Changed graphic card and then Xorg doen't work anymore (noob)

kennyspirit · 2009-04-03 09:29:27

Hi friends, I'm sorry for ask in my first post but I don't know what to do.
I had a Nvidia7600 (wich make me fight for a good configuration a full week) and for some reason it burned, I'm not going to buy a new one in few months (waiting to change motherboard for have pci port, processor...) so I've put a old one (Nvidia savage of 32mg) that works fine in Windows XP in the other partition.
My trouble is that all go ok until it has to plot the KDM only getting a black screen whit a white "_" in the up-left corner. I've tried to change of screen from F1 to F7 and I can't get anything. Furthermore I can't write for editing the xorg.conf because I don't know how to stop the start of kdm at the beginning.
windows (with drivers for look at the linux partitions) says that the hard drive doesn't have format so I can't edit from here (maybe unmounted not correctly).
I suppose that the solution would need that I put the arch instalation cd, mount all the partitions and acces to them, but I'm extremly noob and I don't know how to do that and can find it nowhere.

Please help me, I can't use my biggest hard drive and I'm condemned at the moment to use a really slow windows XP for work.

Lots of thanks to all, hi to everyone of the wiki and the forums and sorry for my poor english (I expect that something can be bad written so sorry about that)

Last edited by kennyspirit (2009-04-03 09:32:37)

whoops · 2009-04-03 09:56:27

Hi!

You can use grub's edit function to call the kernel runlvl 3 as parameter (add "3" to the kernel line - you can try several times, it sets the menu back on reboot).

Then you might want to change to nv driver in xorg or install nvidia-legacy - whatever works for you (search the internet for a driver, that matches your "new old" card ) .

You can just use a archlinux install/boot-cd to do stuff like that, too, if you know how to mount your drives.

pseudonomous · 2009-04-03 10:03:43

Hi Kennyspirit, welcome to the forums!

I can't help you with your video card troubles, but I can tell you how to get to a login shell:

Reboot your computer, wait for the grub bootloader to come up (I'm assuming you're using grub, not lilo)

When you get a list of boot options, hit "e", you'll probably see something like:

title  Arch Linux
root   (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/disk/by-uuid/166e636f-36ad-4027-9531-a75e3924b545 ro
initrd /kernel26.img

now select the line beginning with kernal, and hit "e" for edit, this will bring up a grub prompt that will let you edit the line edit it to look like:

kernel /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/disk/by-uuid/166e636f-36ad-4027-9531-a75e3924b545 ro single

instead, then hit enter when you're done.

Now you'll be back at the screen you left, but the line you editied should be changed now, so you see:

title  Arch Linux
root   (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/disk/by-uuid/166e636f-36ad-4027-9531-a75e3924b545 ro single
initrd /kernel26.img

Now hit "b" for boot.

What you just did, was change your boot options so that instead of booting to the default run-level for your system, you boot to single user mode, in single user mode, after your kernal boots you will be prompted for you're root password (or hit control d to continue), if you enter your root password you'll drop into a single tty, where you'll be able to edit rc.conf and stop kdm from starting on boot.

If you exit your login, you either go back to the login prompt, or your machine starts booting to your default run-level, I forgot which. If you hit control d at the login prompt instead of typing in your password, your machine will boot to the default runlevel.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Okay, here's one other suggestion I've got, in the process of debugging video problems, I've noticed a tendancy for displays to get totally locked up, like you have now, but ussaully you can still ssh into your machine and run it like normal. So if you've got a spare machine, i'd advise you to set up ssh logins so you can get in and reboot your machine if you lock up your display.

Another thing to note: If you lock up your display, you might still be able to switch to a virtual console, login blindly and reboot, even though you can't see crap.

Good luck!

edit: whoops replied, while I was typing.

whoops wrote:

You can use grub's edit function to call the kernel runlvl 3 as parameter (add "3" to the kernel line - you can try several times, it sets the menu back on reboot).

This works if you use inittab to start kdm at runlevel 5, if you're using rc.conf to start kdm, you have to boot to single user mode. Of coursing booting from a liveCD works under any circumstances, but if you don't have one, single user mode will work unless there's a problem with grub, the kernel, or your ramdisk(s).

Last edited by pseudonomous (2009-04-03 10:09:42)

kennyspirit · 2009-04-03 10:22:25

wow so fast and so efficient (Arch way ) lots of thanks dudes, I will print both instructions now and try to solve it. After that I will repost whatever happens if I'm succes or if I need more help. See you later

ckristi · 2009-04-03 12:00:40

After you get to login in text mode I suggest you to run as root:

# X -configure
# X -config /root/xorg.conf.new (this is for checking if X works with the new config)

After this, you can exit the plain/bulk X with Ctrl+Alt+Backspace if it worked or Alt+F1, if it didn't.
At this point, if you've seen the X screen (the config worked), copy the file /root/xorg.conf.new to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.

You should be all set at this point.

Another observation is that I think your card is an S3 Savage, not an Nvidia Savage.

Arch Linux

#1 2009-04-03 09:29:27

Changed graphic card and then Xorg doen't work anymore (noob)

#2 2009-04-03 09:56:27

Re: Changed graphic card and then Xorg doen't work anymore (noob)

#3 2009-04-03 10:03:43

Re: Changed graphic card and then Xorg doen't work anymore (noob)

#4 2009-04-03 10:22:25

Re: Changed graphic card and then Xorg doen't work anymore (noob)

#5 2009-04-03 12:00:40

Re: Changed graphic card and then Xorg doen't work anymore (noob)

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