screen resolution theme changing in new 21.2 (ahs) install [Solved]

[cmhobbs]

I'm on a fresh install of MX Linux. I've changed my screen resolution from 3840x2160 to 2560x1440 via xfce4's display tool and I've changed my theme to "MX Dark Thick Borders" with the MX Tweak tool.

If I let my machine idle for about 10 minutes, it'll turn off the screen (as specified by the power settings) but instead of staying off, it will come back on after a short period of time and change the resolution back to 3840x2160. This happens reliably every single time it's idle. If I happen to manually lock the computer by way of the whisker menu, the resolution stays the same.

A possibly related issue is that my theme will sometimes revert to what looks like MX Dark and I suddenly have blue borders around windows. This happens less frequently but I can't figure out what's causing it.

I don't see anything in the logs for either issue. Any ideas as to what's going on? As a workaround I'm going to leave the higher resolution on and try to enable scaling. Thanks!

Here's my quick system info:

Code: Select all

System:    Kernel: 5.18.0-4mx-amd64 [5.18.16-1~mx21+1] x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 10.2.1 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.18.0-4mx-amd64 
           root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet splash 
           Desktop: Xfce 4.16.0 tk: Gtk 3.24.24 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm 4.16.1 vt: 7 
           dm: LightDM 1.26.0 Distro: MX-21.2.1_ahs_x64 Wildflower September 18  2022 
           base: Debian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye) 
Machine:   Type: Desktop Mobo: ASRock model: X399 Taichi serial: <filter> 
           UEFI: American Megatrends v: P3.90 date: 12/04/2019 
CPU:       Info: 12-Core model: AMD Ryzen Threadripper 1920X bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Zen 
           family: 17 (23) model-id: 1 stepping: 1 microcode: 8001137 cache: L2: 6 MiB 
           flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm bogomips: 167661 
           Speed: 2144 MHz min/max: 2200/3500 MHz boost: enabled Core speeds (MHz): 1: 2144 
           2: 2147 3: 2283 4: 1888 5: 2109 6: 2153 7: 2034 8: 2116 9: 1938 10: 2050 11: 2094 
           12: 1888 13: 2047 14: 2145 15: 2039 16: 2190 17: 1889 18: 1888 19: 1889 20: 2033 
           21: 2001 22: 1887 23: 1887 24: 2195 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: Not affected 
           Type: l1tf status: Not affected 
           Type: mds status: Not affected 
           Type: meltdown status: Not affected 
           Type: mmio_stale_data status: Not affected 
           Type: retbleed mitigation: untrained return thunk; SMT vulnerable 
           Type: spec_store_bypass mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Retpolines, IBPB: conditional, STIBP: disabled, RSB 
           filling, PBRSB-eIBRS: Not affected 
           Type: srbds status: Not affected 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: AMD Navi 24 [Radeon RX 6400 / 6500 XT] vendor: XFX Limited driver: amdgpu 
           v: kernel bus-ID: 45:00.0 chip-ID: 1002:743f class-ID: 0300 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.14 compositor: xfwm4 v: 4.16.1 driver: 
           loaded: amdgpu,ati unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,radeon,vesa display-ID: :0.0 screens: 1 
           Screen-1: 0 s-res: 3840x2160 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 1016x572mm (40.0x22.5") 
           s-diag: 1166mm (45.9") 
           Monitor-1: HDMI-A-0 res: 3840x2160 hz: 60 dpi: 140 size: 698x393mm (27.5x15.5") 
           diag: 801mm (31.5") 
           OpenGL: renderer: AMD BEIGE_GOBY (LLVM 14.0.5 DRM 3.46 5.18.0-4mx-amd64) 
           v: 4.6 Mesa 22.0.5 direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: AMD Family 17h HD Audio vendor: ASRock driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel 
           bus-ID: 09:00.3 chip-ID: 1022:1457 class-ID: 0403 
           Device-2: AMD Navi 21/23 HDMI/DP Audio driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 45:00.1 
           chip-ID: 1002:ab28 class-ID: 0403 
           Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.18.0-4mx-amd64 running: yes 
