Blank Boot Screen

[curt_grymala]

I just recently installed Linux Mint Elyssa on an older eMachines t2040 computer. I am having two minor issues when booting (these are not major problems, but they're just sort of inconvenient).

First, when Grub loads, the screen overflows my display. I can see all of my standard options and everything, but I cannot see the command line at the bottom, so I can't adjust the boot parameters.

Secondly, after I make a choice with Grub, rather than seeing the standard Mint boot splash, I have a completely blank screen until the log in screen appears. I get a completely blank screen when shutting down the computer, too.

Normally, neither of these are serious problems. However, without being able to see the command line on Grub, it is difficult to put it into verbose mode (which does actually work when I choose that; it does not show a blank screen when in verbose mode). As a result, if I have any issues booting Mint (like I was having the other day), I can't see where the boot process is hanging.

Does anyone have any suggestions to help me work out these issues? I've seen some posts suggesting the installation of Startup-Manager, which I am installing now. I will report back if that gives me any luck.

Also, just as an aside, why is it not possible to hit the escape key while booting to move from "splash" mode to verbose mode? I was under the impression that that was universal on Linux, but have found that I can't do that in Mint. Is there any way to enable that in Mint?

[Husse]

There are really two questions here

why is it not possible to hit the escape key while booting to move from "splash" mode to verbose mode?

It's either because it is not possible under Ubuntu (which I think) or because gfxgrub does not have it
The other problem can (I hope) be solved once you're logged in

Code: Select all

gksu gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst

Find the line that loads your kernel - it looks like this

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-16-generic root=/dev/sda2 ro quiet splash

add vga=791 between ro and quiet and you get 1024x768 resolution before X starts

[curt_grymala]

Thank you for the help.

Oddly enough, 791 showed up as unsupported when I tried that solution. However, I was able to get startupmanager working, and was able to set it to 773 (1024x768 with 8-bit color), and it seems to be working fine.

I also used the startupmanager to remove the "quiet" option so that I can see what's going on. My splash screen now shows up properly and I get a little window with the boot-up information scrolling by.

However, I still cannot figure out how to get Grub to fit on my screen. For some reason, Grub overflows my screen so that I cannot see the whole menu.

I can't see the letter "F" where it says "F1 - Help", as that overflows off the left side of my screen. In addition, as mentioned below, I can't see the command-line that's usually at the bottom of a Grub screen.

Does anyone know of anything I can do (aside from manually adjusting the display area on my monitor) to see the entire Grub screen when I turn on my computer?

Again, thank you for the help, so far. That pointed me in the right direction to get one of my problems solved.

[alligoodw]

What number would you use if your resolution is 1280x800? I mean, vga=???

[Husse]

These are the ones I know of
Screen 640x480 800x600 1024x768 1280x1024 1600x1200
Colors --------------------------- -------------------------------------------
256 | 769 771 773 775 796
32,768 | 784 787 790 793 797
65,536 | 785 788 791 794 798
16.8M | 786 789 792 795 799