Occasional Blank Desktop and/or No kbd/mouse input

from Stardock Forums

My primary and secondaries are all 1Gb lan wired connections on Win 10 with no AV and no firewall (i would like to enable these after fixing this)

When I connect to a secondary I commonly see a blank desktop. Sometimes for 5 seconds, sometimes for 2 minutes. It NEVER FAILS OR ERRORS. Its just slow to initially draw the desktop.

Other times the display is just fine but keyboard/mouse dont work. If I close and reopen the keyboard usually starts working.

There is nothing running on the secondary machine and "netstat -an" shows it listening properly on all multiplicity ports.

When things work fine, they will work fine forever UNTIL i close the session. Upon reopening, I may/may not have the blank display or kbd/mouse issue. 

Again when this occurs it clears itself.

I have read through the FAQs around connection troubleshooting and related but none of it seems to resolve the issue.

Is there any wireshark traces or verbose multiplicity logging that could help identity whats occuring?

multiplicity
2,792 views 3 replies
Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top

Hello,
I have forwarded your problem/question to Stardock Support Team for their assistance. Please keep an eye on this thread for any updates. We appreciate your feedback and patience.

Basj,
Stardock Community Assistant

Reply #2 from Stardock Forums Top

You have had an MP license for a long time.  I suspect then this is a new thing and not always happened, yes?

Is an active VPN connection involved on any of the PCs?  If so, and they are eliminated, does it still occur? 

Other times the display is just fine but keyboard/mouse dont work. If I close and reopen the keyboard usually starts working.
End of quote

Close and reopen the keyboard...? Do you mean unplug it \ plug it back in?

When I connect to a secondary I commonly see a blank desktop.
End of quote

Then these are KVM connections you are referring to.  Are they headless (no monitor)? If so, it would be prudent to consider these cheap and effective options:

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=hdmi+dummy+plug&sprefix=hdmi+dum%2Caps%2C89&ref=nb_sb_ss_ts-doa-p_1_8

Sean Drohan
Stardock Product Lifecycle Manager

 

Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #3 from Stardock Forums Top

1) I have had this issue for years but until recently I didnt need to access the secondary machines a lot. Originally I thought it was a bug in MP and that other people would report it and eventually it would get fixed. No such luck. Now that Im using the secondaries daily, I was hoping to get this resolved

2) You misunderstood "Close and reopen the keyboard ...". What I mean is... If I close and reopen the MP session, then the keyboard usually starts working. I may have to close/reopen the session 2 or 3. Its a bit random.

I NEVER unplug the keyboard. The machine is in a rack in the garage and isnt easily accessible.

3) I dont have a VPN opened. I do understand how that could affect it if a vpn was active. Technically nordvpn is installed on the primary but I never use it. Someday ill uninstall it.

4) Both secondaries have a monitor installed. They are however in the garage so I cant physically see the monitors. That eliminates MP seamless mode.

What Im trying to convey is that when I launch a connection to the secondary, the desktop appears blank. If I wait 30-300 seconds, it will eventually draw the correct desktop image. At that point, the image is perfect until I close the connection.

Since Im experiencing intermittent video and keyboard issues at session launch, I was asking if there was additional logging or troubleshooting steps.

 

PS. Both my secondaries are poweredge servers and have a quad channel ethernet nic built-in. All 4 cables are jacked into the same lan segment for fault tolerance. Thus my box has addresses 192.168.0.251 through 192.168.0.254. This shouldnt cause any issues but as this maybe different than you are used to using, I thought i would mention it.

Would sending you a wireshark trace help?