3.5.7: Black Screen, backlight only when entering Desktop Mode

[rdlf4]

Your system information

• Steam client version: 1702079146
• SteamOS version: 3.5.7
• Opted into Steam client beta?: No
• Opted into SteamOS beta?: No
• Have you checked for updates in Settings > System?: Yes

Please describe your issue in as much detail as possible:

I have my all of my ROMs & Steam games on my microSD card. Screen brightness is set to less than 50%. Sometimes, when powering on my 1st-gen Steam Deck, it will "ignore" this setting and have the screen brightness set to a higher value - I can tell because it's perceptible. When that happens and I attempt to enter Desktop Mode, chances are my screen will remain black and backlight will remain on and it will be stuck in that until a forced shutdown is performed. In addition to that, upon realizing the Deck is ignoring my brightness settings (which happens often, but not always), once I put my Deck to sleep and then wake it after some time, it will not connect to the internet. Wifi icon will misrepresent its state (will show as connected when it's not) and attempting to reconnect via settings won't do produce any result.

Describe what you expected should happen and what did happen. I expected my Deck not to ignore my settings and be able to enter Desktop Mode without any issues by now.

Steps for reproducing this issue:

1. Set screen brightness to a low value (below 50%)
2. Have your game files stored on your microSD card (I can't relate whether this happens when using a SSD - mine is a 64GB so I leave it all to SteamOS & updates)
3. Play some games, then exit to Home screen and enter desktop mode. It will work this time.
4. Upon rebooting or powering on the device, once you realize your settings aren't being followed by the Deck, you can take that as a signal things will go south if you enter Desktop Mode (it most likely will).
5. If by some miracle your screen brightness setting isn't respected by the Deck but you still managed to enter Desktop Mode, try getting back to Big Picture mode. It might trigger a black screen with nothing to show, but a backlight again.

As a quick reminder, there was a bug with auto-mounting the microSD card back in SteamOS v3.4.11 (or earlier, I'm not sure). I don't recall having any issues with Desktop Mode back in the day. I'm not saying this is related, but that was my experience. Maybe someone still had issues with it and I'm not aware, but this could be useful in case... I dunno, maybe fixing the microSD automount for desktop mode introduced some kind of reggression that's now impacting Desktop Mode somehow?

[pparmy]

seconded

[DarkenLX]

Same seems to also be triggered if you put the deck to sleep then after waking trying to go to desktop mode same result.

[Copilots-pilot]

DO THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK, I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR YOUR STEAM DECK FILE INTEGRITY. Sorry if that was unclear before.

It’s a stretch but I had an issue where going to desktop mode from the (STEAM) button would lead to a black screen (with haptic feedback and still functioning). I’ve read that this can be caused by a bug existing in the steamdeck-recovery-3.img.bz2 version of SteamOS that may be imaged on your deck (speculation as I haven’t found the source of the bug).

I found a fix for my system and it may help:

1. From gaming mode turned on, hold power button and then select “Switch to Desktop”
2. Open the terminal app ‘Konsole’
3. Type in the following: ls -alF ~/.local/share/kscreen/*
4. Hit enter and you will see the files that you will be moving to the temp folder in step 6
5. Enter this command next mv ~/.local/share/kscreen/* /tmp
6. Hit enter and there won’t be any output, which is expected

This /tmp folder will be cleared out upon a restart of the deck. This solved the black screen upon entering desktop mode bug for me. Hope it helps!

[DarkenLX]

Just a follow up this issue is also present on the beta channel version of steamos this was initially the reason why i changed back to the stable channel i will have to try the suggestion Copilots-pilot gave.

[rdlf4]

Thank you @Copilots-pilot for the suggestion. Just a question, would it be ideal to have mv -alF ~/.local/share/kscreen/* /tmp set as a startup command?

Have you tried that?

[Copilots-pilot]

would it be ideal to have mv -alF ~/.local/share/kscreen/* /tmp set as a startup command?

Have you tried that?

I actually thought about doing that but haven’t set it up yet. It seems as though my problem has been fixed with me running that command a single time. If I run into the same problem again down the road I will likely try that.

I’m interested to see if the fix I used works for you if you try it.

[rdlf4]

would it be ideal to have mv -alF ~/.local/share/kscreen/* /tmp set as a startup command? Have you tried that?

I actually thought about doing that but haven’t set it up yet. It seems as though my problem has been fixed with me running that command a single time. If I run into the same problem again down the road I will likely try that.

I’m interested to see if the fix I used works for you if you try it.

Initially, that didn't work, as the Terminal complained about the -a argument for the move command. So I did a rm -rf ~/.local/share/kscreen/* and then restarted the Deck. Then, it took too long for something to show on the big screen, bad sign. I then unplugged the Deck from my dock and it's in 1080p (?); I then tried plugging it in one more time, to no effect.

