https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=521668

Chrystal M. <[email protected]> changed:

           What    |Removed                     |Added
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                 CC|                            |[email protected]

--- Comment #4 from Chrystal M. <[email protected]> ---
Date: 2026-06-18 / 2026-06-19

System: Arch Linux, kernel 7.0.12-arch1-1, KDE Plasma (Wayland), AMD GPU
(amdgpu), Dell D6000 USB dock (DisplayLink, USB VID 17e9), displaylink 
6.2-1, evdi-dkms 1.14.15-1

---

Symptom

Following a routine system update that brought in KWin 6.7.0-1, the Dell D6000
dock became non-functional under Plasma Wayland. At login, kwin_wayland entered
a crash loop: 10+ restarts over approximately 28 seconds, each terminated by a
SIGSEGV in the llvmpipe-3 thread (segfault at c30). Once the crash loop
subsided, the dock monitors displayed the SDDM login screen rather than the
Plasma desktop. kscreen-doctor -o showed only the internal display (eDP-1); the
dock outputs were absent.

---

Diagnosis

Journal analysis (journalctl -b) confirmed repeated kwin_wayland exits with
signal 11, followed by SDDM spawning a new Xorg process (/usr/bin/Xorg :1 -seat
seat0 vt2) on each restart. By the time KWin stopped crashing, SDDM's Xorg held
DRM master on the evdi devices, so KWin could no longer open them — hence the
dock showing the SDDM session instead of Plasma.

Root cause: KWin 6.7.0 GpuManager regression

KWin 6.7.0 introduced a new GpuManager class (src/core/gpumanager.cpp) that
separates GPU roles into "render devices" (cards with renderD* DRM nodes) and
"display devices" (KMS/DRM outputs). When pairing a display device with a
render device, GpuManager::findCompatibleRenderDevice() searches for a render
device on the same bus.

evdi (the DisplayLink kernel module) is a DRM_BUS_PLATFORM device and has no
renderD* node. The AMD GPU is DRM_BUS_PCI. Because no platform-bus render
device exists to pair with evdi, findCompatibleRenderDevice() returns nullptr.
This causes the evdi DrmGpu's renderDevice() to be null, which triggers KWin to
fall back to software rendering via llvmpipe for the DisplayLink outputs.
llvmpipe then crashes during pipeline initialization for those outputs.

KWin 6.6.x does not have GpuManager; the regression is entirely contained
within 6.7.0.

What was ruled out:

- options evdi initial_device_count=4 in /etc/modprobe.d/evdi.conf — ensures
evdi DRM nodes exist at boot but does not fix the null render device pairing;
crash persisted. - SDDM/kwayland configuration — the SDDM-on-dock-displays
symptom was a secondary consequence of the crash loop, not an independent
cause.

---

Fix

Downgraded kwin from 6.7.0-1 to 6.6.5-4 using the Arch Linux package archive:

`sudo pacman -U
https://archive.archlinux.org/packages/k/kwin/kwin-6.6.5-4-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst`

Only kwin itself required downgrading. KWin 6.6.5 links against
libkdecorations3.so.6 and libKF6*.so.6 sonames that are unchanged in the 6.7.x
Plasma packages, so the rest of the Plasma suite remained at 6.7.x without ABI
conflict.

To prevent the package manager from silently re-upgrading kwin on the next
pacman -Syu, kwin was added to IgnorePkg in /etc/pacman.conf:

IgnorePkg = kwin

After relog, kwin_wayland --version confirmed 6.6.5. All dock displays came up
correctly under Plasma Wayland.

---

Resolution

System is stable with kwin 6.6.5-4 pinned. The upstream bug is tracked as KDE
Bugzilla #521668 ("kwin_wayland SIGSEGV when DisplayLink display is
connected"). IgnorePkg should be cleared and kwin upgraded once that bug is
resolved in a future release.

-- 
You are receiving this mail because:
You are watching all bug changes.

Reply via email to