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Forums » Tech and Talk » OS and Software » All Things Unix » Fresh install of xubuntu blacks out after installing video
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Realtek RTL8111C Controller Compatibility »
« Any such thing as out of box/easy found driver Linux Scanner  
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No_Strings
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reply to C0deZer0
Re: Fresh install of xubuntu blacks out after installing video

said by C0deZer0 See Profile :

•ATi Radeon X1600 Pro (512MB)

I suspect that's your issue. Install the ATI driver and fix the xorg.conf file. You should be good after that.


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
How do I fix it if I can't even get to a desktop or see anything?


jimkyle
Btrieve Guy
Premium
join:2002-10-20
Oklahoma City, OK
·AT&T Southwest

Try booting from the Live CD rather than the hard disk. This may get you through the blackout, since the Live CD will use its own drivers rather than the update that you put on the hard disk. If you get there, you should then be able to mount the hard disk (if it's not mounted automagically) and navigate to its /boot/grub/menu.lst file. Open the file, locate all occurrences of the word "splash" and delete them, then save the file (you may need to launch Mousepad via gksudo in order to edit this file).

You can now reboot using the hard disk and you should see the long list of status reports, rather than the logo screen and its progress bar. This may show you exactly where the problem is hitting. You can also edit the menu.lst file to specify using the "vesa" driver for video rather than the ATI driver, but I don't remember just how...

In general, booting from the Live CD is the way to get around a borked hard-disk configuration issue. You can change the video driver in the xorg.conf file from "ATI" to "vesa" and this should give you a usable screen again although at the cost of losing most of the acceleration features of your ATI card...
--
Jim Kyle


No_Strings
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reply to C0deZer0
said by C0deZer0 See Profile :

How do I fix it if I can't even get to a desktop or see anything?
Ctrl-Alt-Fx to get a console, then use a text editor?


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
reply to jimkyle
Should I just go ahead and reformat and start fresh?


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
·Verizon FIOS

reply to No_Strings
said by No_Strings See Profile :

said by C0deZer0 See Profile :

How do I fix it if I can't even get to a desktop or see anything?
Ctrl-Alt-Fx to get a console, then use a text editor?
Fx? huh? Never saw that key before on any keyboard... most I'd ever seen was Fn, and that was specifically on laptops.


No_Strings
Premium,Mod
join:2001-11-22
The OC
Ctrl-Alt-F1, Ctrl-Alt-F2, Ctrl-Alt-F3, ...


jimkyle
Btrieve Guy
Premium
join:2002-10-20
Oklahoma City, OK
·AT&T Southwest

reply to C0deZer0
said by C0deZer0 See Profile :

Should I just go ahead and reformat and start fresh?
That depends on how much customization you've done to the system. I usually spend several days tweaking a system to do what I want, right after installing it, so when something goes wrong a few months later I tend to try to fix it rather than re-installing. However if you've just done the install and haven't added much to the system, that would definitely be the quickest way to solve the problem.
--
Jim Kyle


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
·Verizon FIOS

Okay, so I finally get it to successfully (re)format and install, and now when I start, it talks about the software updates, but again it pops up with that same notification about updating the ATi driver. And after what just happened, I'm afraid as hell to click that again!


No_Strings
Premium,Mod
join:2001-11-22
The OC
Are you running anything that requires h/w acceleration? If not, don't install the ATI driver. If you need it, install, but be prepared to manually edit the xorg.conf file ass mentioned above.


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
·Verizon FIOS

... okay, this is annoying.

I try to go to ATi directly to download their driver for Linux. I get the file on my desktop, and I try to double-click and it won't run. I open up a terminal, type in the name of the file completely, and it won't run. it keeps saying command not found.

... Seriously, what? it's like who do I have to murder at ATi to get a driver that will just work?


No_Strings
Premium,Mod
join:2001-11-22
The OC
1. Check the permissions on the driver file. You may need to make it executable: chmod +x filename

2.Why not use the one from the Ubuntu repository?


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
·Verizon FIOS

said by No_Strings See Profile :

2.Why not use the one from the Ubuntu repository?
Unless I'm mistaken, the one that xubuntu told me to go get through its notifier for hardware drivers is from the ubuntu repository, and that's the one that led to me having a nice blackout and unable to use the computer at all.


No_Strings
Premium,Mod
join:2001-11-22
The OC
Because you didn't make the required changes to the xorg file. I suspect you'll have the same result with the driver from ATI.

Good luck.


C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
·Verizon FIOS

What xorg file? I just did what it told me to do. It told me I needed the driver, I let it download and install. It asked me to reboot, so I did. When I restart, I got blackout and no way to get anything to turn up.

couldn't it just have done this already?


No_Strings
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Do you want to know how to fix it or do you want to whine about how it's not like Windows? I'm trying to help.

You should be able to get to a console as I described above, invoke an editor and make changes to the config file to properly list the driver, resolutions available and the like.
-
Forums » Tech and Talk » OS and Software » All Things UnixRealtek RTL8111C Controller Compatibility »
« Any such thing as out of box/easy found driver Linux Scanner  


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