Coal: X crashes after DU

[pottzie]

Just installed Coal, and after doing the first DU, X is borked. During the upgrade, I saw one of those "Package has changed. Would you like to install the new version or keep your old one?" and went with installing the new one. and that package was Openbox. I also saw that X installed what looked to me to be more than a dozen new files. I didn't see anything in Upgrade Warnings.

When I restarted, the screen just has a couple of panels of static, separated by black spaces.

[GekkoP]

It's been a while since I did a DU on my Coal. I'll try tonight and let you know.

[machinebacon]

I very much doubt that the questions regarding Openbox borked anything, because this is just a confirmation if the default rc.xml (not the system-wide one in /etc/skel, but the fallback one in /etc/X11) should be overwritten with a recent version.

What you describe sounds like a problem with the graphics adapter. Can you add 'nomodeset' to the kernel boot line?
1) Boot into GRUB
2) choose the entry that loads Coal
3) press <e>
4) move the cursor to the end of the line where you see "init=/bin/systemd" and append the word "nomodeset", without quotes, if possible *before* the init=/bin/systemd.
5) Press F10 or Ctrl-x to boot

Anyway, please *always* post "lspci -nnk" in the opening post, because I don't know what hardware you run with.

[pottzie]

There was no line in grub with init=/bin/systemd. In fact, no line remotely like it!

lspci -nnk shows (for video) VGA compatible controller[0300]; VIA Technologies Inc. k8m800 /k8n800/k8n800a [S3 UniChrome Pro] [1106:3108] (rev01)

[machinebacon]

Then please add it to the kernel boot line.

Also, edit /etc/default/grub in this way:

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# If you change this file, run 'update-grub' afterwards to update
# /boot/grub/grub.cfg.
# For full documentation of the options in this file, see:
#   info -f grub -n 'Simple configuration'

GRUB_DEFAULT=0
GRUB_TIMEOUT=5
GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR=`lsb_release -i -s 2> /dev/null || echo Debian`
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet nomodeset init=/bin/systemd"
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=""

# Uncomment to enable BadRAM filtering, modify to suit your needs
# This works with Linux (no patch required) and with any kernel that obtains
# the memory map information from GRUB (GNU Mach, kernel of FreeBSD ...)
#GRUB_BADRAM="0x01234567,0xfefefefe,0x89abcdef,0xefefefef"

# Uncomment to disable graphical terminal (grub-pc only)
#GRUB_TERMINAL=console

# The resolution used on graphical terminal
# note that you can use only modes which your graphic card supports via VBE
# you can see them in real GRUB with the command `vbeinfo'
#GRUB_GFXMODE=640x480

# Uncomment if you don't want GRUB to pass "root=UUID=xxx" parameter to Linux
#GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID=true

# Uncomment to disable generation of recovery mode menu entries
#GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY="true"

# Uncomment to get a beep at grub start
#GRUB_INIT_TUNE="480 440 1"

save and exit, then run "sudo update-grub" and reboot. You can later still remove the nomodeset term there. First we try to get into X normally.

[pottzie]

Edited /etc/default/grub and ran update-grub, then rebooted to the same no-X screen. Then edited grub using "e" at boot, again X failed. I'm posting this from the netbook that I'm having the problem with, using the live CD, and hoped to show a more complete lspci -nnk, but for some reason I can't copy and paste using both mouse buttons as the middle mouse. Sorry.

The thought has occured to me that I could just try reinstalling and see if it happens again. Might be worth a shot?

[pidsley]

The thought has occured to me that I could just try reinstalling and see if it happens again. Might be worth a shot?

If you do this and it "fixes" the problem you will never know what the original problem was. If that's OK with you, go ahead and reinstall. Of course, it might not work and then you will still have to try to troubleshoot the problem (or you could use a different spin, or a different distro, and never really learn anything).

I guess it kind of also depends on how critical it is that you always have a working install. Is this your only machine? Do you need it for daily work, or even routine things like banking? If so, you might want to carve out a 5G partition and install a Debian stable release (like #!) on it and dual boot so you always have a working fall-back install.

If you'd like to try to solve the Coal problem, can you tell me if you are able to switch to a different tty when Coal boots (can you use ctrl+alt+f2 to switch to tty2 and log in there)? Also, is this Coal32 or Coal64?

[pottzie]

Coal 32. I've got other computers. And there's no emergancy on making this one work. And I'm pretty sure tty2 is working, plus I have bash working before I do startx.

[pottzie]

Installed aptitude and then updated, and ran DU. Aptitude brought in xorg-server, and a a few other X files, looked like what I would install on a new system. Now startx gives me a screen with the top half static, and the bottom half booting into this forum page, although fuzzy/static looking. No mouse, unable to use Ctrl/Alt/f1 or f2, etc, so X has the mouse and keyboard as well as the screen clobbered. Odd that it loads the forum page instead of the splash screen. When I logged into the forum I used Roaster, as at that time it was the only browser I had.

[pidsley]

OK. Can you boot into the console, then before you startx, do this

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sudo apt-get install pastebinit
uname -a
apt-cache policy xserver-xorg-video-openchrome
pastebinit /var/log/Xorg.0.log

and then post the output of the uname and apt-cache policy commands, and the link you get from pastebinit here (this will let us look at your Xorg log).

[pottzie]

It showed "unable to read from /var/log/Xorg.O.log." Other lines were:

uname -a: Linux Averatec 3.12.-1.towo-siduction-686 #1 SMP PREEMPT (and a timestamp)
apt-cache policy xserver-xorg--video-openchrome: Installed: 1:0.3.3-1 Candidate: 1:0.3.3-1 Version table 1:0.3.3-1 0
500 http://http.debian.net/debian/ unstable/main i386 Packages
100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[wuxmedia]

try tapping 'tab' after X.

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pastebinit /var/log/X

although there are only two files on my system.

[rhowaldt]

use code-boxes.

[machinebacon]

/var/log can be read with root permissions, so a sudo should do.

[pottzie]

Got it!

http://pastebin.com/LFRNEbCX

[wuxmedia]

I'm no specialist on xorg logs, looks like it's picking the wrong mode, settles on 1024x768, is that what you normally have?

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Vi ... ome_driver

hey - try looking around in google with your chipset from lspci and your problem, maybe a couple of suspicious looking lines from your log.
Thats all i'm doing.

[machinebacon]

[ 33.936] (II) CHROME(0): Unable to get panel size from EDID. Return code: 0

This means that the screen does not send the EDID (the maximum possible resolution, or a list of possible resolutions) back, so wux's question makes sense.

You need to add some modelines to the xorg.conf file (that is probably not existing, which is by design)

http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Openchrome/ gives some hints.

[pottzie]

Just a question about the second line:
33.572] Build Operating System: Linux 3.2.0-4-amd64 i686 Debian

I have a 32 bit computer.

[machinebacon]

But you were not the person who built the drivers and sent them upstream to Debian, so it's not the problem ;)

[wuxmedia]

it would take some serious work to install a 64bit system onto a 32bit computer. SO I doubt thats happened.
the line says 'amd64 i686' So its kinda both of them.
i686 is 32bit.