Orphan packages who has no depencies but still lead to errors after removing

Support Software & Applications
1

Hello,
i experienced yesterday a situation where i removed a few orphans and saw additional errors in journal after a reboot.

pacman -Qi mhwd-nvidia-570xx
Name            : mhwd-nvidia-570xx
Version         : 570.211.01-1
Description     : MHWD module-ids for nvidia 570.211.01
Architecture    : any
URL             : http://www.nvidia.com/
Licenses        : LicenseRef-custom
Groups          : None
Provides        : None
Depends On      : mhwd
Optional Deps   : None
Required By     : None
Optional For    : None
Conflicts With  : None
Replaces        : None
Installed Size  : 1912,00 B
Packager        : Mark Wagie <mark@manjaro.org>
Build Date      : Di 13 Jan 2026 18:40:41 CET
Install Date    : So 28 Jun 2026 11:43:06 CEST
Install Reason  : Explicitly installed
Install Script  : No
Validated By    : Signature

$ pacman -Qi mhwd-nvidia-575xx
Name            : mhwd-nvidia-575xx
Version         : 575.64.05-3
Description     : MHWD module-ids for nvidia 575.64.05
Architecture    : any
URL             : http://www.nvidia.com/
Licenses        : LicenseRef-custom
Groups          : None
Provides        : None
Depends On      : mhwd
Optional Deps   : None
Required By     : None
Optional For    : None
Conflicts With  : None
Replaces        : None
Installed Size  : 1902,00 B
Packager        : Mark Wagie <mark@manjaro.org>
Build Date      : Do 18 Dez 2025 19:27:54 CET
Install Date    : So 28 Jun 2026 11:43:30 CEST
Install Reason  : Explicitly installed
Install Script  : No
Validated By    : Signature

I thought okay, there is None on Required By and the same with Optional Forā€¦ as a general rule everyone recommend that its save to remove them.

Im also removed it on my AMD Laptop and got this errorā€™s (that are vanished after reinstalling this packages):

Jun 28 11:37:14 koboldx-tuxedopulse15 kernel: i2c i2c-4: SMBus Timeout!
Jun 28 11:37:14 koboldx-tuxedopulse15 kernel: i2c i2c-4: Failed reset at end of transaction (01)
Jun 28 11:37:14 koboldx-tuxedopulse15 kernel: i2c i2c-4: Failed! (01)

&


Jun 28 11:44:48 koboldx-tuxedopulse15 pulseaudio[830]: Error opening PCM device front:1: No such file or directory
Jun 28 11:44:48 koboldx-tuxedopulse15 pulseaudio[830]: Error opening PCM device front:1: No such file or directory

Isnā€™t it pure false to widespread recommend this info below, when i hit errors already even with manual investigation from every single orphan?

2

You cannot remove mhwd-<something> without removing parent mhwd package.

sudo pacman -Rns mhwd

The mentioned mhwd-nvidia- packages is truly orphans - they are not in the repo - but they used to be as they are part of mhwd-db package.

The recommendation in the update thread does not take into account if a system - for one reason or another - has lost track of a few packages.

The mentioned packages serve a database function only, and does not influence a running system in any way.

EDIT: 2026-06-28T22:00:00Z
If you - for any reason - wish to keep mhwd around - reinstall the package

sudo pacman -Syu mhwd
mhwd package info 
 $ pamac info mhwd
Name                  : mhwd
Version               : 0.6.6-6
Description           : Manjaro Linux Hardware Detection library and application
URL                   : 
Licenses              : GPL-3.0-or-later
Repository            : extra
Installed Size        : 209,3 kB
Groups                : --
Depends On            : hwinfo mesa mhwd-db pacman
Optional Dependencies : grub: for choosing kernels [Installed]
                        lib32-mesa: for 32bit libgl support [Installed]
Required By           : mhwd-nvidia mhwd-nvidia-390xx mhwd-nvidia-470xx mhwd-nvidia-580xx
Optional For          : octopi
Provides              : libmhwd.so=libmhwd.so-64
Replaces              : --
Conflicts With        : --
Packager              : Philip Mueller <philm@manjaro.org>
Build Date            : man 29 sep 2025 00:55:40 CEST
Install Date          : ons 22 okt 2025 08:52:04 CEST
Install Reason        : Explicitly installed
Validated By          : Signature
Backup files          : --
mhwd-db package info 
 $ pamac info mhwd-db
Name                  : mhwd-db
Version               : 20260305-1
Description           : Manjaro Linux Hardware Detection Database
URL                   : https://gitlab.manjaro.org/applications/mhwd-db
Licenses              : GPL-3.0-or-later
Repository            : extra
Installed Size        : 47,5 kB
Groups                : --
Depends On            : libnotify mhwd-amdgpu mhwd-ati mhwd-nvidia>=455 mhwd-nvidia-390xx mhwd-nvidia-470xx
                        mhwd-nvidia-580xx nvidia-driver-assistant
Optional Dependencies : --
Required By           : mhwd
Optional For          : --
Provides              : --
Replaces              : --
Conflicts With        : --
Packager              : Philip Mueller <philm@manjaro.org>
Build Date            : fre 27 mar 2026 23:06:11 CET
Install Date          : sĆøn 29 mar 2026 10:24:17 CEST
Install Reason        : Installed as a dependency for another package
Validated By          : Signature
Backup files          : --
1 Like
3

ā€ƒ

3 Likes
6

Coming soon: mhwd-nvidia-580xx will replace mhwd-nvidia-570xx mhwd-nvidia-575xx.

1 Like
7

TBH, im not relying on Legacy Driversā€¦ but i donā€™t like that idea that a Nvidia 900 Gen, no longer gets supported. I understand that backporting patches takes time.

I just feel sorry for the people who are left alone and they probably forced to use Nouveau driver or leaving Manjaro to a Distro like Mint/Kubuntu where ongoing support is granted for several more yearā€™s.

But 6.18 LTS still has support for 570xx and 575xx for a certain time, so idk why you write its coming soon.

8

570xx & 575xx are long EOL and will be removed from the repos starting with the unstable branch later on today. 580xx will replace them.

1 Like
9

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