KDE graphic card woes. Please help [solved].

[DoubtingT]

If anyone could offer me some help with the following, I would really appreciate it. At the end, I offer an observation that might be something others should look out for, as this tale of woe quite possibly begins with a misdiagnosis.

My old Acer lasted 12 years but now sounds like a pneumatic drill, so I invested in a new computer, an Acer Aspire Vero AV14 laptop. Intel Core i7-1255U; Intel Iris Xe Graphics G7 96EUs, Core: 1250 MHz, Memory: 2133 MHz, Dual-channel, 31.0.101.3301; Memory 16 GB, LPDDR4-4266, Dual-channel mode; Display 14.00 inch 16:9, 1920 x 1080 pixel 157 PPI, AU Optronics B140HAN06.2; Mainboard Intel Alder Lake-P PCH.

Lightning hub.

I had no problems setting up dual boot with Windows 11 and Mageia 9, and installation of KDE seemed to go fine, but it degraded as soon as I started working with it. Eventually it refused to boot, and even the buttons on the login panel refused to work.

I reinstalled with Gnome, which worked perfectly, but it has never really suited my needs, so I tried KDE again. Still no joy. I was able to log in, but it seemed to stick at a black screen with a mobile cursor.

Looking through prior posts, I assumed the fault must be graphics driver related, so I followed the instructions in the corresponding Wiki. After logging into drakconf I found everything as it should be: Intel Kernel Mode setting (Xorg modesetting), just as it was in Gnome.

I decided to try and boot into KDE as root - success, but still no-go with my usual 3-character login name. Then I wondered if the failure could possibly have something to do with its length. I added two characters to it - success. It seemed bizarre.

Unfortunately I could not access my home files, as they remained in another folder under the original, shorter name.

Here is where it all went wrong: I decided to try and add the 3-character username within MCC. It worked, but of course it created a new folder and locked the original as: renamed_duplicate_2023-12-05-17:37:38.

Current state: I can boot KDE, but all my data is locked away, and I have two empty user folders that I would like to get rid of.

I would rather not port everything over from my backup again as I know it contains some malformed filenames that slow the procedure down horribly, so I have the following questions:

Can I safely delete the new 3-character user in MCC? If so, can I then unlock the duplicate? If so, how? Or can I somehow populate the new folder with the data from the locked one? In other words, what is the most efficient, kindest and safest way to return the home folder to its original state before I reinstall, hopefully for the last time?

Any help will truly be appreciated.

A final thought: I'm beginning to think that this entire saga started because a dodgy HDMI port on the brand new computer caused a software glitch in KDE. Even after I got it up and running, it failed to identify an external monitor. It was only when I checked the connection that I realised how twitchy it was. I have an HDMI port on my hub, and I wonder if I would have better luck with that. It could well be that a half-hour installation has turned into days of frustration because of a faulty port.

Thanks for your attention.

[xerxes2]

I would like to help you but it's too much text for me to understand what is really going on. You can add/delete users with useradd/userdel commands. But if you can specify more clearly what you want to do it would be easier to help you.

[DoubtingT]

Xerxes2, thanks for looking in.

On a new computer (KDE clean install), I created a user named 'sam'. I transferred the data from my old computer into the newly-created 'sam' in my Home folder. Then KDE appeared to crash on me. After another clean install I couldn't get KDE to boot at all with that username. I discovered that when I reinstalled yet again and created a user with a longer name it *did* allow me to boot into KDE. I then tried to add a user 'sam' within MCC (so I could access my data), but the system created a brand new folder and locked the original as:

'renamed_duplicate_2023-12-05-17:37:38'.

I need to remove the new 'sam' user (the creation of which was obviously a stupid mistake), and give that name back to the original folder, which is currently designated as the 'renamed duplicate.' A simple way of doing this (preferably graphically) would be very welcome.

Thanks again for looking in.

[xerxes2]

It sounds like you have old kde settings that are screwing up your new installation. I haven't used kde in a long time so would not know what folders to delete sorry. But fixing this problem graphically may not be possible either way. Your renamed folder obviously contains something that makes kde not to start. So if you have a completely new folder now called /home/sam you should be able to transfer non kde stuff and then switch to user sam again should work.

[doktor5000]

It would be helpful if you could provide the output of

Code: Select all

ls -al /home/
getent passwd

[DoubtingT]

hi xerxes2

It seems I spoke too soon about KDE booting. It does, but with a black desktop, no links, and no context menu on mouse right button. At least software runs.

At this stage I would settle for just retrieving the contents of my original Home folder and going over to Gnome, which has no such problems. The question remains about how to put the data back in place safely.

