SDDM Login Manager won't start

My system boots up to console tty only, no graphics.

I can get to the graphics (KDE) with startx only.

I cannot get SDDM to start.

[bullshark:~]$ sudo systemctl restart sddm
[sudo] password for bullshark:
[bullshark:~]$ sudo systemctl status sddm
× sddm.service - Simple Desktop Display Manager
Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/sddm.service; enabled; preset: disabled)
Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Sun 2022-12-04 18:59:52 CST; 3s ago
Duration: 2ms
Docs: man:sddm(1)
man:sddm.conf(5)
Process: 77913 ExecStart=/usr/bin/sddm (code=exited, status=203/EXEC)
Main PID: 77913 (code=exited, status=203/EXEC)
CPU: 905us

Dec 04 18:59:52 beastlinux systemd[1]: sddm.service: Scheduled restart job, restart counter is at 2.
Dec 04 18:59:52 beastlinux systemd[1]: Stopped Simple Desktop Display Manager.
Dec 04 18:59:52 beastlinux systemd[1]: sddm.service: Start request repeated too quickly.
Dec 04 18:59:52 beastlinux systemd[1]: sddm.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Dec 04 18:59:52 beastlinux systemd[1]: Failed to start Simple Desktop Display Manager.
[bullshark:~]$

Also this file was empty.

/lib/systemd/system/sddm.service

Reinstalling sddm didn’t fix that, so I borrowed the file from my friend’s Manjaro installation.

I found 2 more errors that might be useful.

Dec 07 22:10:49 beastlinux systemd[11096]: sddm.service: Failed to execute /usr/bin/sddm: Exec format error
Dec 07 22:10:49 beastlinux systemd[11096]: sddm.service: Failed at step EXEC spawning /usr/bin/sddm: Exec format error

I solved the issue with SDDM.

Install a newer kernel, 6.0

Update the entire system like this

pacman -Syyu --overwrite “*”

Reinstall SDDM like this

sudo pacman -Syy --overwrite “*” sddm sddm-breath-theme sddm-kcm

Bad practice and should be avoided. Use

$ sudo pacman -Syu

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