The Blank Screen of Death. How To Fix.

[Old Ruler]

This is my first attempt at a How-To, here, and it will hopefully help get you to a working 'root' terminal, create, or use an existing X server configuration file and edit it so that it works with the graphics card driver you prefer. There seems to have been a fair few reports of blank screens after trying to install, particularly proprietary drivers. Seems that Ubuntu (on which Mint is currently based), prefer users to use OpenSource drivers. It's a reasonable requirement IMHO, but it is not working well for everyone and this is to offer a way to get closer to a fix for those circumstances. If the installed drivers are working well enough for you, then please stay with those.

If you get a blank screen on first re-boot after Mint installation, or after an upgrade of some kind; give it a few minutes after the blackness appears and then press the key combination Ctrl-Alt-F1. If that switches your screen to a virtual terminal, you should be able to log in with your usual password (use your root password if you've set up a real root account, of course). If you have success, you can skip the next part and jump to "Testing for xorg.conf".

Also, bear in mind that you have access to six virtual terminals. Any one of the key combinations Ctrl-Alt-F1 to Ctrl-Alt-F6 will give you a terminal and you can log in on as many as you like. You could keep an eye on a log file with 'tail -f' in one terminal and even use a non graphic browser in another and quickly switch between them by holding down Ctrl and Alt and tapping along the function key row.

Ctrl-Alt-F7 is special. Pressing that combination will show where the desktop should be. If you try this while using a working system, you'll see what I mean.


Use Recovery Mode options:

Reboot.

If you don't usually see the Grub screen with the available choices, hold down the shift key very soon after POST (as soon as you see anything on screen really). You should see a Grub2 boot chooser screen like:

1st-choices.png (204.65 KiB) Viewed 1972 times

Press Down arrow until the top most recovery option is highlighted and press Enter. You can tap the escape key during this part and you may see the boot progress reports.

When this screen appears:

2nd-choices.png (29.42 KiB) Viewed 1972 times

Choose Netroot:

You should soon see a Login prompt. Type root as your username and, when asked, your normal password.

You should see the machine name in red and a ready prompt like a $ sign. It doesn't look like much, but it's actually a very powerful place. Some old timers do everything they need to from that prompt and only rarely run a window manager or desktop environment.



Testing if xorg.conf exists:

Code: Select all

cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf

will either show nothing or the contents of the current X windows configuration file.

Code: Select all

cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf.failsafe

May reveal the contents of what should be used in the (possibly broken) failsafeX Recovery boot option, I think. If it exists and you want to try a very basic 'vesa' graphics driver, which should be enough to get your desktop back. No OpenGL or compositing, for sure, but access to Synaptic and GUI tools at least.

Code: Select all

cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf.failsafe

Code: Select all

Section "Device"
        Identifier      "Configured Video Device"
        Driver          "vesa"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
        Identifier      "Configured Monitor"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
        Identifier      "Default Screen"
        Monitor         "Configured Monitor"
        Device          "Configured Video Device"
EndSection

If it exists, to try it; backup an existing xorg.conf first:

Code: Select all

cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.OLD
cp -f /etc/X11/xorg.conf.failsafe /etc/X11/xorg.conf
reboot


Maybe that's enough? While that has been successful to regain the desktop experience on a couple of test VMs, I haven't had much luck with xorg.conf files created by the 'Xorg -configure' method. It may be a peculiarity of virtualisation. I'm not sure.

Where from there depends on a lot of variables. Add to the thread with solutions you find and problems you run into, or start a new question thread in Hardware Support - Graphics Cards and Monitors: viewforum.php?f=59

If your search luck finds a solution involving manipulating xorg configuration files and you've got your desktop environment back, you can of course use your File Manager. In KDE's Dolphin; look in /etc and right click on X11 (the word, not the icon) and select Root Actions - Open In File Manager. You'll probably see an xorg.conf.failsafe file there. To try using that on next boot, you can backup any existing xorg.conf by right click - copy then paste it back. Dolphin will ask for a new name rather than over write itself, so just add OLD01 or similar. Then do the same with xorg.conf.failsafe (or your shiny new test edition), this time copying it back as xorg.conf

The next step will create a configuration file in your home folder called xorg.conf.new

From a prompt as obtained above, but this time not becoming root (log in as you):

Code: Select all

sudo service kdm stop (use 'sudo service gdm stop' if you're using Gnome)
sudo Xorg -configure


Copy the file generated to /etc/X11/xorg.conf and the graphics system will use it, on the next boot, to configure the X windows server.

