mouse pointer disappears when using external display (i855GM)

[Jason Bechtel]

Using Kubuntu 7.04 (Feisty) (with all updates, but this has been a problem for a long time) on a Dell Inspiron 1150 laptop with an Intel 855GM VGA adapter with external display support... When I switch to an external display (or dual), the mouse pointer disappears. Switching back to the built-in display does not help.

I'm not sure if this is a general problem with Xorg and external displays or what.

Let me know if I should file this elsewhere.

[Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton)]

Please try with 7.10 or Hardy alpha2.

[Jason Bechtel (jasonmbechtel)]

Timo,

I just tested it out with the same hardware under Gutsy (7.10) with
all patches/updates. The problem seems to be fixed. The mouse
pointer is persistent in both the internal and external display
through multiple cycles of switching between displays (internal,
external, both, internal, external, etc.).

The only related issue that I see now is that the mouse pointer is not
rendered correctly when in the "external display only" mode (it is
correct under both of the other modes). The pointer appears to be
rendered in the wrong color palette, or in reduced color mode, or
something like that. It almost appears to be inverted in color and
the shadow is sharply pronounced instead of transparent (while the
pointer itself still seems to retain some transparency.

Oh, wait. I spoke too soon. I had turned off the projector, but
wanted to turn it on to see if I could capture an image of the poorly
rendered mouse. I turned the projector back on and switched to
external mode. Indeed, the pointer was poorly rendered. I switched
to dual display mode and everything looked great. I switched back to
internal display only mode and the pointer disappeared. :o(
Another cycle through the modes hasn't brought it back.

Oh, and I can't get the mouse to appear in any screenshots. Is there
a trick to that?

Anyway, thanks for following up on this bug. Good luck!

Jason

On Jan 4, 2008 1:30 AM, Timo Aaltonen <email address hidden> wrote:
> Please try with 7.10 or Hardy alpha2.
>
> ** Changed in: xserver-xorg-video-intel (Ubuntu)
> Sourcepackagename: xorg => xserver-xorg-video-intel
> Status: New => Incomplete
>
>
> --
> mouse pointer disappears when using external display
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/145186
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Hi Jason,

Could you please attach your /var/log/Xorg.0.log, /etc/X11/xorg.conf, and the output of lscpi -vvnn?

[unggnu (unggnu)]

The Hardy Heron Alpha series is currently under development and contains an updated version of the -intel driver. You can download and try the new Hardy Heron Alpha release from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/hardy/ . You should be able to test the new -intel driver using the LiveCD. If you can, please verify if this bug still exists or not and report back your results. General information regarding the release can also be found here: http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/ .
Thanks.

[Jason Bechtel (jasonmbechtel)]

[I sent the following message as an email to <email address hidden> but it didn't get posted here for some reason... perhaps because it had three files attached to it... -Jason]

Bryce,

See attached...

I tried to reproduce the error so you could maybe see some helpful
error message in the Xorg.0.log file. But now, of course, the pointer
just happily appears at all times, even after multiple cycles of the
external/dual/internal displays. Sorry. But, hey, at least it's
working now! :o)

Again, I'm using the most current patches against Kubuntu 7.10. I
honestly can't recall whether X was updated since the last time I
submitted an update on this bug.

Thanks so much for all your efforts.

Jason

[Jason Bechtel (jasonmbechtel)]

I just tried to check for this behavior using Hardy Heron alpha 6, as requested by unggnu. Unfortunately, I was unable to do so because the keystroke combination (Fn+F8 on this Dell keyboard) for switching between displays was non-functional. If I started the liveCD with the projector hooked up, it would automatically go into dual-display mode (internal and external simultaneously). If I started the liveCD with the projector disconnected, then there was no way to indicate that the system should attempt to find it and no attempt was automatically undertaken.

This is surely an unrelated bug, but nonetheless an obstacle to further testing with Hardy.

But, as I mentioned in my previous post, the problem seems to have been fixed now in Gutsy. I can no longer reproduce the error with my fully-patched system. The only glitch is the strange pointer misrendering when in "external display only" mode under Gutsy (can't test this under Hardy until I can toggle modes there).

Thanks again to all.

Jason

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Thanks for letting us know the issue is gone. Feel free to reopen if it reappears. For the hotkey issue, please file a new bug (sometimes those are kernel issues).