Fix for black screen display issue seems to break VMWare VM display rendering

[Enigma]

So as per https://www.nomachine.com/AR09L00814 (A black screen is displayed when running virtual desktops on Unity 3D or GNOME 3 and proprietary drivers) I configured the file and pointed it to mesa as I have been using the proprietary Nvidia driver.

Twice now, after having made this change, I have connected to my server to check on some VM’s only to find that they aren’t rendering at all locally.

I confirmed that if I used teamviewer or remote desktop to get at the few that I could access, that they were working just fine behind the scenes but they aren’t being rendered on the host system. The one exception is a non-accelerated VM that is running in text-only mode.

1. If I never connect to this system with NoMachine, this problem doesn’t occur
2. If I shut down the VM’s and restart them afterwards (even without rebooting) they are back to normal
3. It happens as soon as I connect with NoMachine
4. No amount of resizing or futzing with VMWare Workstation gets them working again

The main host system is running Kubuntu 16.04.1 and the latest NoMachine 5.1.44. I connected from a Windows NoMachine system running 5.1.44 also. I have an old 9400 GT for the GPU.

[fra81]

Hi,

can you please provide more info:

1) Is the server a headless machine?

2) If it’s not headless, are the VM consoles on the physical screen of the host?

3) Can you provide the name of the VMware product in use and its version?

4) Can you provide the version of the nvidia driver?

[Enigma]

1) It is not headless

2) Yes they are

3) VMWare Workstation 12.5.0 build-4352439

4) 340.96

[fra81]

I still can’t imagine how NoMachine can cause this issue. While we try to reproduce in our labs, please make sure you check the following in order to exclude two possible causes:

– disable any remote resize caused by NoMachine (i.e. make sure ‘Resize remote screen’ button is not enabled in the session menu and also the ‘Match the client resolution upon connecting’ not checked in the Display settings);

– disable screen blanking (i.e. make sure ‘Lock the physical screen when somebody connect’ is not checked in the Server preferences -> Security tab on the server).

Do you confirm that only NoMachine triggers this behaviour and not the other remote desktop solutions that you tried?

[Author]

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