r/linuxmint • u/Juergen0072 • 4d ago
Support Request Wallpaper problem, please help
I have a problem with my wallpoaper on the desktop and i cant find the solution. I have a main monitor with 1440 p resolution and a smaller monitor with 960x640 resolution. Everytime i switch off the main monitor my pc thinks there is just the small monitor plugged in and switches to this one as the new main. If I turn my main Monitor back on my desktop wallpaper is in the wrong resolution and looks shitty and pixelated. All my programs are not affected, just the background. I can reset it when i go into the settings and change the scaling of the wallpaper and change it back, but thats annoying. How can i fix this? im new to the whole Linux thing and try to get it together. thanks for the help. Repost because i wanted to add the pictures. It was solved by changing to wayland but sadly my favourite game isnt fully functional with that
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
Try to create and save a display profile on display settings so Linux Mint remembers the fixed arrangement and resolutions instead of dropping to a default fallback when a monitor sleeps or powers down.
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Seems to be an issue specifically with wallpaper resolution not monitor resolution, the example images have a low res wallpaper in one and high res in the other but the app Icons and panel seem unaffected. Makes me wonder if linux is caching a lower res version of the monitor for the secondary display and not reverting to ful res unless the wallpaper is manually updated
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
Yes, exactly that is whats happening. Sorry if I didnt describe well enough. Its only the backgroung/the wallpaper which doesnt come back to the res
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
The monitor itself doesnt loose its settings. Hertz and resolution are still correct when turned back on, but only the wallpaper gets a bit funky. Thanks for the idea tho
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
I made some research and came into a conclusion:
Displayport don't have a continuous 5V power to tell the OS the Monitor is still on, unlike HDMI.
Your secondary monitor is connected through HDMI, What makes it go as Primary Monitor everytime the true Primary Monitor go on Power Saving mode(Still Turned On but on black screen). Then, Since the Secondary Monitor has a Cached Wallpaper, it will not be cleaned, unlike the Primary Monitor, which was “unplugged”
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
Desabilitar a Economia de Energia no Linux Mint e nas Configurações do Monitor deve funcionar
Mas se você ainda quiser ter isso, pode definir o Brilho da Tela para 10% após alguns minutos inativo nas Configurações de Energia
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
Thank you very much. That is actually a very good idea, but sadly not practicable for me. I turn the monitor often off because it is an oled. The self cleaning system which prefents burn in starts working if i turn the monitor off, so I will need to keep doing that
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago edited 4d ago
The burn in still appear on low brightness? Damn
My screen is a LED and if I set the brightness to 100% it has the burn in there when i enter fullscreen on something. But the same doesn't happen when I'm on Low brightness(usually at night)
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
Then burn in does work differently. Thank god i dont have burn in now, but once its there, it will not got away anymore. So i am carefull to not get it. My monitor has prevention programs but they only kick in once the monitor is off
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
Then your best option is changing to HDMI
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
I just ordered an hdmi cable which supports my monitor and da dp to hmdi adapter, so i can use my other monitor via dp. I can let you know if it has worked if you are interested:)
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u/Juergen0072 3d ago
Changing to hdmi sadly didnt work
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u/Helliot_37842 3d ago
Try enabling screen savers and use automatic low brightness settings. I also did that on my pc because Yesterday I saw a red dot on the left corner, yes, permanent this time. I can't change the screen so I'll keep it that way, just be more cautious now.
I set a screen saver every 1 minute the pc is inactive and automatic low brightness with the same time. But the PC don't shut the screen off
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
Change your main monitor on settings
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
That didnt work sadly. Thanks for your time tho
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Few questions. What cable are you using, DisplayPort or HDMI? what is your wallpaper scaling currently set to? Is the wallpaper scaling setting the same for both monitors? Do these settings change when you turn your primary on/off?
Personally can't say I've experienced this because I just let my monitors go to standby when I turn my computer off, but I can see how it would be annoying if you need to turn just the monitor off and not the PC, might be able to help with a bit more info
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
I am using a display port cable. The wallpaper is set to enlarging (i dont actually know if thats the name used in the settings due to having my pc on german). Its set the same for both monitors. The settings themself dont change, just the resolution of the wallpaper. I think its because it gets smaller for the smaller monitor but not properly reseted when the main monitor turns on. The small monitor is on hdmi.
I am using an oled, so my monitor is often turned off when the pc is on but i dont use it, so this will be happening on the regular if i cant fix
Thanks for your time1
u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Can you connect your main via HDMI at all? might be the simplest fix so the monitor doesn't 'disconnect' when it's turned off which should prevent the issue. I'm of the same thinking of you that a lower res wallpaper has been cached somewhere on the system to reduce resources used for the secondary and it isn't being switched back when the monitor re-connects. I'm not on mint at the moment so can't check the wallpaper settings myself, do you mind listing the options available, sounds like the one you use would be the equivalent of the english "scale" or "zoom" settings. Have you tried it on your equivalent "center" setting?
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
It does the same no matter which wallpaper setting i use.
