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vis

Member

From: Switzerland

Registered: 2007-02-25

Posts: 81

Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

This is a new model Lenovo X201 http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:X201Type 3626 (Core i5).

Did a fresh installation from 2010.05-core-i686 CD with x86_64. I had the dreaded "dark screen" problem caused by kernel mode setting switching off the backlight! I can boot only with the 'nomodeset' kernel boot parameter.

The problem persists after 'pacman -Syu' 2.6.34-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMT Sat Jun 19 00:07:49 CEST 2010 x86_64. As a result I can't startx, the log says - using xf86-video-intel driver, no xorg.conf:
...
(II) VESA: driver for VESA chipsets: vesa
(--) using VT number 7

(II) Primary Device is: PCI 00@00:02:0
(WW) Falling back to old probe method for vesa
(EE) intel(0): no kernel modesetting driver detected
(II) UnloadModule: "intel"
(EE) Screen(s) found, but none have a usable configuration
Fatal server error:
no screens found

Obviously, I have to boot without the 'nomodeset' parameter.

How should I progress? Compiling a more recent kernel? Which version? What configuration parameters are needed?

vis

Member

From: Switzerland

Registered: 2007-02-25

Posts: 81

Re: Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

Apparantly "nomodeset" boot parameter disables the whole kms section of the kernel. I managed to boot without "nomodeset" if I add "options i915 modeset=0" to /etc/modprobe.d/modprobe.conf.

Still I get "no kernel modesetting driver detected" from Xorg once it tries the device driver "intel".

Any hints, pointers?

vis

Member

From: Switzerland

Registered: 2007-02-25

Posts: 81

Re: Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

I moved to the vesa driver keeping "options i915 modeset=0" in /etc/modprobe.d/modprobe.conf.

If anybody has an elegant solution, would be happy to know.

combuster

Member

From: Serbia

Registered: 2008-09-30

Posts: 711

Website

Re: Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

Hm, shouldn't be a problem with 2.6.34-ARCH (had this problem only on installing Arch with 2.6.33 - it gives a boot screen once out of 5 boot's). When you disable KMS in the kernel - you cant start X with intel driver cause it's requiring KMS now.

I don't know why this is happening, I have custom compiled kernel with i915 build in into kernel image and not as module, it works fine on 2.6.33, 2.6.34, 2.6.35.

Your link is broken but I think that's Ironlake you got there, could be that the bug persists on this new IGP.

If you know how to compile the kernel yourself - just build i915 and intel_agp drivers in the kernel image and enable modesetting by default - should be ok...

Zoole

Member

Registered: 2008-07-27

Posts: 6

Re: Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

I have an X61T, and I had a dark screen problem for the longest time. I had to guess at when the login prompt showed up and enter my username and password 'blind'. The monitor turned off halfway through the boot sequence and turned on again after I started X. Trying to turn KMS off gave the same kind of error that you got about usable configurations. Perhaps we had the same problem? If not, maybe this will help somebody else with a dysfunctional screen.

I fixed it by leaving vga=xxx out of the kernel line of my menu.lst and keeping KMS on (I think it's on by default in the default arch linux kernel). Yes, I compiled my own kernel with i915 and intel_agp, but that didn't fix the problem for me. Here's the relevant line:

kernel /vmlinuz26-x61t root=/dev/sda5 ro

zelnick

Member

Registered: 2010-07-13

Posts: 1

Re: Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

I am running the current git kernel and the problem is solved. rc-4 should also work. Good luck

karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: Lenovo X201, Xorg, modesetting problem

@ vis

pacman -Qs video

I;ve found this http://mailman.archlinux.org/pipermail/ … 14714.html

Last edited by karol (2010-07-13 22:04:14)