Cannot Boot to Live CD - Black Screen White Rectangle

[El Presidente]

I'm recreating this thread here. Was originally in Newbie questions. I hope that's not an issue. viewtopic.php?f=90&t=121154

This is my first go at Linux ever. I'm trying to install Mint on a second hard drive (Win 7 on the primary HDD) and after messing with the BIOS (had to enable SATA Boot ROM), I can finally get a Mint splash screen from the live CD which then goes to a black screen with a white rectangle in the top left that takes up about 1/4 to 1/3 of the screen. At this point, the optical drive ceases to show any signs of life and everything freezes.

I've tried with Mint 13 Cinnamon 64, Mint 13 Mate 64, Mint 14 Mate 64, Ubuntu 12.10, Mint Debian 201204; same thing happened with all of them. Checksum on all of them is legit. My mid 2009 white MacBook booted one of the live CDs so it doesn't appear to be the media at all. I created a bootable USB stick of Mint 13 Mate using the dd command in Mountain Lion and it was the same issue so that would rule out the optical drive being the issue.
http://community.linuxmint.com/tutorial/view/744

Booting in compatibility mode doesn't work: booted to pulsing black screen with no video
Integrity check: booted to black screen with white rectangle

I successfully booted Fedora 18 the first time I tried it. I was able to play around with a fully functional OS. But now it consistently hangs 3/4 of the way into the startup.
I updated the BIOS (I was 2 updates behind when I started)
I've flashed the BIOS several times to no avail

I also found some boot parameters that people have claimed address similar issues
http://ubuntu-tutorials.com/2010/05/06/ ... orkaround/
viewtopic.php?f=59&t=113043
replace "quiet splash" with i915.modeset=0 (booted to pulsing black screen)
replace "quiet splash" with i915.modeset=1 (booted to a bunch of errors culminating in an ATA bus error)
i915.915_enabled_rc6=0 quiet splash (booted to black screen with white rectangle)
i915.915_enabled_fbc=0 quiet splash (booted to black screen with white rectangle)
i915.semaphores=1 quiet splash (booted to black screen with white rectangle)
I should say, I'm not sure if I entered the above parameters correctly or if there are any other parameters that might help?

SPECS
ASRock H77 Pro4M
Core i5 2500K
I'm using the onboard graphics of the 2500K (Intel HD Graphics 3000) running VGA to a Toshiba HDTV
8 GB AMD Performance Series RAM (2 x 4GB)
2 x 1 TB WD Caviar Green HDD (Win 7 and blank GUID)
optical drive is from ASUS

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

[caf4926]

Does it though have hybrid graphics?
That is: Intel + other? (nvidia/AMD)

[El Presidente]

No, man. It's just the onboard intel graphics.

[caf4926]

I successfully booted Fedora 18 the first time I tried it. I was able to play around with a fully functional OS. But now it consistently hangs 3/4 of the way into the startup.

This is odd

I take it your research has revealed some issues with your graphics?

[El Presidente]

I successfully booted Fedora 18 the first time I tried it. I was able to play around with a fully functional OS. But now it consistently hangs 3/4 of the way into the startup.

This is odd

I take it your research has revealed some issues with your graphics?

That's what it would appear to be. But what do i know? But there must be people running Linux with the onboard graphics of a 2500k.
I'm considering getting an enclosure and installing from my MacBook to see if the PC will boot to it as an external drive.
Is there a way to boot in verbose mode with Linux so I could see where it's hanging/failing?

Forgot to mention. I've aldo tried with only 1 RAM stick and it made no difference.

[El Presidente]

Okay. So, Google told me how to do a verbose boot and Mint 13 Mate 64 seems to fail at Begin: Preconfiguring network... ... which is followed by a myriad of stuff I don't understand that includes a couple of ATA bus errors.

Hopefully this picture helps?

[El Presidente]

Ubuntu 12.10
replace "quiet splash" with "text -verbose": hangs at Begin: Regenerating SSL certificate

Mint 14 Mate 64 bit
1. replace "quiet splash" with "text -verbose": throws an error while loading removable SCSI disk
2. remove flash drive and try again: i915 timed out
3. replace "quiet splash" with "i915.modeset=0 text -verbose": no text, just a pulsing black screen
4. replace "quiet splash" with "i915.modeset=1 text -verbose": fails after Begin: Preconfiguring networking
5. compatibility mode with same parameters as #4: fails after Begin: Preconfiguring networking
6. boot from USB (actually I think the flash drive had Mint 13, not 14) with same parameters as #4: error in regards to removable SCSI disk
7. back to Mint 14 Mate 64 bit Live CD with nomodeset text -verbose: plenty of optical drive activity but no text, just a pulsing black screen

