knoppix 3.8.1 can't find a suitable xserver for video card

Printable View

04-13-2005, 04:48 AM
roofer

knoppix 3.8.1 can't find a suitable xserver for video card

I've tried all of the cheatcodes that look like they might have anything to do with the video card including failsafe, but no luck. And this is on two separate machines - a Dell 8500 laptop with 512mb RAM, and an Athlon K7 with 392mb RAM. The video cards in question are the Mobility Radeon 9000 and an older ATI Rage Pro. The autodetect finds the hardware just fine, but X11 just won't start and it tries several times going through several iterations before finally giving up. This does not appear to be a bad cut of the CD or a corrupt .iso, but I suspect it's possible. I can get a console prompt but no X and, of course, no KDE. Startx (from the said console) does not do anything more than what the CD normally does (doesn't work either).

Just curious if anyone else has run into a similar problem. I'm booting the live CD version 3.8.1 that I downloaded from one of the German mirrors (it was featured on the front page of Distrowatch).

BTW, I have a ver. 3.7 knoppix Live CD that works like a charm on both machines. The Athlon machine has gentoo 2005.0 loaded, so I know X (well, xorg) works on that machine in a native build. I've also gotten Mepis, DSL, Puppy, and other distros to boot on the laptop.

I will try again when a 3.8.2 is released, of course ;-)

roofer
04-13-2005, 04:23 PM
Digital Parasite

I'm having the same problem. I have a Compaq Presario V2000 with an Intel Pentium M 1.5GHz processor, Widescreen Display (1280x768), 512MB of RAM, integrated Intel 82852/82855GM video card.

Using Knoppix 3.7 it dies during boot, some of the kernel modules seg fault or it never gets past the Ethernet driver. With Knoppix 3.8 and 3.8.1 it seems to detect the hardware just fine and then hangs at "Starting X11..."

I have tried using a bunch of cheat codes without any success:

screen=1280x768
xserver=XFree86
xserver=XF86_SVGA
xmodule=i810
xmodule=svga
acpi=off
noscsi

Nothing seems to be working. Any ideas???
04-14-2005, 04:35 AM
roofer

Others have the same problem

I noticed in a few posts up the forum that someone else was experiencing the same problem (see can't get graphics on Dell...). I have not had any time to look any further or try any more combinations of cheatcodes so I'm still in the same quandry. If I find out anything I'll post a note. They did seemingly find a soltion by setting teh vsync (vertical sync rate of the monitor) to 100.0 and resolution to 1280x1024 with vga=normal. I haven't tried that yet.
04-14-2005, 08:20 PM
Lyndsay

:? Having the same problem on my Siemens Field PG (A Laptop) with S3 Savage Graphic card, also treid all the cheats with no luck. text console works fine but not the X server. I think it has somthing to do with the Display. Will keep eyes and ears open.

P.S what is the PCI nummer of the card or where do we find it.
04-15-2005, 09:16 PM
Digital Parasite

I tried the vsync and vga=normal with different parameters but still not working.

The new Ubuntu 5.04 live CD works fine though without any extra settings. Anyone know how I can find out what it might be doing differently than Knoppix to allow X to work properly?
04-15-2005, 09:58 PM
MGILB81

Same problem here too....

I have hardware that is definately supported by KNOPPIX: AMD Athlon XP 3200+ processor, 256Mb RAM, ATI Radeon 9550SE video card, among other stuff. KNOPPIX 3.7 works fine, 3.8 doesnt. I have ran testcd, among other codes, yet to no avail. When it says X Windows session starting the screen goes black before the GUI shows up. In 3.7 it does this and the GUI shows up like 1 second later. With 3.8, an amber light turns on on my CRT monitor, and the screen is black. I have waited 5 minutes one time to see if a miracle would happen but none did. I HAVE SUCCESSFULLY BOOTED THE SAME KNOPPIX CD ON ANOTHER COMPUTER THOUGH, AND IT WORKED FINE. I dont know wth is wrong here. >(
04-16-2005, 10:49 AM
wonoscho

On the ACER TravelMate 4000 WLMI the xserver also didn't start, but with the following cheat code the xserver comes up:

knoppix noagp

Don't no why this cheat code works, of cause there is an AGP-Port in this notebook, and normally AGP is auto detected while the knoppix boot process.

With “noagp” the Autodetection of the AGP Port is bypassed but the xserver starts up.

Wolfgnag Nohl
04-17-2005, 05:32 AM
roofer

Still no workee

I've tried several more of the cheatcodes, including noagp, and, of course, several variations thereof. I am not able to find a combination that works. I get the "Starting X..." message, the screen flashes a few times, it then tries XFree86(vesa), then some more flashing, then the fb server, before it finally gives up.

I might try a different download from another mirror because I really would like to have the 3.8.1 Live CD (working of course). It does have some updated versions of software and that's a good thing. After that, if it does the same thing, I'll give up and use something else.

Thanks for help,

roofer
04-17-2005, 08:15 PM
MGILB81

IT WORKED!!! kind of....

I FINALLY GOT IT TO WORK ON MY PC! :)
Heres how:
I typed in:
failsafe

Now it works. The only problem is that I cant get onto the internet and other stuff doesnt work BUT AT LEAST I GOT TO SEE IT!! :)
04-17-2005, 08:53 PM
MGILB81

I got it to work again! :)

I typed in:
knoppix screen=800x600 depth=24

Everything works now including the internet(im on KNOPPIX now;) )
I have not run into any problems thus far. Im going to try other screen resolutions but Im not going to post any of them that work because by using common sense: they should all work. You need to know the screen resolution that you fancy(like my 800x600) before you do this and you shouldnt try any other depths unless you know what you are doing.
04-18-2005, 05:46 AM
roofer

Well, I had to download and burn another iso...