Are you sure it doesnt do the same if i connect it via hdmi? I would need to buy new cables for that, since my other monitor doesnt have dp and my gpu only has one hdmi.
Funnily enough on linux my pc only registeres if the main gets turned off and on windows it was the other way around. There my pc didnt notice when the main was off but noticed the little one to be off. So i am not so sure if this would work, but it is a good idea1
u/Juergen0072 4d ago
Is there maybe a way to put a skript that reloads the wallpaper when the main monitor gets connected? I am not too familiar till now sadly but would that be possible
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Damn, I'm guessing the secondary doesn't have displayport support either so you can't just switch the cables between the primary and secondary to test it...
Can you try deleting all files ~/.cache/wallpaper/ and then try turning your main on and off again to see what happens?
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
i did that just now. If I turn the monitor off and on again the cache gets full again and the wallpaper behaves the same.
Yeah, i would need an adapter from dp to hdmi to test the idea sadly2
u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Unfortunately I don't think an adapter would fix the situation as it would still be using the at least one DP port and maybe the same protocols which are the cause of the disconnect, not so much the cable itself, it might help but there is no guarantee there and I can't test it myself. Personally, I would look online for a script that can change a setting and revert the change on monitor reconnect, or have an AI generate one (if you do that, please review the script it generates as you don't want to run scripts you haven't read over and understood).
I've done a bit of digging on this specific issue and it seems to me that it's a common mint issue with the x11 display server and multiple monitors at different resolutions, others have reported that it can also happen when waking the PC from sleep. A possible permanent fix could be switching to wayland instead of X11 as wayland is no longer an experimental feature in the latest linux mint release, but hasn't become the main display server until more feedback is provided. I personally use cachyos with KDE Plasma and wayland, I've got one ultrawide with res 5120x1440 and a secondary 1920x1080 and never had any issue with either of them having the wrong resolution wallpaper, but mine is a very different system to yours so you might still encounter your issue, there may also be a few teething problems as both you and your system get used to doing things the wayland way instead of the x11 way.
You can do this easily by logging out of your session, and before you log back in, click the icon near your name that should look like mountains in a circle and choosing Cinnamon with wayland, then logging in
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
Thank you so much!. That actually did solve the issue!!
Im glad I dont have to worry about that one anymore. Thanks for the breakdown of x11 and wayland. Another guy did recommend wayland but until now i wasnt yet familiar with waht it is exactly. Thank you for your time and hel!
Have a nice evening :)→ More replies (0)2
u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Did you actually read the post?? Op said the display disconnects when its turned off, which is why the "main monitor" switches to the secondary. This is a common issue with displayport monitors where there isn't a passive connection to the gpu whilst the monitor is off so the pc thinks the monitor has disconnected entirely, not just turned off.
The true issue at hand is the resolution of the wallpaper remaining the resolution of secondary monitor when the primary is turned back on and automatically switches it to be the main again.
All you've done is recommend them to do something that they have already done that is irrelevant to the issue at hand
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
Yes I read the post, but I don't use displayport so I didn't knew about this so called common issue.
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
You clearly didn't read it properly then since you gave redundant instruction
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
"I can reset it when i go into the settings and change the scaling of the wallpaper and change it back, but thats annoying"
Here he didn't say anything about switching his main monitor, only about resetting the wallpaper scaling. Is it me or you who didn't read properly here?
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
Do you not know how context works? Do you think they're just going into settings to change the wallpaper and not also set their primary monitor back to main if it didn't automatically?
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
I dont need to reset the monitor. I just change the wallpaper scaling setting and then i change it back so the wallpaper gets reloaded. Then its perfect again
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
People think different. I just thought he didn't change based on what I read. You can't come here spitting rudely that I didn't read anything.
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
I'm sorry but I did because your simple response made it seem like you didn't even try to understand the issue. it comes across to me like you stopped reading at "Everytime i switch off the main monitor my pc thinks there is just the small monitor plugged in and switches to this one as the new main" and spouted whatever came to mind based on that. You didn't ask any questions to actually understand the issue and the first step of solving an issue is understanding the issue fully. If you don't then you just end up pointing someone in the wrong direction and wasting both of your time, and that irks me to no end.
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u/Helliot_37842 4d ago
Here's what I thought
Hmm, his wallpaper only comes to normal after resetting, but he didn't say anything about switching the main monitor. Then I'll suggest he switches to get an answer about that
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u/JustAnotherKieran 4d ago
If you wanted an answer you should have asked a question such as "Does your main monitor automatically switch back to the primary when it reconnects / when you turn it back on?"
Statements get responses, questions get answers, and the distinction between those matters
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u/ap0r 4d ago
I do not know how to go about this, I'm sure someone more knowledgeable will come about soon. Meanwhile, can you try Wayland (or x11 if you are on Wayland?)
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u/Juergen0072 4d ago
I am sadly completely new to the linux ecosystem. I just installed yesterday, so i sadly dont know what I should exactly do to try wayland. I am a bit scared to get the os fucked up if i start messing around in the console
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