I understand and appreciate what you have said. I suppose the dilema I have is wether to choose a new install of NetRunner or go for Manjaro KDE. I’ve used the later on my laptop for many months without significant issue and whilst NR looks nice, beauty needs to be more than just skin deep.
I’ve used almost all of the Manjaro flavors and they all have their pluses and minuses.
Netrunner Rolling and the Manjaro KDE Edition are still both based on the same Manjaro base system, so this just comes down to personal preference, even if you decided to go with the later you are still more than welcome here in our forums.
The plot thickens.
I decided to give the latest NetRunner (2014.09.1) a go and installed it into a spare partition on my HDD. It installed fine (using the non-free drivers) and rebooted OK. I was able to login and all was good. I then manually updated Bash using Pacman and let Octopi install the remaining 200+ updates. This updated OK. Remembering my previous issues with SDDM I copied the config file and moved the old directory out of the way:
sudo cp /etc/sddm.conf /etc/sddm.conf-old
sudo cp /etc/sddm.conf.pacnew /etc/sddm.conf
sudo mv /usr/share/apps/sddm /usr/share/apps/sddm-oldand then rebooted and guess what ?
Yup, same problem as before. The system boots and then freezes after a few seconds when the login screen appears. I can’t believe I’m the only one effected by this issue.
I really wish I had an nvidia system to test on.
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Try booting normally but before it locks up hit ctrl+alt+f2 and log in, then issue these commands:
sudo mhwd -r pci video-nouveau
sudo mhwd -f -i pci video-nvidia-304xx
sudo mhwd-gpu --setgl nvidia --setxorg /etc/X11/mhwd.d/nvidia.conf
sudo mkinitcpio -p linux314I’m afraid that made no difference. I did notice that mhwd is kicking back a warning:
Warning: config '/var/lib/mhwd/local/pci/video-nvidia-legacy/MHWDCONFIG' is invalid!
> Installed PCI configs:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NAME VERSION FREEDRIVER TYPE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
video-nvidia-304xx 2014.09.24 false PCI
Warning: No installed USB configs!The file in question looks like:
# mhwd Driver Config
NAME="video-nvidia-legacy"
INFO="Closed source NVIDIA legacy drivers for linux."
VERSION="2014.01.05"
FREEDRIVER="false"
PRIORITY="3"
CLASSIDS="0300 0302"
VENDORIDS="10de"
DEVICEIDS=">/var/lib/mhwd/ids/pci/nvidia-legacy.ids"
# Conflicts
CONFLICTS="nvidia-utils"
CONFLICTS_64="lib32-nvidia-utils"
CONKMOD="nvidia"
# Conflicts with other mhwd configs
MHWDCONFLICTS="video-hybrid-intel-nvidia-bumblebee video-hybrid-intel-nvidia-legacy-bumblebee"
# Dependencies
DEPENDS="nvidia-304xx-utils"
DEPENDS_64="lib32-nvidia-304xx-utils"
DEPKMOD="nvidia-304xx"
XORGFILE="/etc/X11/mhwd.d/nvidia.conf"
fix_screen_flickering()
{
sed -i /'Section "Device"'/,/'EndSection'/s/'EndSection'/"\tOption \"RegistryDwords\" \"PowerMizerEnable=0x1; PerfLevelSrc=0x2222; PowerMizerDefault=0x2; PowerMizerDefaultAC=0x1\"\nEndSection"/g "${XORGFILE}"
}
post_install()
{
nvidia-xconfig -o "${XORGFILE}" --composite &>/dev/null
MHWD_ADD_BACKSPACE "${XORGFILE}"
# Remove logo
sed -i /'Section "Device"'/,/'EndSection'/s/'EndSection'/"\tOption \"NoLogo\" \"1\"\nEndSection"/g "${XORGFILE}"
# Fix screen flickering for some nvidia devices
MHWD_FUNC_ON_MATCH 0300 10de "0400 0401 0402 0403 0407 0409 0425" fix_screen_flickering
mhwd-gpu --setgl nvidia --setxorg "${XORGFILE}"
}
post_remove()
{
if [ -e "${XORGFILE}" ]; then
rm "${XORGFILE}"
fi
mhwd-gpu --check
}I thought nvidia-legacy was replaced by nvidia-304xx ?
Your right, it looks like that package didn’t get removed first, try removing it yourself:
sudo mhwd -r pci video-nvidia-legacyIf that complains that the package isn’t installed then delete the file yourself.
sudo rm /var/lib/mhwd/local/pci/video-nvidia-legacy/MHWDCONFIGThe system thinks it’s already been removed:
[install@cartman log]$ sudo mhwd -r pci video-nvidia-legacy
Warning: config '/var/lib/mhwd/local/pci/video-nvidia-legacy/MHWDCONFIG' is invalid!