           Sound Server-2: PulseAudio v: 14.2 running: yes 
Network:   Device-1: Intel I211 Gigabit Network vendor: ASRock driver: igb v: kernel port: 2000 
           bus-ID: 04:00.0 chip-ID: 8086:1539 class-ID: 0200 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter> 
           Device-2: Intel Dual Band Wireless-AC 3168NGW [Stone Peak] driver: iwlwifi v: kernel 
           modules: wl port: 2000 bus-ID: 05:00.0 chip-ID: 8086:24fb class-ID: 0280 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           Device-3: Intel I211 Gigabit Network vendor: ASRock driver: igb v: kernel port: 1000 
           bus-ID: 06:00.0 chip-ID: 8086:1539 class-ID: 0200 
           IF: eth1 state: down mac: <filter> 
Bluetooth: Device-1: Intel Wireless-AC 3168 Bluetooth type: USB driver: btusb v: 0.8 bus-ID: 1-9:2 
           chip-ID: 8087:0aa7 class-ID: e001 
           Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 1 state: down bt-service: N/A rfk-block: 
           hardware: no software: yes address: <filter> 
           Info: acl-mtu: 1021:4 sco-mtu: 96:6 link-policy: rswitch sniff link-mode: slave accept 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 9.13 TiB used: 2.99 TiB (32.8%) 
           SMART Message: Unable to run smartctl. Root privileges required. 
           ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 maj-min: 259:0 vendor: A-Data model: SX8200PNP size: 953.87 GiB 
           block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 type: SSD 
           serial: <filter> rev: 42BEU1TB temp: 36.9 C scheme: MBR 
           ID-2: /dev/nvme1n1 maj-min: 259:2 vendor: A-Data model: SX8200PNP size: 476.94 GiB 
           block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 31.6 Gb/s lanes: 4 type: SSD 
           serial: <filter> rev: 32B3T8EB temp: 36.9 C scheme: GPT 
           ID-3: /dev/sda maj-min: 8:0 vendor: Samsung model: SSD 860 EVO 500GB size: 465.76 GiB 
           block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s type: SSD serial: <filter> 
           rev: 4B6Q scheme: MBR 
           ID-4: /dev/sdb maj-min: 8:16 type: USB vendor: Western Digital model: WD Elements 25A2 
           size: 3.64 TiB block-size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B type: N/A serial: <filter> 
           rev: 1026 scheme: GPT 
           ID-5: /dev/sdc maj-min: 8:32 type: USB vendor: Western Digital model: WD Elements 2620 
           size: 3.64 TiB block-size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B type: N/A serial: <filter> 
           rev: 1018 scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / raw-size: 468.68 GiB size: 460.25 GiB (98.20%) used: 7.52 GiB (1.6%) fs: ext4 
           dev: /dev/nvme1n1p2 maj-min: 259:4 
           ID-2: /boot/efi raw-size: 256 MiB size: 252 MiB (98.46%) used: 274 KiB (0.1%) fs: vfat 
           dev: /dev/nvme1n1p1 maj-min: 259:3 
           ID-3: /home raw-size: 465.76 GiB size: 457.38 GiB (98.20%) used: 46.95 GiB (10.3%) 
           fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda1 maj-min: 8:1 
Swap:      Kernel: swappiness: 15 (default 60) cache-pressure: 100 (default) 
           ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 8 GiB used: 1.2 MiB (0.0%) priority: -2 
           dev: /dev/nvme1n1p3 maj-min: 259:5 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 34.4 C mobo: N/A gpu: amdgpu temp: 37.0 C mem: 40.0 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A gpu: amdgpu fan: 0 
Repos:     Packages: note: see --pkg apt: 2102 lib: 1120 flatpak: 0 
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb http://mirrors.rit.edu/mxlinux/mx-packages/mx/repo/ bullseye main non-free
           2: deb http://mirrors.rit.edu/mxlinux/mx-packages/mx/repo/ bullseye ahs
Info:      Processes: 431 Uptime: 3h 46m wakeups: 1 Memory: 31.21 GiB used: 3.46 GiB (11.1%) 
           Init: SysVinit v: 2.96 runlevel: 5 default: 5 tool: systemctl Compilers: gcc: 10.2.1 
           alt: 10 Client: shell wrapper v: 5.1.4-release inxi: 3.3.06 
Boot Mode: UEFI

[cmhobbs]

A followup: I tried changing the resolution with the MX Tweak tool instead of xfce4's display settings and the same behavior exists with the resolution changing.