Backup xorg.conf as above and then:

Code: Select all

sudo rm /etc/X11/xorg.conf
sudo cp xorg.conf.new /etc/X11/xorg.conf


Lastly; if you need to edit a text file, whether it's our beloved xorg.conf or any other, you can use 'nano' which is a quite functional, easy to use, editor like:

Code: Select all

sudo nano /etc/X11/xorg.conf


There are a great deal of links to up-to-date information on Linux Graphics Drivers at the following link:

http://www.linux-drivers.org/display.html

I'll experiment with installing the latest nvidia graphics drivers on my main PC next and I'll add to this thread with any new things I discover along the way, but I hope you manage to fix your Mint graphics system and enjoy the full benefit of your hardware.

[Old Ruler]

cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf.failsafe /etc/X11/xorg.conf

For overwrites you should use the -f (force) parameter:

Code: Select all

cp -f /etc/X11/xorg.conf.failsafe /etc/X11/xorg.conf


Thanks. Fixed.

sudo kdm stop (use 'sudo gdm stop' if you're using Gnome)
sudo Xorg -configure

This should actually be:

Code: Select all

sudo service kdm stop (use 'sudo service gdm stop' if you're using Gnome)


Right again! Odd how kdm stop seemed to work for me yesterday.

Tutorial seems good (minus minor mistakes), haven't got access to a Linux computer right this second
so I cannot be 100% sure, I'm sure one of the regulars would be kind enough to look

Thanks again.

[Old Ruler]

There are two ways to install proprietary nvidia drivers here. I suggest you read them both first. One or the other may be a better solution for you. They both worked for me.

Method 1:

I did some experimenting and successfully installed nvidia graphics driver 256.44 on the most recent of the stock kernels I had. I see that there are later kernels like 2.6.33 with an updated VM I use, but the version I used was 2.6.32.24. It shouldn't matter which kernel you are using. The main thing is to make sure the extra kernel files you get match the current working kernel. See below.

You need to blacklist some drivers:

Look in the /etc/modprobe.d/ folder for lines in the .conf files affecting nvidia or nouveau drivers. blacklist.conf is worth checking and if there's already an nvidia-graphics-drivers.conf edit that or create a new file called nvidia-graphics-drivers.conf and add the following three lines to it:

Code: Select all

blacklist nouveau
blacklist lbm-nouveau
options nouveau modeset=0


also add in, if you're sure you don't want these:

Code: Select all

blacklist nvidia-173
blacklist nvidia-96


Go get the driver you want from http://www.nvidia.com/
I have NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-256.44.run and that trailing .run looks ever so enticing.

But wait! You must have the correct kernel-source and kernel-headers files for the new driver installer to successfully patch itself into the kernel. Check which kernel you're running with:

Code: Select all

uname -a


You should be able to find the exact linux-headers and linux-source packages for your kernel in Synaptic. I also installed 'linux-tools-common' because it looked nice

Skip this bit if you're in a hurry. It's just an explanation why I couldn't install this driver for my current kernel.
================================================================================
My current working kernel is:
Linux asus 2.6.34-02063401-generic #02063401 SMP Tue Jul 6 13:50:16 UTC 2010 x86_64 GNU/Linux
I've already got the headers for that one in: /usr/src/linux-headers-2.6.34-02063401-generic/
I fetched the source files from: http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/
Unfortunately, there's a problem with the particular kernel I'm using. When I ran NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-256.44.run it complained that:

The CC version check failed: 4.2 was used to compile the kernel, but the current compiler is gcc 4.4. The Linux 2.6 kernel module loader rejects kernel modules built with a version of gcc which does not exactly match that of the compiler used to build the running kernel.
Select No and set the CC environment variable to the name of the compiler used to compile your kernel, and restart the installation.