Error: config 'video-nvidia-legacy' is not installed!Looking back at the pacman logs the mhwd-nvidia-legacy package was removed as part of the update:
[2014-11-12 14:35] [PACMAN] upgraded manjaro-system (20140913-1 -> 20141014-1)
[2014-11-12 14:36] [PACMAN] Running 'pacman -Syy'
[2014-11-12 14:36] [PACMAN] synchronizing package lists
[2014-11-12 14:36] [PACMAN] Running 'pacman -Su --noconfirm'
[2014-11-12 14:36] [PACMAN] starting full system upgrade
[2014-11-12 14:41] [PACMAN] removed grantlee (0.4.0-1)
[2014-11-12 14:41] [PACMAN] removed mhwd-nvidia-legacy (304.123-1)
...I think moved the directory & file out of the way, forced a re-install of the driver and rebooted:
sudo mv /var/lib/mhwd/local/pci/video-nvidia-legacy /root/
sudo mhwd -f -i pci video-nvidia-304xx
sudo mhwd-gpu --setgl nvidia --setxorg /etc/X11/mhwd.d/nvidia.conf
sudo mkinitcpio -p linux314This was worse ! It froze as usual, so I rebooted in rescue mode and then tried to go into “systemctl default” and that froze. A few attempts suggests it was related to the change so I restored the file, rebooted and at least I can get in via rescue mode. To me the problem seems to be with mhwd.
I’ll try removing the nvidia-304xx driver and using the Open source version to see if that at least boots.
It does not seem to matter which driver nvidia-304xx or nouveau both cause the freeze on my system.
Removing the directory /var/lib/mhwd/local/pci/video-nvidia-legacy seems to be fatal. It will lock the system hard on a reboot. Removing the file /var/lib/mhwd/local/pci/video-nvidia-legacy/MHWDCONFIG is slightly better - it gets rid of the warnings in mhwd, but the underlying freeze problem still persists.
I’m not sure where to go from here.
OK, I think there may be an issue with the Netrunner Rolling install media when installing using the non-free method. Let’s try something different, boot the live media using the first boot option which uses the free drivers (nouveau in your case), after you re-install, boot a few times and let me know if the problem persists.
I’ll try, but every time I’ve used the nouveau drivers the screen tearing is so bad I can’t really read what options I’m choosing on the install screen. Mind you, by now I think I know all the options off by heart. 
Yea, but screen tearing can be fixed, locking up not so much, LOL 
I’ve installed with the default nouveau drivers and the vanilla install works fine (just like the vanilla non-free drivers).I then allowed pacman to update the system (pacman -Syu) and rebooted and freeze appeared when trying to login.
The pacman log shows that when the initial install was done (with the free drivers) it also installed mhwd-nvidia-legacy, this was later upgraded to nvidia-304xxx
I’ve also tried to install Manjaro 0.8.11 KDE (RC1). That installed fine and installs the nvidia-304xx package by default (rather than the old legacy package). No freezes so far, but that maybe because it’s a RC and so there are no updates to install.
Can you tell if it was just the mhwd-nvidia-legacy package or are the nvidia-legacy drivers being installed as well. mhwd-nvidia-legacy is just a database file for mhwd and doesn’t contain any drivers.
However, if the nvidia-legacy drivers are also being installed they shouldn’t be, there must be something wrong on the install media. Now that we tracked this down, Install the system using the non-free mode, but before upgrading make sure all of the nvidia-legacy driver packages are removed.
On a free install the package mhwd-nvidia-legacy is present - it does not look like nvidia-legacy drivers are present.
On a non-free install we seem to have a bit of both. mhwd-nvidia-legacy is present, but the drivers are the re-packaged 304xx ones; lib32-nvidia-304xx-utils, linux314-nvidia-304xx, nvidia-304xx-utils. When an update is done it will try to replace mhwd-nvidia-legacy with mhwd-nvidia-304xx this may be causing a problem or it could be something else.
I’ve done a non-free install, then updated only mhwd-nvidia-304xx and rebooted - all OK. I then installed the updates for the remaining mhwd packages and again all OK. Then I updated the kernel together with the kernel nvidia drivers and again all OK. SDDM was next and that was OK. Boredom set in at that point and I just upgraded the remaining 200 or so packages and that caused the freeze to appear.
So it’s not the Kernel, drivers or SDDM causing the freeze on your system but something else altogether, this is good to know, however it is going to make it harder to figure out.
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Could you try disabling desktop effects from loading at startup?
[attachment=509]
This will tell us if it is Netrunners default software rendering setting in KDE that is causing the freeze, If it is we may need to play with the effects settings.
Remember we are getting the freeze when the SDDM greeter screen is displayed i.e. before a user has logged in so I doubt desktop effects are causing it. Anyway, I disabled it and there is no difference.
OH yea, I forgot it was before you logged in. I think It might be something other than the graphics driver causing the freeze, but just in case could you try using the new mhwd-dev to reconfigure you drivers?
sudo pacman-mirrors -g && sudo pacman -Syy
sudo pacman -Rdd mhwd
sudo pacman -S mhwd-devI replaced mhwd with the development version and re-installed the video drivers, but it did not help - still freezes on bootup.
I hate to say it, but might need to go through the updates one by one till you find the package that is causing the freeze.
update package - reboot
update package - reboot
and so on.
I’m not keen on 290+ updates/reboots. Especially as I think it’s timing related and the problem may not surface on the package that is really causing the issue. I’ll maybe try some selective updates and maybe I’ll get lucky. I may just give up and stick with Manjaro and keep my fingers crossed it does not occur on that version.
Thanks for your help and suggestions anyway.