Arch Linux

yodo

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2008-02-02

Posts: 71

[solved] no booting possible since upgrade (kernel?)

Hi there.
Since the last upgrade my PC can't boot anymore. There were quite a few packages in the upgrade, but most notably of course the kernel.

This is what happens: Everything normal until GRUB. I select Arch and it begins to boot. The text is in the usual "big" letters. That is how it was before the upgrade (see the screenshot: http://img831.imageshack.us/i/img3236r.jpg/ ).
Missing vbox, fglrx module may be ignored I think. Its definitly because of the kernel upgrade, but its normal and I can fix it once I reach the console...
Then the screen turns black, and after a second it turns on again. Now the text is much smaller, ("higher resolution"), even in 16:10. ( http://img602.imageshack.us/f/img3237.jpg/ )

The normal booting process proceeds for a few seconds. There are no [FAIL] messages. When normally X would start the screens turns black permanently. No signal until reboot. I know that X can't start (see missing fglrx module). But at least I should be thrown back to the console.

But I doubt its X problem anyway because I had this problem ONCE before before the upgrade. I just rebooted and everything worked. Now its permanent.
Maybe its not even caused by the upgrade... But at least it shows up permanently since the upgrade...

Anyone with the same problem?

Thanks!

Last edited by yodo (2010-11-28 13:25:25)

toffyrn

Member

Registered: 2008-10-07

Posts: 221

Re: [solved] no booting possible since upgrade (kernel?)

High resolution means kms is kicking in. which it should not do if you are (trying) to use fglrx.
You should try rebuilding fglrx (catalyst) against the new kernel, and add "nomodeset" to the end of you kernel line in grub's menu.lst.

This is mentioned in the wiki: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/AT … ock_Kernel

Edit: To rebuild thing you can start directly to the shell by adding "3" to the end of you kernel line in grub...

Last edited by toffyrn (2010-11-28 13:07:20)

yodo

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2008-02-02

Posts: 71

Re: [solved] no booting possible since upgrade (kernel?)

Thanks, that helped!
Works now. So in the past (this problem occured once before) kms was just started too soon by chance?

toffyrn

Member

Registered: 2008-10-07

Posts: 221

Re: [solved] no booting possible since upgrade (kernel?)

Kms will start when modules are loaded.

You can tell your driver not to use KMS by either appending "nomodeset", or by making a rule in modprobe.d.
With the proprietary "fglrx" KMS is not supported at all, so that would mean lots of trouble

I'm not sure what happened last time this problem occured, but if you rebooted without rebuilding catalyst, you wont have the desired graphics driver, and X can't start...
On aur there are some packages (either catalyst-daemon or catalyst-hook) that will rebuild it for you. Though the compilation don't always succeed