Can't start a Desktop Manager on my raspi

[jbrains]

Hi, folks. This isn't really a problem with Retro-Printer, but perhaps one of you has run into this problem and could help. An hour of web searches did not help me figure things out.

In short, I can't run a desktop environment on the Raspberry Pi I've installed in the Retro-Printer. I'm using the SD Card that I received from RWAP, so I have not installed an OS from scratch. When I try to boot to a Desktop Environment, apparently lightdm, I get stuck in a loop of login screens. Evidently this means that the desktop manager doesn't start. I get a generic "Failed to get a D-Bus connection". I'm not sure where to look for more information.

This isn't critical, but it would be nice.

There is one other thing, which might relate.

When I run 'raspi-config', I see something odd in the menu for "Boot Options" > "Desktop / CLI".

The two options for "automatically logged in as '' user" don't show a user name. It shows an empty user name. I wonder if some important environment variable or configuration setting is not set. Maybe this is a symptom of the problem that's stopped me from getting a D-Bus connection.

By chance, does that ring any bells for anyone?

Many thanks.

[RWAP]

I have not tried running the desktop since updating to the latest Raspberry Pi (which was required for use on a Pi 4).

The issue could be simply resources - we run the software "headerless" without a desktop in order to ensure that the capture program can use as many resources as possible - perhaps now it uses too many to allow a desktop to run?

[jbrains]

I hadn't seriously considered that, but it wouldn't surprise me. I could understand that leading to spurious error messages that one ought perhaps not to take too literally.