Bug 494886

I've been having the same issue since updating to KDE Neon 6.2 and the subsequent Ubuntu update. Currently on Plasma 6.2.1, Frameworks 6.7.0 and QT 6.7.2 and can still reproduce. It doesn't have every time I start-up my laptop, but more often than not. I normally have to try 2, 3, 4 or sometimes more times until it successfully turns out and doesn't freeze before reaching the login screen.

since plasma 6.2 and continuing in 6.2.1
BLACK SCREEN

Still have to CTL-ALT # to terminal, CTL-ALT# to open plasma desktop

same issue on a CachyOS partition
Lenovo Legion T5 26ARA8
AMD Ryzen 7 7700
Radeon RX 6600
samsung s32ag55 monitor

(successful upgrade on totally different system)

possibly related to ddcutil, powerdevil and plasma-desktop ??

Working system with Manjaro Stable. Need I back away from the bleeding edge???

Just as a data point, I am not able to reproduce this on a KDE Neon stable VM, but it's using UEFI

For those of you who are affected by this, does your system use BIOS or UEFI for the boot loader?

My system is using UEFI for the boot loader. If I boot into recovery mode and then resume normal boot, without some of the usual (graphics) drivers, the system does reliably boot, but not otherwise. If I boot a specific kernel instead of the default KDE Neon option, I get "Loading Linux ..." and "Loading initial ramdisk" before the system freezes.

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(In reply to garybig from comment #2)
> since plasma 6.2 and continuing in 6.2.1
> BLACK SCREEN
> 
> Still have to CTL-ALT # to terminal, CTL-ALT# to open plasma desktop
> 
> same issue on a CachyOS partition
> Lenovo Legion T5 26ARA8
> AMD Ryzen 7 7700
> Radeon RX 6600
> samsung s32ag55 monitor
> 
> (successful upgrade on totally different system)
> 
> possibly related to ddcutil, powerdevil and plasma-desktop ??
> 
> Working system with Manjaro Stable. Need I back away from the bleeding
> edge???

DEFINITELY powerdevil package causing my issue   !!

I was still having the same issue up until i updated today. When I updated last week, it still put "splash" in the grub, and I had to go in and manually remove it before the device would boot. However, today when I updated the computer, it did not put splash in the grub and the update when through and the computer booted fine after.

(In reply to Bryan Schaefer from comment #7)

That's great news. I'm glad your system is booting reliably now.

(In reply to FormularSumo from comment #4)
> My system is using UEFI for the boot loader. If I boot into recovery mode
> and then resume normal boot, without some of the usual (graphics) drivers,
> the system does reliably boot, but not otherwise. If I boot a specific
> kernel instead of the default KDE Neon option, I get "Loading Linux ..." and
> "Loading initial ramdisk" before the system freezes.

Can you run any updates in Neon and let us know if you still have this problem? Thanks!

(In reply to garybig from comment #6)
> DEFINITELY powerdevil package causing my issue   !!

Can you also try to reproduce the problem with a fully up to date system? Thanks!

Unfortunately I am still having the issue, on the latest KDE Neon as of the time of writing (6.2.3, 6.8.0). It's still inconsistent, sometimes not happening, other times happening many times in a row.

However I haven't tried removing spalsh from the GRUP, I can have a go at that and re-test afterwards, see if it fixes my issue like it has for Bryan.

Removing "splash" from GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT in /etc/grub has worked for me. Setting the value to "quiet" or "" instead of the previous "quiet splash" means my system now reliably boots. I also installed another minor system update after doing this (just 9 packages) and it has remained the same value and still booting. Personally I prefer the graphical splash UI when booting or shutting down to the text ones I now get, but it's not a major issue and definitely better to have to boot issue fixed.

Sources / other people with the same problem:

https://www.kubuntuforums.net/forum/currently-supported-releases/kubuntu-24-04-nitpick-noble-lts/post-installation-az/678936-resolved-black-screen-after-first-start
https://www.reddit.com/r/Ubuntu/comments/1f6naow/ubuntu_24041_fresh_install_no_splash_on_boot/
https://discuss.kde.org/t/kde-neon-24-04-lts-completely-broke-my-system/23180/47

Related bug in Ubuntu: https://bugs.launchpad.net/systemd/+bug/2063143 - fixed a bug with SDDM
Fix is in sddm 0.20.0-2ubuntu4.2

Version in KDE Neon is 0.21.0+p24.04+vstable+git20241111.0737-0

(In reply to FormularSumo from comment #4)
Can you confirm the version of the sddm package on your system with `apt info sddm` and paste the version in a comment? Thanks.

(In reply to garybig from comment #6)
> (In reply to garybig from comment #2)

> > Working system with Manjaro Stable. Need I back away from the bleeding
> > edge???
> 
> DEFINITELY powerdevil package causing my issue   !!

This is a different bug than the one reported in this report. Different issues can have different causes, even if the symptoms look the same. Please file a new bug report about your issue. Thanks!

Readding through the Ubuntu bug it does sound pretty similar to my issue. Running that command I get "0.21.0-0zneon+24.04+noble+release+build3". However, I also get "N: There are 5 additional records. Please use the '-a' switch to see them." Running it again with -a yields the above, and the following (in order):
"0.21.0-0zneon+24.04+noble+release+build2"
"0.21.0-0zneon+24.04+noble+release+build1"
"0.21.0-0xneon+24.04+noble+release+build13"
"0.20.0-2ubuntu4.2"
"0.20.0-2ubuntu4"

Do you think it's possible that my system is still using one of the older versions of SDDM (the last one is older than the patch I believe), and that that could be causing the issue? I could try cleaning up packages so old ones aren't kept around and then retesting.

Tried autoremove, autoclean and clean but all the old versions are still around. Also tried reinstalling from my package manager but it just reinstalled the most recent version. Do you know how I'd do this (if needed)?

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Downgrading_packages

(In reply to FormularSumo from comment #15)
> Tried autoremove, autoclean and clean but all the old versions are still
> around. Also tried reinstalling from my package manager but it just
> reinstalled the most recent version. Do you know how I'd do this (if needed)?

The -a flag output shows you all the packages that are available, not just the one that's installed. To which one is actually installed run
apt-a list sddm

That will probably show 1.0-0zneon+24.04+noble+release+build3 is the installed package
That's a later version than the one that contained the fix referenced in the Ubuntu bug report.

I'll leave this open in case someone is able to reproduce the issue or we get more reports

Ah that makes sense, and yeah running "apt -a list sddm" shows "0.21.0-0zneon+24.04+noble+release+build3" as the installed package, as does my package manager.

Well, my issue WAS fixed... but in the updates I just installed today, you all are back to putting "splash" in the grub which breaks my system again. I have to manually go in and edit the grub every time this happens to remove "splash" from it. Is there a reason why you all keep putting it back in if it is obviously causing a problem for so many. No one really needs "splash" in the grub, so why not just take it out and leave it out? You'll solve a lot of your problems with this latest Ubuntu update if you do so.