This time around my theme appears to have changed as well (I now have blue borders again). I'm not sure if the two issues are related or not.

Some searching online has pointed to screensaver issues causing this but I noticed that the xfce4 interface for screensavers doesn't exist in the settings manager on MX. I'm not sure which package might provide that.

[dolphin_oracle]

debian (and us) don't have xfce4-screensavers installed. so light-locker could be a factor, especially if manually locking the screen doens't produce the issue.

I have switched on my own machine to xscreensaver and removed lightlocker. I have xscreensaver set to lock the screen, which unlike light locker does not affect the actual running session.

[cmhobbs]

I think your likely right and I'll make those changes and reboot the rig tomorrow sometime.

As further evidence of that, I enabled the "Lock screen when system is going to sleep" option in the Power Manager and set the "Automatically lock the session:" option to "When the screensaver is activated". This solved the issue of the resolution changing but I"m unsure if it solved the theming issue because I still have blue borders.

Thank you for the reply!

[JayM]

Another thing that might be happening is that your display manager might be re-detecting the monitor each time you unlock your session. What I would try is (assuming you have Xfce not KDE) go to Settings/Display, click the Advanced tab (after setting it to the correct resolution on the General tab), click the icon to create a new display profile, name it whatever you want, then set it to automatically enable profiles when a new display is connected. From then on it should apply the saved profile including the resolution even if it keeps detecting the monitor whenever you unlock the display.

[dolphin_oracle]

Some gtk3 apps use client side dectorations and so wouldn’t have window manager borders and some would use the window manager theme.

[cmhobbs]

Another thing that might be happening is that your display manager might be re-detecting the monitor each time you unlock your session. What I would try is (assuming you have Xfce not KDE) go to Settings/Display, click the Advanced tab (after setting it to the correct resolution on the General tab), click the icon to create a new display profile, name it whatever you want, then set it to automatically enable profiles when a new display is connected. From then on it should apply the saved profile including the resolution even if it keeps detecting the monitor whenever you unlock the display.

That makes sense. I've gone ahead and made those changes and I probably should've done that anyway as sometimes I have an additional monitor for this desktop.

Some gtk3 apps use client side dectorations and so wouldn’t have window manager borders and some would use the window manager theme.

I understand that but the blue borders happen to show up across all applications. The entire theme is switched back to "MX Dark" rather than the "MX Dark Thick Borders" I had selected.

I replaced light-locker with xscreensaver, set the former to kick on at 8 minutes of inactivity and the power manager is set to blank after 10 minutes and is still set to "Lock screen when the system is going to sleep". Hoping for the best. I'll report back after a reboot and some idle time to see what happens.

[cmhobbs]

Oddly with the current configuration, the display never seems to go to sleep. Perhaps removing light-locker or setting the xscreensaver time to a shorter duration than the power manager is the issue there?

I really don't care much if the screen locks, I'd just like it to turn off after a period of inactivity. I've set xscreensaver to 10 minutes to match the power manager and I'll see what happens. I didn't experience a resolution change this time, though.

[dolphin_oracle]

in the xscreensavers settings you can configure the power down time. it kind of takes over some of the display management functions.

here's what I meant about the borders (screenshot). Not all apps will display the thick borders. in the shot, my thunar window has them, but the Appearance app does not. Appearance users gtk3 client side decorations, but thunar does not, so it picks up the window manager decorations.

[cmhobbs]

in the xscreensavers settings you can configure the power down time. it kind of takes over some of the display management functions.

here's what I meant about the borders (screenshot). Not all apps will display the thick borders. in the shot, my thunar window has them, but the Appearance app does not. Appearance users gtk3 client side decorations, but thunar does not, so it picks up the window manager decorations.

I'll tinker with xscreensaver's settings some more.

I understand what you're saying about the borders. In my case, thunar does not have blue borders when I have chosen the mx dark thick borders theme from mx tweaks, nor do gtk apps (say for example baobab). After some arbitrary conditions I've not yet experienced, *all* of my windows will have the blue border (except maybe qt applications). I still haven't figured out what's kicking it off. I also didn't have this issue when I was running MX 21.1 or 19. I'm not too worried if I don't ever solve it, though. The borders don't bother me that much.

I really appreciate all the replies. I love this distro and I'm glad I was able to get it running again.