So - no latest driver for me on my current working 2.6.34 (which I need for 'discard') kernel.
I have other kernels available though. So I test booted an older one (2.6.32.24) and got into the lovely 'Your Graphics card is configured for Low-Resolution' thing we all know so well.
================================================================================

Reboot to a netroot recovery terminal by following the first post of this thread.

For best results; also follow that through to use the failsafe vesa driver. If you've already tried that and it didn't work, it may well work now that nouveau modeset is blacklisted.

All that remains, hopefully, is to run the installer. Make sure kdm or gdm is stopped and then:

cd to the folder to which the driver was downloaded eg.:

Code: Select all

cd /home/john/downloads


Code: Select all

sudo sh NVID<PRESS TAB KEY>


(If you only have one nvidia driver, press the TAB key to get auto completion and save you typing the whole thing)

Everything went smoothly for me. After some work by the installer, I was asked Install Nvidia's 32-bit compatibility OpenGL libraries? Yes I said.

Later; Would you like to run the nvidia-xconfig utility to automatically update your X configuration file so that the NVIDIA X driver will be used when you restart X? Any pre-existing X configuration file will be backed up. I said Yes again.

Later again; Your X configuration file has been successfully updated. Installation of the NVIDIA Accelerated Graphics Driver for Linux-x86_64 (version: 256.44) is now complete. I said whoopeee!

So I rebooted and it worked. Full resolution as previously, OpenGL screen savers working OK and this from the nVidia X Server Settings tool:

nvidia-driver-256.44-on-kernel-2.6.32.24.png (117.92 KiB) Viewed 1972 times

If something went wrong and there was no warning about problems from the installer, look at /var/log/nvidia-installer.log for clues.

If all went well with the installation, but still no desktop GUI, look for errors in /var/log/Xorg.0.log they are marked with (EE) at the beginning of the line.


================================================================================

Method 2:

So now, another way to fix nvidia hardware driver problems. This time by installing nvidia-current. This is quite separate to the method outlined above and, if you've been trying that way, or you have by some other means produced a nvidia-graphics-drivers.conf in /etc/modprobe.d/ it will be deleted, changed or recreated by the following process. So back it up if you want to keep it. I lost mine

Start from the same prompt without an X server running. Log in as your usual username (I think it matters) and be ready to reboot a failsafe xorg.conf as described In the 1st post above.

Code: Select all

sudo -i
apt-get purge nvidia-current nvidia-common nvidia-current-modaliases
apt-get update
apt-get install -f
dpkg --configure -a
dpkg-reconfigure -phigh xserver-xorg


Note 1: If you prefer, you can try to start the X server at this stage, by either rebooting or doing:
/etc/init.d/kdm restart ('/etc/init.d/gdm restart' for Gnome). From the desktop, run the System - Hardware Drivers and try enabling drivers it has found. I had to do the whole thing though. Just thought I'd mention it.

Code: Select all

apt-get install nvidia-current-modaliases
apt-get update


See Note 1.

Code: Select all

apt-get install nvidia-current
nvidia-xconfig

reboot or restart kdm/gdm as above and if your luck is as good as mine, you'll either have a working nvidia-current driver, or you should be able to activate it in System - Hardware Drivers.

The Hardware-Drivers tool still doesn't say the right thing with this driver:

nvidia-driver-Hardware-Drivers-wrong.png (55.39 KiB) Viewed 1972 times

But the nvidia X Server Settings tool reports it right.

nvidia-driver-X-server-settings-Right.png (133.11 KiB) Viewed 1972 times

Good luck.

LM9 KDE amd_64 on asus M2N32WSPro, Dual core AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+, nVidia GeForce 9800 GTX

[bugmenotprettyplz]

FIrst of all, great tutorial, will definitively come in handy.
My question is though, will this work with laptops that use dual graphics cards? like my UL80vt, which has an onboard
intel integrated graphics and a dedicated Nvidia G210m.

I have tried before to update the driver under windows, which turned out to be a mistake, because then windows did not recognize either one of the graphics chips.

So, i wont hold my breath on this one, but if you got an idea if it would work or could point me somewhere, your help would be much appreciated...

[meh]

Is this for the m11x R2 as well?

[meh]

Is this for the m11x R2 as well?

[richyrich]

@ meh , please read the red box at the top of this page . . then start your own topic in the proper support section.