[SOLVED] Mint 22.1 Only Recognizing One Monitor

[earnest estuary]

Been using mint for a few weeks now, had some monitor issues before but they were solved by just using the right NVIDIA driver. Started up my laptop today and only one monitor is being registered. I have two external monitors connected, and the only monitor being registered is one of the external ones. The other two are black with the Mint logo that displays on startup stuck there. I tried booting without any external monitors connected, and the laptop screen still stayed stuck on the Mint logo. I assume the OS was loaded but the monitor wasn't detected properly, as hitting escape didn't open up grub.
Output of LANG=C inxi -Fxxxrzc0 --usb is attached as a txt file.

[earnest estuary]

Mint 22.1 Only Recognizing One Monitor (Latest Kernel Installed)

[earnest estuary]

after reinstalling it like 3 times the nouveau drievr seems to be working now even though it never was before, sure i guess (?)

nvm my performance with the nouveau driver is TERRIBLE lol

[thorny sinew]

That is normal, you can thank nvidia for that.
How are you attaching the screens? Which ports, which cables?

[earnest estuary]

there's the primary screen that's a part of the laptop (not working), one attached via usb-c (not working), and one attached via hdmi (working)

[thorny sinew]

Please share the output of mokutil --sb-state.

[earnest estuary]

let me get back to my computer in a moment

[thorny sinew]

This will tell you if Secure Boot is locking down your nvidia driver.

If so, disable Secure Boot or enroll your nvidia-tainted kernel in MOK Manager.
Next thing you check is if the switchable graphics is actually set to nvidia. In a setup like yours, the iGPU physically controls all graphics outputs, including the laptop lid. It just hands off to the dGPU when instructed. This is controlled with an applet in the system tray on Mint.
I will be off now, going to check back in tomorrow.

[earnest estuary]

hey! sorry for the delay, been out of the house.
mokutil --sb-state returns SecureBoot disabled and i've manually checked my bios to make sure it's actually disabled.
the switchable graphics are set to nvidia.
going to try switching from performance mode to nvidia on-demand mode and see if that makes a difference.

it did not lol

[earnest estuary]

just remembered timeshift is a thing!

im gonna try to restore to a snapshot before this started happening

[earnest estuary]

timeshift didnt fix it so i do Not know whats wrong

[thorny sinew]

On-demand is broken, do not use.
What happens if you disconnect the external displays? Does it snap back to using the laptop lid?

Also, about your software state: Did you get that 6.14 kernel through Update Manager? And the nvidia driver through Driver Manager? Because if you got them through other channels, this is likely the issue.

[earnest estuary]

it does not; only displays connected via hdmi are visible

[earnest estuary]

the 6.14 kernel was downloaded through update manager, and the nvidia driver was through the driver manager

[tough quest]

can you show an image of what you mean that the monitor has a logo or something graphical showing but isn't otherwise working properly?

[earnest estuary]

the usbc connected monitor and the laptop lid monitor both display the mint logo

if i unplug the usbc monitor and plug it back in it still displays the mint logo so it has to be detecting them somewhere? but they dont show up under display

it displays properly on all 3 monitors only when using the nouveau driver

but the nouveau driver obviously has the problem of really bad performance

[earnest estuary]

dont know if it helps but it shows the terminal (blank after startup) on those monitors when i remove splash quiet from boot args

[earnest estuary]

I FIXED IT

https://forums.developer.nvidia.com/t/ubuntu-22-04-4-laptop-screen-not-working-external-monitor-does-rtx4090-core-u9/285132 this was the fix for whatever reason

i had to go in and delete /etc/x11/xorg.conf

im a little mad that was all it took lol

jesus christ im never buying another msi laptop again. whenever this guy shits itself and i have to get a new computer im going to build it myself

[SOLVED] Mint 22.1 Only Recognizing One Monitor

[thorny sinew]

Thank you, for sharing the solution. The nvidia legacy crud apparently still tries to finagle Linux desktops into obsolete settings using this. Much appreciated. Enjoy your Mint.