Unstable HDMI out

[james8880]

I could not find a posting on this topic.
Is this situation specific to my instance of the phone or not? Is anyone else observing these things?

With my phone, I have to use Megi's workaround here

I get the HDMI on the monitor but in short time (like within a minute) , the display does any and all of these: flickers, shears, wraps, blanks out and comes back to stable for a bit and then repeat after some ad hoc short period of time.

It kindof seems to happen when I interact with the phonephone --> using the HDMI display e.g. click on something or start to type.

I see zero messages from dmesg.
I have swapped mice, keyboards, HDMI cables, monitors and the issue remains.
I have tried with battery at all various charge levels and charger plugged in or out.
I have tried different HDMI/hubs

No matter on any of the hardware above swap-outs the issue remains and with no messages in output from dmesg. I figure that the issue is hardware in the phone.
I have not studied up to be a hardware guru.

Any insight to the cause and fix would be great.
I leave these observations for those who know stuff.

Thank you

-Jim

[nelstomlinson]

I'm using a NexDock, HDMI hooked up via the PP docking bar. Occasionally the monitor will go black for a moment. It's irritating but not a show stopper. Not sure if this is the same problem you are having.

I am not using Megi's patch on my phone.

[smufu]

When I got the phone (should be the current 1.2b), the hdmi out worked.
This was on the stock manjaro image. But shortly after when I tried again it was not working anymore.
I also had no lock with the workaround.
when connecting the dock just see a single plugin followed by a plugout event for the hdmi.
USB and ethernet work fine.

Also the internal screen flickers some time (visible pwm).
And no this also happens after a fresh reboot, but only when the phone was sleeping before.
Not sure if this related.

If would be nice if there was a way to fix at least display out.
I would even buy a new board if they created a new revision.
I think they are still a few issues related to the usbc port and the power distribution.

All in all I like the phone so far but it would be awesome to dock it reliably.

[beta-user]

I have the Beta Edition and HDMI output has never worked for me on any version of Mobian and Manjaro. Megi's workaround didn't work for me (but maybe I did it wrong). Also USB data connection is very buggy, especially with the hub and most of the time it doesn't work and there are many dmesg errors.

[smufu]

Still didn't get it working again.
I think the pp has some hardware defects.
Its really unfortunate, this was one of the features I really wanted to play with.
This alone makes me consider upgrading to the ppp if its available for non developers (don't have time at the moment to contribute).
I hope they nail the usb-c port this time.
Don't want to bash pine64, I am really happy with the pp otherwise.
If someone knows a practical fix (hardware or software) let me know.

[tllim]

Still didn't get it working again.
I think the pp has some hardware defects.
Its really unfortunate, this was one of the features I really wanted to play with.
This alone makes me consider upgrading to the ppp if its available for non developers (don't have time at the moment to contribute).
I hope they nail the usb-c port this time.
Don't want to bash pine64, I am really happy with the pp otherwise.
If someone knows a practical fix (hardware or software) let me know.

Check out the megi log: https://xnux.eu/log/#050

[zltpxqhp69o2]

My current experience:

Device shipped in August 2021 from EU warehouse, so probably 1.2b, but I haven't removed the screwed-on part to look at the board.

[My practical HDMI use is either HDMI-to-PC,VGA-to-monitor adapter, or HDMI-capture USB quasi-webcam stick; I can go to an HDMI projector at work, though]

With Mobian: 5.10 kernel, August build, workaround with force-on (and EDID) does not usefully work at least with the adapter, but after some of the experiments on shutdown I see a half of mobian logo on the external screen (so presumably the hardware is in good enough shape)…

postmarketOS 5.14.6: also could not get things to work.

Downloaded binary 5.15 Linux kernel build from megous, it seems to be 5.15.0, convinced pmOS to make initramfs for it then gunzip'ped the initramfs because the kernel complained otherwise. Now uname is showing 5.15.0 built on October 31, things like WiFi work, so I assume forced-update went well.

All three of HDMI-adapter, HDMI-capture, and native-HDMI result in roughly the same situation. Three different docks tried with native-HDMI, one of them PinePhone dock. Both dock powered and unpowered, both connect-dock-then-HDMI and connect-dock-with-HDMI attempted. The connection does not get recognised by the other side, PinePhone does not seem to think something has been connected, in dmesg I see:

Code:

sun8i-dw-hdmi 1ee0000.hdmi: EVENT=plugin
sun8i-dw-hdmi 1ee0000.hdmi: EVENT=plugout
anx7688 1-0028: DP state changed to 0x0302

At home I tried the forced-on workaround with adapter, does not work with the new kernel either.