[SOLVED]Background color obscures windows on external monitor

[Metal Mick]

Hi all,

I have a fresh install of Mint 20 Cinnamon on a new laptop, fitted with the intel Iris graphics chip only (machine is an LG Gram 17).

When I use an external monitor, the tiled images for the background do not show, and the color background (default is black) appears to overlay all windows, but not the desktop icons or menu. It does however, overlay the shut-down window and any others I might launch from the start menu.

If after a fresh boot, I set the display to use the external monitor only (and turn off the laptop monitor), all is fine. It is only when I restart the machine with external monitor only, that the problem returns.

Disconnecting the monitor and using the laptop screen sees no problems at all.

My typical use of the machine is with an external keyboard and monitor. My previous machine (Dell Inspiron 7000) never showed this, nor any of my previous machines with earlier releases of Mint. They all had a separate nVidia graphics chip and I used the nVidia drivers for them. My new Mint shows there are no drivers of any kind required/available for my new machine.

Is there a way I can fix this display glitch?

All helpful suggestions will be gratefully received.

[Moonstone Man]

All helpful suggestions will be gratefully received.

You have 70+ posts to your name so one would have thought that you'd know by now that we need technical details about the current machine, not descriptions of machines from history.

You might like to click the link at the top of the page. You can't miss it, it's in red and says...

Forum rules
Before you post please read how to get help

Pay particular attention to item 5. If you reply with code from a terminal, wrap it in code tags. You'll see the code tags icon </> when you reply.

[Metal Mick]

You have 70+ posts to your name so one would have thought that you'd know by now that we need technical details about the current machine, not descriptions of machines from history.

You might like to click the link at the top of the page. You can't miss it, it's in red and says...

Forum rules
Before you post please read how to get help

Pay particular attention to item 5. If you reply with code from a terminal, wrap it in code tags. You'll see the code tags icon </> when you reply.

I'm sorry to have failed in certain aspects of posting. I did check through the thread listings for similar postings as I usually do. And I'm of the belief that I complied with the other 12 items listed. My apologies to all forum members for missing item 5.
The results of the inxi command as are as follows:

Code: Select all

System:
  Kernel: 5.4.0-40-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 9.3.0 
  Desktop: Cinnamon 4.6.6 wm: muffin 4.6.2 dm: LightDM 1.30.0 
  Distro: Linux Mint 20 Ulyana base: Ubuntu 20.04 focal 
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: LG product: 17Z90N-R.AAC8U1 v: 0.1 serial: <filter> 
  Chassis: type: 10 v: 0.1 serial: <filter> 
  Mobo: LG model: 17Z90N v: FAB1 serial: <filter> UEFI: Phoenix 
  v: C2ZE0160 X64 date: 04/07/2020 
Battery:
  ID-1: CMB0 charge: 62.6 Wh condition: 78.1/80.0 Wh (98%) volts: 8.2/7.7 
  model: LG LGC-LGC type: Li-ion serial: <filter> status: Discharging 
  cycles: 4 
CPU:
  Topology: Quad Core model: Intel Core i7-1065G7 bits: 64 type: MT MCP 
  arch: Ice Lake rev: 5 L2 cache: 8192 KiB 
  flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx 
  bogomips: 23961 
  Speed: 1100 MHz min/max: 400/3900 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1056 2: 1058 
  3: 1053 4: 1055 5: 1060 6: 1056 7: 1052 8: 1056 
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 vendor: LG driver: i915 v: kernel 
  bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:8a52 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.8 driver: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa 
  resolution: 2560x1600~60Hz 
  OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel Iris Plus Graphics (ICL GT2) 
  v: 4.6 Mesa 20.0.8 direct render: Yes 
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Smart Sound Audio vendor: LG driver: snd_hda_intel 
  v: kernel bus ID: 00:1f.3 chip ID: 8086:34c8 
  Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.4.0-40-generic 
Network:
  Device-1: Intel Killer Wi-Fi 6 AX1650i 160MHz Wireless Network Adapter 
  driver: iwlwifi v: kernel port: 2000 bus ID: 00:14.3 chip ID: 8086:34f0 
  IF: wlp0s20f3 state: up mac: <filter> 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 939.74 GiB used: 218.77 GiB (23.3%) 
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Samsung model: MZVLB512HAJQ-00000 
  size: 476.94 GiB speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 serial: <filter> rev: EXA7301Q 
  scheme: GPT 
  ID-2: /dev/sda type: USB model: SMI USB DISK size: 462.80 GiB 
  serial: <filter> rev: 1100 scheme: MBR 
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 27.38 GiB used: 15.15 GiB (55.3%) fs: ext4 
  dev: /dev/nvme0n1p5 
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 32.0 C mobo: N/A 
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Repos:
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list 
  1: deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/official-package-repositories.list 
  1: deb http://packages.linuxmint.com ulyana main upstream import backport #id:linuxmint_main
  2: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal main restricted universe multiverse
  3: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates main restricted universe multiverse
  4: deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-backports main restricted universe multiverse
  5: deb http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ focal-security main restricted universe multiverse
  6: deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu/ focal partner
Info:
  Processes: 245 Uptime: 11m Memory: 15.27 GiB used: 1.24 GiB (8.1%) 
  Init: systemd v: 245 runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 9.3.0 alt: 9 Shell: bash 
  v: 5.0.16 running in: gnome-terminal inxi: 3.0.38 

The monitor I seek to connect is a Dell U2913WM, resolution 2560 x 1080, and connected via HDMI cable.

[Moonstone Man]

I'm sorry to have failed in certain aspects of posting.

It's ok.

Code: Select all

Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Iris Plus Graphics G7 vendor: LG driver: i915

That's very new so this is a shot in the dark. You might want to execute sudo apt install linux-generic-hwe-20.04 in a terminal and reboot. That command will install the hardware enablement stack, which is intended for newer hardware. I don't know if that will help or not, but it's all I can offer, unfortunately. Despite that, installing this kernel stack shouldn't result in any negative effects.

[Metal Mick]

Hi,

thanks for the suggestion - I'll give it a try.

I'm in Australia where it's early evening, and I have a few things to finish in Windows so I'll reboot into Mint in a short while, and post the results - probably overnight if you're in the States.

Cheers,

Michael P.

[Metal Mick]

... You might want to execute sudo apt install linux-generic-hwe-20.04 in a terminal and reboot...

The install made a minor difference to the situation: the black background is still foremost on the display, but other windows like browsers can now be seen. The logout window cannot. Of those windows that are visible, there is also several seconds of black and white tearing/flashes across the display.

It is correct to say that my machine has some fairly new hardware and it may take some time before support comes through.

A workaround is to start the machine, allowing it to finish booting and then plug in the external monitor. All works fine so far. So the simplest course of action is to use the workaround, and check every now and again - as I apply updates that come through - to see if the situation has changed. I'm very confident that it will.

Thanks for your help. I'll mark this as "SOLVED" because it appears to have gone as a far as possible for now.

[Metal Mick]

Apparently truly solved now.

I just rebooted following a raft of updates and tried booting with external monitor connected and got behaviour as per my old machine.

Cheers,

Michael P.