[DoubtingT]

Hi doktor5000,

requested output:

Code: Select all

[sammy@SamPC111 ~]$ ls -al /home/
total 36
drwxr-xr-x  6 root  root   4096 Dec  5 17:37 ./
drwxr-xr-x 22 root  root   4096 Dec  5 16:54 ../
drwx------  2 root  root  16384 Nov 12 16:04 lost+found/
drwxr-xr-x 17 sam   sam    4096 Dec  6 23:18 sam/
drwx------ 17 sammy sammy  4096 Dec  6 23:22 sammy/
drwx------ 60 root  root   4096 Dec  5 16:41 sam.renamed_duplicate_2023-12-05-17:37:38/
[sammy@SamPC111 ~]$ getent passwd
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
bin:x:1:1:bin:/bin:/bin/sh
daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/bin/sh
adm:x:3:4:adm:/var/adm:/bin/sh
lp:x:4:7:lp:/var/spool/lpd:/bin/sh
sync:x:5:0:sync:/sbin:/bin/sync
mail:x:8:12:mail:/var/spool/mail:/bin/sh
news:x:9:13:news:/var/spool/news:/bin/sh
uucp:x:10:14:uucp:/var/spool/uucp:/bin/sh
operator:x:11:0:operator:/var:/bin/sh
games:x:12:100:games:/usr/games:/bin/sh
nobody:x:65534:65534:Nobody:/:/bin/sh
messagebus:x:999:999:system user for dbus:/:/sbin/nologin
systemd-coredump:x:998:998:systemd Core Dumper:/:/sbin/nologin
systemd-network:x:192:192:systemd Network Management:/:/sbin/nologin
systemd-resolve:x:193:193:systemd Resolver:/:/sbin/nologin
systemd-oom:x:993:993:systemd Userspace OOM Killer:/:/usr/sbin/nologin
systemd-journal-remote:x:992:992:systemd Journal Remote:/:/usr/sbin/nologin
systemd-timesync:x:991:991:systemd Time Synchronization:/:/usr/sbin/nologin
rpm:x:990:990:system user for rpm:/var/lib/rpm:/bin/false
polkitd:x:989:989:system user for polkit:/usr/lib/polkit-1:/sbin/nologin
sddm:x:988:987:system user for sddm:/var/lib/sddm:/sbin/nologin
rtkit:x:987:985:system user for rtkit:/proc:/sbin/nologin
vcsa:x:69:69:virtual console memory owner:/dev:/sbin/nologin
geoclue:x:986:983:system user for geoclue:/var/lib/geoclue:/sbin/nologin
pipewire:x:985:982:PipeWire System Daemon:/run/pipewire:/sbin/nologin
mysql:x:984:981:system user for mariadb:/var/lib/mysql:/bin/bash
flatpak:x:983:979:User for flatpak system helper:/:/sbin/nologin
vnstat:x:982:977:system user for vnstat:/var/lib/vnstat:/sbin/nologin
nscd:x:981:973:system user for glibc:/:/bin/false
sammy:x:1000:1000:sammy:/home/sammy:/bin/bash
sam:x:1001:1001:Sam:/home/sam:/bin/bash
[sammy@SamPC111 ~]$

I'd appreciate any input.
Please see my reply to xerxes2 about the current state of my KDE installation.
Thanks.

[mrmazda]

Code: Select all

...
drwxr-xr-x 17 sam   sam    4096 Dec  6 23:18 sam/
drwx------ 17 sammy sammy  4096 Dec  6 23:22 sammy/
drwx------ 60 root  root   4096 Dec  5 16:41 sam.renamed_duplicate_2023-12-05-17:37:38/
...
sammy:x:1000:1000:sammy:/home/sammy:/bin/bash
sam:x:1001:1001:Sam:/home/sam:/bin/bash
...

These are your key. Whichever username you wish to keep and use needs to have its UID and GID applied to the other two directories. IOW, if you want to use sammy, then login as root (or use sudo) to do:

Code: Select all

chown -R 1000:1000 /home/sam
chown -R 1000:1000 '/home/sam.renamed_duplicate_2023-12-05-17:37:38'

The result should be full access by user sammy (1000) to all files in /home/sam and in /home/sam.renamed_duplicate_2023-12-05-17:37:38 that user sammy can move around as desired.

[doktor5000]

Why not simply remove both the sam and sammy users and then remove those 3 directories in /home, then create a new user and transfer the files from your backup back ?

[DoubtingT]

mrmazda:

Thanks. The code you suggested was what I was looking for. It would have done the job and also would have preserved a couple of sent e-mails - nothing more.

However, as per doktor5000's suggestion, I decided to just bite the bullet and wipe and reinstall everything. Ultimately it was the simplest solution.

The KDE issue remains. It just doesn't want to play nicely with my new computer. It doesn't help that everything (power, internet, external display) routes through a hub plugged into the Thunderbolt port. On top of that, my house developed an earth fault on its incoming power cable at the same time as the computer issues arose. I floundered trying to establish which fault was causing the various issues.

Anyway, anyone looking in can take their pick of which solution to apply if they have similar problems. I guess I can therefore mark the query as solved.

Thanks for your help in the matter. All the best for 2024.