gate: stop gating the painter probe on the audio engine

The one probe that asks whether the LCXL is actually being painted carried
needs=("scsynth",), so it SKIPPED for the whole of every cold run — which is
exactly the setup window, when the rig is cold by definition. The painter
translates hands to CCs and lights LEDs; it has nothing to do with SuperDirt.

It now also reports NRestarts, because a unit retrying forever is invisible
from outside. StartLimitIntervalSec=0 is deliberate (bind within 5s of a
replug) and the cost of it is that 1077 consecutive failures look exactly
like a healthy idle unit. The counter is the only place that shows.

TODO_GIG.md

@@ -380,3 +380,83 @@ than a wrong profile.
 - Raw second-client `set_text` writes did not visibly render (A/B test, PLN half-watching) —
   consistent with H1 (bare set_text needs bring-up); probe will settle it.
 - LED rings update instantly; OLED glass ~2 Hz effective. Rings = fast channel, OLED = state.
+
+## Wed 23 morning — the tripwire day (gig TOMORROW evening)
+
+Three root causes found before 09:30, all evidenced, none of them what we thought.
+
+### 1. The LCXL3 driver has failed 1077 times and nothing ever said so
+
+`journalctl --user -u lcxl3-driver` — **one** distinct message, 1077 times:
+`lcxl3: no LCXL3 DAW output port found.` Restart counter reached **497**.
+`StartLimitIntervalSec=0` is doing its job (retry forever, bind on replug), so
+this is not a systemd fault — it is the surface being absent, loudly, into a
+journal nobody reads.
+
+Right now the port IS there (`lcxl3.py ports` resolves
+`DAW out='LCXL3 1:LCXL3 1 DAW In 24:1'`), and the unit is `inactive (dead)` —
+a clean stop at Sep 22 19:55:31, not a start-limit hit. So it starts fine today.
+
+- [ ] **YOU: `systemctl --user start lcxl3-driver`** (sandbox refuses unit starts).
+      Then `aconnect -l | grep ParVagues` and check C1/C2/C3 in midimon.
+- [x] **The gate's hole** — `Probe("LCXL LEDs", ...)` does check
+      `is-active lcxl3-driver.service`, but carries `needs=("scsynth",)`, so it
+      **SKIPs whenever the rig is cold** — exactly when you are setting up. The
+      painter has nothing to do with SuperDirt. Fixed: the probe now runs cold.
+- [x] **Crash-loop detector** — a unit that is retrying forever looks identical
+      to a unit that is fine, from outside. The gate now reads the restart
+      counter (`NRestarts`) and says so.
+
+### 2. Audio is on the NVIDIA GPU because two hand-set pins say so
+
+`~/.local/state/wireplumber/default-profile`:
+
+```
+alsa_card.pci-0000_00_1f.3-platform-sof_sdw=off     <- the LAPTOP card. OFF.
+alsa_card.pci-0000_01_00.1=pro-audio                <- 01:00.1 = NVIDIA 22bc
+```
+
+So: Speaker / Headphones / HDMI 1-3 are missing because **the card that carries
+them is pinned off**, and the four `pro-output-*` sinks are the **GPU's HDMI
+audio** pinned into pro-audio. WirePlumber never chose either — its
+`findBestProfile` skips `pro-audio` by name. A human set both.
+
+The SOF card's profile list also lacks `HiFi` until a device re-probe
+(`alsaucm -c sof-soundwire list _verbs` says `HiFi`; PipeWire offers only
+`off`/`pro-audio`), so clearing the pin alone is not enough.
+
+- [ ] **THE WINDOW IS NOW** — scsynth dead, Ardour closed, nothing to break. A
+      WirePlumber restart with the rig up kills every SC->Ardour link
+      (`project_travel-rig-headphones`). Do it cold, today, not tomorrow.
+      Five ordered steps in `docs/2026-09-22-audio-profile-stuck.md`.
+- [ ] **OPEN QUESTION for you:** did you pin the laptop card `off` yourself? If
+      you set it *because* Speaker/Headphones had already vanished, then `off`
+      is a symptom and the profile disappearance is the disease.
+
+### 3. WATCH_PREFERENCE: belt AND suspenders (his call, 2026-09-23)
+
+"in my perspective, we would have always cell and rain?" — right. midiviz
+prefers the driver's translated `ParVagues LCXL3` port and falls through to the
+raw `LCXL3 1 DAW` port, where v3 numbering lands in the wrong cells. The viewer
+should translate for itself when it is on the raw port, so the picture is
+correct whether or not the driver runs.
+
+- [x] The v3->v2 table is now canonical in `lcxl_grid.py`; midiviz translates
+      on the raw port. The driver's own copy is left untouched (it is the
+      nervous system, one day out) and a test asserts the two never drift.
+
+### Still the actual gate: the 2h arc
+
+- [ ] **YOU: perf regime has regressed** — `epp=power`, `gov=powersave`,
+      **PL1=15W**, and **457 xruns/hour**. `max_perf_pct` is 100 (you did that),
+      but EPP and the package power cap put the box at 854MHz. Every audio
+      measurement today is untrustworthy until this is fixed:
+      `sudo cpupower set --epp performance` +
+      `sudo /usr/local/sbin/thermal-mode-apply aggressive`
+- [ ] **YOU: `systemctl --user restart parvagues-sc`** — loads `s.latency 0.1`
+      (still 0.2 in the running process, edit never went live) AND warms the
+      132-bank preload. ~15s of silence, safe while cold.
+- [ ] **YOU: docker is running** — `sudo systemctl stop docker.service`.
+- [ ] **YOU: the 2h run with Ardour recording.** Unmoved since Sunday. It is the
+      only check that has never been run, and the only one that can still
+      surprise you.

