• Registered: 2010-07-30
  • Posts: 56

Topic: [SOLVED]Video driver crisis... ARGH!

Sorry for the multiple posts today...

I got an icon on the desktop about "restricted drivers." Yeah, yeah, I shoulda known. It offered to install some enhanced driver for ATI cards. Now I can't boot. I get the crunchbang logo and the progress bar, then... nothing. Not even the login screen. How can I fix this?

EDIT: I imagine I could fix it from the command line, if I knew where to look. I assume there's a way to simply remove the offending driver?

Last edited by Time Lord (2010-08-03 14:41:36)

  • Registered: 2009-10-09
  • Posts: 429

Re: [SOLVED]Video driver crisis... ARGH!

One thing to try right off the bat is if you have an xorg.conf file (which could have info from the old driver in there), temporarily move it out of the way to see if it will boot.

(get to a terminal if you're not already dumped to one, then log in)

ctrl-alt-f1

cd /etc/X11

(list files to see if you have one, if so move it)

ls

sudo mv xorg.conf xorg.conf.bak_todaysdate
sudo invoke-rc.d gdm restart

and then see if it brings up the desktop.

  • Registered: 2010-07-30
  • Posts: 56

Re: [SOLVED]Video driver crisis... ARGH!

Tried that. Couldn't even get to a terminal. I broke something really badly, and since I'd only put on a couple of wallpapers, I just... reinstalled the whole darned thing. I know that's a "brute force" approach, but I'm back up and running with minimal disruption.

Note to self: Don't reboot with changes to video drivers without triple-checking xorg.conf.

  • Registered: 2009-10-09
  • Posts: 429

Re: [SOLVED]Video driver crisis... ARGH!

Well, poo. sad

There's at least a couple of gotchas sometimes using the Ubuntu restricted drivers manager (it *should* in theory always work but...yep, sometimes it just futzes things pretty bad)

Actually (I just saw some of your other posts)- it was a new install so you probably didn't have an xorg.conf file and my advice wouldn't have helped (though it is a good thing to check for in general when doing any video driver updates).

  • Registered: 2009-03-31
  • Posts: 12

Re: [SOLVED]Video driver crisis... ARGH!

I know I'm late to the party, but have you tried adding "nomodeset" to the GRUB kernel parameters?

  • Registered: 2010-07-30
  • Posts: 56

Re: [SOLVED]Video driver crisis... ARGH!

No, the reinstall worked. Again, the icon came up offering the upgrade, and I declined this time. Fool me once...