Mint Debian boot failure on HP laptop AMD proc ATI Graphics

[bushy]

I can run the OS successfully from the Live DVD. The install appears fine but during the boot from the HDD I have a green screen n no desktop but an operational cursor. All I am able to do is execute a reboot.

I tried booting in recovery mode and had a working desktop for a minute and then an error message that Cinnamon crashed. From the point forward I was in a loop of constant Cinnamon crashes.

I expect I have to change video drivers but I don't see how I can get past the crashes to do this.

Suggestions?

[gtsfer]

Sounds like a graphics driver issue for sure. To be clear, you installed Linux Mint Debian edition, correct? Which desktop, Mate, Cinnamon? if you can boot back up in live mode from whatever media you used (DVD / USB) and run this command from Terminal Window that might help as well. Copy / paste results back here. It'll give some details on your system hardware.

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inxi -Fx

Alternately, try booting again from hard disk again and you can try this as a temp fix. On the GRUB screen, hit "e" to edit boot params. Find the line that ends in "quiet splash". Append this to the line. Make sure you add a space after "quite splash". If this works you can run the "inxi" command from Terminal in there too.

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nomodeset

[bushy]

It is MINT Debian Cinnamon is the DE
I previously tried adding nomodeset xforcevesa w/o success.

System: Host: mint Kernel: 3.11-2-486 i686 (32 bit, gcc: 4.8.1) Desktop: Cinnamon 2.0.14 Distro: LinuxMint 1 debian
Machine: System: Hewlett-Packard product: HP Pavilion dv5 Notebook PC version: Rev 1
Mobo: HP model: 30F2 version: 98.1E Bios: Hewlett-Packard version: F.07 date: 07/17/2008
CPU: Single core AMD Turion X2 Mobile RM-70 (-UP-) cache: 512 KB flags: (lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 svm) bmips: 4000.1 clocked at 2000.00 MHz
Graphics: Card: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] RS780M [Mobility Radeon HD 3200] bus-ID: 01:05.0
X.Org: 1.14.3 drivers: ati,radeon (unloaded: fbdev,vesa) Resolution: 1280x800@60.0hz
GLX Renderer: Gallium 0.4 on AMD RS780 GLX Version: 3.0 Mesa 9.2.2 Direct Rendering: Yes
Audio: Card-1: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] RS780 HDMI Audio [Radeon (HD) 3000 Series]
driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 01:05.1
Card-2: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA) driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 00:14.2
Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture ver: k3.11-2-486
Network: Card-1: Realtek RTL8101E/RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller
driver: r8169 ver: 2.3LK-NAPI port: 2000 bus-ID: 09:00.0
IF: eth0 state: down mac: 00:1e:68:c4:73:bb
Card-2: Qualcomm Atheros AR242x / AR542x Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) driver: ath5k bus-ID: 08:00.0
IF: wlan0 state: up mac: 00:22:69:40:8e:54
Drives: HDD Total Size: 250.1GB (-) 1: id: /dev/sda model: WDC_WD2500BEVS size: 250.1GB temp: 35C
Partition: ID: / size: 1.4G used: 45M (4%) fs: rootfs
Sensors: System Temperatures: cpu: 73.2C mobo: N/A
Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info: Processes: 130 Uptime: 7 min Memory: 274.7/2785.2MB Runlevel: 2 Gcc sys: 4.8.2
Client: Shell (bash 4.2.45) inxi: 1.9.14

[kurotsugi]

you can install the driver while you're in recovery mode without using X. I forgot the details about which package needs to be installed but AFAIK LMDE have built in tools to do all the dirty task. it was smxi or sgxi.

[bushy]

At least for now I am giving up on Mint Debian. Now I cannot get to a desktop, period. Not by editing the boot menu or by using the recovery mode. I have reformatted the partition and re-installed and the same experience. Makes no sense that the live DVD works perfectly, there are no errors displayed during the install and yet I cannot boot to a desktop.

[PatH57]

Hi

• ,
  
  in fact it does make sense, livecd uses a base approach like all fits one, so display driver is basic and x server runs a minimalistic gui.
  When it installs it does a hw detection and tries an appropriate driver for your stuff then configures the xserver according to this (that's where your seems to break).
  Once you have done the installation reboot wih your livecd and check the etc/X11 directory (as root), try to copy the one on your livecd to your hd (replace the one you have) and reboot.
  If it works you will have to configure your X after it and make sure the right driver is used (open source should be ok, AMD dropped a lot of their older cards)
  
  That said it's a lot of trouble to get it working and updates may break it again...
  
  or get an earlier version of he distro like 13 and update as needed...
  
  See ya
  Patrick

[gtsfer]

As Kurotsugi mentioned, there is in fact a built in driver tool on LMDE for ATI in Debian. It was called fglrx... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fglrx#Linux. It's now called "ATI Catalyst" for LInux.

The other one he mentions is for nVidia (sgfxi). As Path57 says you can run it in recovery mode and that should get you out of the woods here. LMDE updates will NOT break it, they won't affect the video driver loaded by fglrx at all. If you haven't abandoned LMDE yet say so and we'll figure out how to load the correct driver for your card.

[bushy]

Last night I installed MINT 17 Cinnamon. The install went perfectly, I have no complaints other than it is UBUNTU based rather than DEBIAN.

I prefer to have DEBIAN because of its rolling updates. I would give it another go but I want to ensure I understand the steps as described:

1) Boot Live DVD and install on HDD
2) Re-boot again to the Live DVD
3) Copy the contents from the Live DVD of the "etc/X11" directory
4) Paste the copied contents into the etc/X11 directory on my HDD


By doing the above I should have a working DE that can then allow me to work with the "ATI Catalyst" tool.
Am I missing anything?

[gtsfer]

I can't say for sure if this method works as I've never tried it. I have seen some other threads that lead me to believe that it might. But I can't commit to it especially if you have to reinstall the whole thing to find out. I run LMDE Mate 64-bit myself and I like the stability, it's like a freaking rock.

If you still had LMDE loaded I would have preferred to try startup in recovery mode and use the ATI Catalyst tool (it's "fglrx" after doing a <ctrl><alt>F1 from the recovery GUI session start up) to load the correct driver. It should auto-detect one. I'd have to do some homework and searches to verify exactly how to run that. But if you've semi-committed to LM 17 already, as I said you'd have to reinstall just to try either of these out.

I've got a nVidia card that requires the other thing mentioned above. The "sgfxi" thing. These two tools are preloaded in LM Debian.

Maybe see if someone else posts back on copying the /etc/X11 files first and how confident they are it will work. It sounds like it might, but again...