Arch Linux

shaurz

Member

Registered: 2004-02-02

Posts: 358

[FIXED] Complete failure to boot after update

Something in yesterdays update has completely hosed my system. I updated the day before so this must have been caused by a recent change.

My system starts to boot, systemd messages flash by, and then... nothing. Screen goes blank. Ctrl+Alt+F1 does not bring up a login prompt. The system appears to respond to Ctrl+Alt+Del by rebooting.

Video

I've booted a live image and have tried everything I can think of... banging my head against the wall for over an hour now. Can't get anything to work. Tried disabling the display manager but I still can't even get a login prompt. Uninstalled catalyst. Scoured every log for clues. Nothing.

Last edited by shaurz (2013-03-14 21:21:07)

mich41

Member

Registered: 2012-06-22

Posts: 796

Re: [FIXED] Complete failure to boot after update

ALT+F2 ?
It seems that systemd doesn't spawn getty on tty1.

jynnantonix

Member

Registered: 2012-09-07

Posts: 33

Re: [FIXED] Complete failure to boot after update

Can you chroot into your system from the live CD? What does the end of your /var/log/pacman.log say?  Were you paying attention to any messages that came up during the upgrade?  When was the last time you upgraded before this one?

Last edited by jynnantonix (2013-03-14 20:49:04)

kaszak696

Member

Registered: 2009-05-26

Posts: 543

Re: [FIXED] Complete failure to boot after update

What is your setup? It kinda seems like a KMS issue, are you using a KMS driver?

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shaurz

Member

Registered: 2004-02-02

Posts: 358

Re: [FIXED] Complete failure to boot after update

OK, I managed to get a login prompt by adding nomodeset. I don't know how I missed that, it has been working fine without it since I built this system 4 months ago.

The main culprit seems to be lightdm. I switched back to KDM and now X starts up normally.