Fedora 18
1. removed "rhgb quiet" from boot parameters which resulted in: initialized i915, started show plymouth boot screen, reached target basic system.. and then it throws some ATA bus errors
2. load basic graphics mode, removed "rhgb quiet" from boot parameters: no text, just a pulsing black screen

Haven't yet figured out how to do a verbose boot with Mint Debian

So.... it seems that there are issues with the graphics but it looks like i915.modeset=1 gets around that. Then there is some sort of network issue? Any thoughts?
The system is not connected to any kind of network, nor have I installed a WiFi card.

[caf4926]

I took a look at that screen
But it doesn't really throw much light on the problem. No for me...
Guess if it were me, I'd be trying with a ethernet cable connected (though it shouldn't matter), you just never know.
And other distros, though considering you already tried so many... but again, you just never know.

[El Presidente]

I booted into Win 7, verified the ethernet connection was working, tried to boot Linux Mint 14 Mate 64 bit disc and now, regardless of whether or not the cable is plugged in, it's not experiencing the network issue. It hangs on initializing 915 every time.

I emailed Intel to see if they knew anything about this and their support said:

Thank you for contacting Intel Customer Support.

I’m afraid that Linux* operating system is not supported by Intel®. In your case, I suggest you visiting the Linux* communities to get the proper support or answer that why you are having problems installing the operating system.

From our side, the chipset supports fine Microsoft* operating system but about Linux* the information is not available from our side.

[El Presidente]

Same issue with Mint 13 Mate 64 bit. No network error anymore. It's just hanging on initializing i915.
I read that ACPI can cause issues so I tried a boot replacing "quiet splash" with "i915.modeset=1 acpi=off text -verbose" and no change

[El Presidente]

I am posting this message from a successful installation of Mageia 2.

[caf4926]

I am posting this message from a successful installation of Mageia 2.

Great news

[El Presidente]

I am posting this message from a successful installation of Mageia 2.

Great news

I guess that's good news. I'm not all that enthused about Mageia. What does being able to install it tell us, though?

[caf4926]

Most probably that the kernel in use there is different and that possibly there has been some un-reported regression in the newer kernel versions. That seems most likely anyway.
Open a terminal an show us:

Code: Select all

uname -a

[El Presidente]

The results of uname -a

Linux xxxxxxx 3.3.6-desktop-2.mga2 #1 SMP Thu May 17 16:25:59 UTC 2012 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Interestingly, the first time I tried to boot to the Mageia install disc, I can't remember if I saw anything about i915 but I got the same 2 errors with ata7 and ata8. These were the ata bus errors mentioned previously. In successive boots, there were errors loading but it looked like it was able to kill the processes that were causing trouble. Unfortunately, it was moving too fast to see what was going on. Any idea how to figure out what ata7 and ata8 are? I'll poke around and see if I can figure that out. Also, for what it's worth, the Mageia install disc is not a Live CD, it's just an install disc.

[caf4926]

ata is as in SATA

[El Presidente]

ata is as in SATA

Right, I understand that. I was wondering if I could identify those exact components. Still planning to look into that out of curiosity. In the meantime, I was able to successfully boot to and install Mint 12 - 64 Bit. I love it. Below is the output of uname -a.

Linux xxxxxxxxxxx 3.0.0-12-generic #20-Ubuntu SMP Fri Oct 7 14:56:25 UTC 2011 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

So I'm good for now. I'll probably still be looking into getting 13 or 14 installed eventually but for now I'm just going to mess around with Mint 12. Thanks for your help. Cheers!

[caf4926]

Support for Mint 12 ends in April 2013--officially
But it usually stays alive for updates for some time after that
It's sure looking like a regression in the kernel module i915

[El Presidente]

So after a month of screwing around it just started working. I booted the Mint 13 64 bit disc and installed it. It's working fine. The only thing I could think of that I changed was disconnecting the Win 7 HDD while installing Mageia. But I reconnected it and it's not interfering with the live CD boot at all. Or maybe Mint 12 installed some necessary drivers or firmware? I am severely confused. I suppose I could disconnect the Mint HDD and see if I can still boot the live CD..... meh. I'll do it later lol. All's well that ends well, I guess.

uname -a

Linux xxxxxxxxxx 3.2.0-23-generic #36-Ubuntu SMP Tue Apr 10 20:39:51 UTC 2012 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

[caf4926]

Put it down to some random shlt that happens