I'm happy to report that after downloading and burning another iso from another site, I have successfully started Knoppix 3.8.1 with an X server and kde. Please note that no strange cheatcodes were required (except noapm which I did try with the other CD).

So I am trying out the latest versions of all of the packages and am as happy as a pig in a poke (I am in the Heart of Dixie). Thanks to everyone offering ideas and assistance - that's testimony to the forum and the community.

I am posting this from the konqueror web browser from the live CD just so you know it's really working.

roofer
04-18-2005, 04:02 PM
Digital Parasite

I will have to try the latest cheat codes that have been posted here and report back.

I did find that KANOTIX 2005-02 edition which is based on Knoppix does work fine with my laptop. The startup looks exactly the same as Knoppix, detecting the same video hardware and monitor. It decided to choose 1024x768 @ 60Hz as the resolution. I didn't have to enter any cheat codes. This one also has KDE 3.4.0 and a slightly new 2.6 kernel as well as being optimized for Pentium+ CPUs.
04-18-2005, 04:29 PM
Digital Parasite

I just tried some of the new cheat codes suggested.

Changing the depth and trying out the 1024x768@60Hz that Kanotix uses did not work.

But using noagp did work! Not sure what is the real problem but using noagp allows Xwindows to run.
04-19-2005, 01:11 AM
roofer

And it works on the Athlon

I tried the new CD this morning on my athlon k7... didn't need the noapm as it does have that power scheme. My screen was a bit dark, contrastwise, but all of the menus displayed well and everything that I tried worked. I was able to create a persistent home and do those things that are needed done 8)

So, the new iso has worked on my Dell 8500 and my older Athlon K7 desktop with very little else needed. Did I mention that I burned the CD at a slower write rate? I throttled down to 12X from 20X, though I don't know that this is enough to make that kind of a difference.

Later...
05-11-2005, 10:21 PM
Digital Parasite

So you just reburned the same .ISO to a new CD using a slower rate and everything "magically" started working?
05-11-2005, 10:55 PM
Harry Kuhman

Quote:

Originally Posted by Digital Parasite

So you just reburned the same .ISO to a new CD using a slower rate and everything "magically" started working?

There are many many cases of such magic, here are just a couple of them:
http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17788 and http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtop...?p=78925#78925

What I'm less clear about is why roofer says "I'm happy to report that after downloading and burning another iso from another site,..." Did he not check the md5 sum of the file when he downloaded it? If he couldn't boot, did he download another copy of the iso without even checking the md5 of the first one then? And did he finally learn and check the md5 sum of the second iso he downloaded, or does he still resist doing that?
05-19-2005, 04:58 AM
roofer

MD5 Sums

Quote:

Originally Posted by Harry Kuhman

Quote:

Originally Posted by Digital Parasite

So you just reburned the same .ISO to a new CD using a slower rate and everything "magically" started working?

There are many many cases of such magic, here are just a couple of them:
http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17788 and http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtop...?p=78925#78925

What I'm less clear about is why roofer says "I'm happy to report that after downloading and burning another iso from another site,..." Did he not check the md5 sum of the file when he downloaded it? If he couldn't boot, did he download another copy of the iso without even checking the md5 of the first one then? And did he finally learn and check the md5 sum of the second iso he downloaded, or does he still resist doing that?

Harry and DP,

I do believe I checked the md5 on the first iso though I no longer have the evidence, and really the CD would boot. I could run Linux all day long, but just not with any Xserver, only a command line. While that's loads of fun, many of the apps do offer gui-based interaction. :wink: Unfortunately, I cannot explain why the first iso would only go so far other than to say it must of been corrupt, but not so much as to not boot (it did to a point). I know that it is supposed to start an xserver as part of the startup process, but it could easily get to a command line. I don't follow your (Harry's) point about me resisting anything as you have no clue as to what I did or didn't do. But suffice it to say that I did download another iso from another site and burn another CD and it works.

I did burn the iso to CD at a slower rate and that's about all there is to the story.

Apparently, no magic white smoke escaped in the process... :D :D

Y'all enjoy yourselves,

roofer
05-23-2005, 03:19 AM
wavetel

RE: Cant find suitable Xserver

8) Here is something Ive noticed since Knoppix 3.7 and also with 3.8.1 and 3.8.2 now.
If I cold Boot the machine from CD . The video card is detected and the AGP bridge as well. It starts up with Xfree86 server but as soon as the X11 interface starts and KDE starts up the monitor goes to a Orange LED indicating the monitor is in standby. The soundcard works and KDE is running as far as I can tell but there is no video on screen. If I use Ctrl Alt F1 I get back to the console ok with video on screen and shutdown from there..

Ok now one easy way around this is to boot windows first and then reboot knoppix from CD without powering down. Sounds odd doesnt it? True enough if I boot windows first and then Knoppix from CD the plug and play detects the same hardware but the video works with KDE this time.

Also if I do a HD install of knoppix there is no problem doing a cold boot into knoppix.
This problem only happens with the last few Knoppix distros when cold booting off CD.
If I use a cheatcode of Xserver=xf86_svga then I get KDE up and going ok but there are a few errors before I get KDE up and stable. Its cleaner to boot windows first frankly.

The fact that I get a different reaction if I boot windows prior to booting knoppix seems to sugest that there is something missing in a plug and play driver.

The video card is a AGP Nvidia Riva TNT2 Model 64 hardware version 21. It boots up in knoppix allways as NV6 Xfree86 and the AGP bridge is allways detected. Ive tried a few different cheatcodes including NOAGP but the only one that has any bearing is the xserver=xf86_svga. The machine is a Athlon 1500Mhz desktop with 256Megs of ram.

Maybee this means something to somone and will help sort out other issues in the same area.