chmod +x /etc/lightdm/display_setup.sh

Edit file /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

sudo nano /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

Go and find the commented line that contains display-setup-script within section [Seat:*]. Replace this line with:

display-setup-script=/etc/lightdm/display_setup.sh

So during the startup process the newly created script is executed prior to showing the login screen, starting the notebook screen properly.

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