So I did a restart while it was still connected to the dock. It worked this time, and switching to Desktop Mode did work as well, but all of my screen-related settings are now gone (screen orientation, have the Deck's main screen set to display on the external monitor, etc). Time will tell if that command actually made any difference, but I'm thinking we went nuclear (deleting all files from kscreen DIR) when the problem required a less-serious solution.

[Copilots-pilot]

Eh, that could be what we did. I guess I didn’t pay attention to what settings I had prior to running the command. Also i think we would just want the mv command without the -alF.

If you had moved the kscreen dir to /tmp you could have recovered the folder.

[rdlf4]

Let's say that code puts an end to not being able to get to or out of Desktop mode. But it doesn't change the fact that one still relies on pure luck to get to Desktop Mode to begin with, in order to input those commands. So I'd recommend to install Decky Loader and the Decky Terminal extension, from the Decky-plugin store (free, and yea that also requires being able to get to Desktop Mode, but once that's installed and the black screen becomes an issue again, it'll be easier to deal with next time).

[DarkenLX]

Those commands do help but it seems like its something linked to the menu accessed via the steam button as it has cropped back up using the steam button to access the power menu then switch to desktop... So whatever the commands delete that causes it that Copilots-pilot mention don't seem to be a permanent fix unless you only Access the power menu via the power button.. so obviously something somewhere needs fixing by Valve.

[buthmathearo]

By deleting everything from ~/.local/share/kscreen/* just temporarily fix the issue. Now, it sucks because I have to force shutdown and restart at least 2 times to see the Desktop Mode. SEEM THIS ISSUE NEVER GOT FIXED BY VALVE. I even tried to create a custom keyboard shortcut to get back to the handheld mode, but it didn't work either when the Desktop mode became black screen.

[5310]

I've found that remote desktop over Steam Link also works when this happens, which I can use to open a terminal and shut down. But the return to gamemode shortcuts still doesn't work in it. SSH to reboot also works, ofc.

[Copilots-pilot]

Hey, I am sorry that my suggestion seems to have messed up some things with your steam decks. I added a clarifier for anyone who finds my instructions in the future. I don’t seem to be having any trouble but I don’t use desktop mode often enough to encounter them it seems.

Good luck.

[ttang4299]

I am also getting a black screen every time I switch to Desktop Mode now :( Hard reboot does not fix the issue

[cinqrouge]

Same thing for me. black screen When switching to desktop mode. Even after deleting the stuff in the kscrren folder. I need to hard reboot and I still get a black screen 2/3 of the time . Please valve fix this. Thanks!

[cinqrouge]

as a temporary "workaround" I use nested desktop. at least its super fast to restard if the desktop does not load.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zu4d2wg6lw

[DarkenLX]

Strange no one from valve has any input on this even stranger no ones been assigned..

[cinqrouge]

I don't know if you all have decky recorder installed but I uninstalled it and it seems to have fix the problem for me.

Let me know if you try and it works for you.

Have a good one :)

[DarkenLX]

I don't know if you all have decky recorder installed but I uninstalled it and it seems to have fix the problem for me.

Let me know if you try and it works for you.

Have a good one :)

I have heard this and i know it does work my question is why does it happen why does the plugin cause it?

[buthmathearo]

I just uninstalled DeckyLoader and it fixed everything.

[Jepl4r]

I have the same issue on my OLED. Latest stable release doesn't have this issue. Only the latest beta.

[rdlf4]

Strange no one from valve has any input on this even stranger no ones been assigned..

I was thinking the same thing, as I get notified that more and more people are being affected by this. Perhaps this could be due to this bug only being triggered by a SteamOS third-party "addon"? Still, that shouldn't be enough to prevent anyone from Valve from coming here and stating whether that's an isolated issue or it has something to do with DeckyLoader or whatever. As @Jepl4r metioned, current stable release isn't affected by this issue, but still the beta one is, so that sounds like a regression to me. Since no one from Valve wants to have anything to do with this thread, we might step up and do something about it ourselves. I'd suggest including some additional info, so we can find a common issue, according to software or hardware.

My system: OS Version: 3.5.19, OS Build: 20240422.1 3rd-party Software: Decky with Decky Recorder, SteamGridDB, CSS Loader System is up-to-date and I haven't opted into Beta channel MicroSD card: 512GB Sandisk Extreme

That's all I can think of for now.

[Jepl4r]

I searched on Google about this issue and found a Reddit post stating that the cause could be the Decky Recorder plugin. That's not what is causing this issue for me as I never installed Decky Loader. I even tried deleting the contents inside the kscreen folder as @Copilots-pilot suggested but that did nothing. In the meantime I reverted back to stable.

Edit: I found this new issue #1542 from 3 weeks ago that describes the same problem and no one was assigned to it too

[rdlf4]

It seems like Valve's been cooking a fix for the blank screen issue, as mentioned in their latest BETA update.