tools/check-gig.py

@@ -280,17 +280,33 @@ print(" ".join(str(p) for p in m.setlist_tracks()))')"""),
     # visuel anymore" the day before a gig. Generation-aware: an LCXL3 is
     # painted by lcxl3-driver, the original LCXL by lcxl-leds-watch. A v2-only
     # grep made this probe pass by accident.
+    # NOT gated on scsynth (it was until 2026-09-23, and that is how the board
+    # sat unpainted through every cold run). The painter has nothing to do with
+    # SuperDirt: it translates hands to CCs and lights LEDs. Gating it on the
+    # audio engine meant the one probe that would have caught a dead driver
+    # SKIPPED for the entire setup window, when the rig is cold by definition.
+    #
+    # It also reports NRestarts, because a unit retrying forever is invisible
+    # from outside: `StartLimitIntervalSec=0` is deliberate (bind within 5s of a
+    # replug) and its cost is that 1077 consecutive failures look exactly like
+    # a healthy idle unit. The counter is the only place that shows.
     Probe("LCXL LEDs", shell(r"""
+        n=$(systemctl --user show -p NRestarts --value lcxl3-driver.service 2>/dev/null)
         if aseqdump -l 2>/dev/null | grep -qi "LCXL3"; then
-          systemctl --user is-active --quiet lcxl3-driver.service
+          if systemctl --user is-active --quiet lcxl3-driver.service; then
+            echo "lcxl3-driver up (NRestarts=${n:-?})"; exit 0
+          fi
+          echo "LCXL3 on the bus but lcxl3-driver is $(systemctl --user is-active lcxl3-driver.service 2>&1) (NRestarts=${n:-?})"
+          echo "  the surface is a very nice-looking brick: no paint, no OLED, no faders to Ardour"
+          exit 1
         elif aseqdump -l 2>/dev/null | grep -qi "Launch Control XL"; then
           systemctl --user is-active --quiet lcxl-leds-watch.service
         else
-          exit 0
+          echo "no surface on the bus"; exit 0
         fi"""),
           fix="start the painter: LCXL3 -> systemctl --user start lcxl3-driver; "
               "original LCXL -> systemctl --user start lcxl-leds-watch",
-          kind=ADVISE, needs=("scsynth",)),
+          kind=ADVISE),
 
     # Asks whether THIS instance warmed, by keying to the unit's own start time
     # — not "was there ever a PRELOAD line", which a previous boot would satisfy