Video trouble (ati)

[nkoozer]

[...]
That is the X server running you just have no screens defined can you post the /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 that you are using. You may also want to try (before you do this but save a copy of the original XF86Config-4 file first) at a console login without the X server running use CTRL and ATL and BKSP keys all at the same time to kill it off once booted to the black screen then login as normal user and type su then enter and the root password to become root and dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86 to reconfigure the X server or cd /root to change to the root directory and then X -configure and use the command it tells you to to test the new screen you will see the same greyish black plus X cursor if it works properly use the command mentioned above to kill off the X server and copy the file to the XF86Config-4 and then use /etc/init.d/kdm restart to test and hopefully to get a new KDE login screen from either of these methods. BTW you do not have to reset your computer you should be able to use the CTRL and ALT and F[1-6] keys to get to a console login and login as normal user and su to root and use either shutdown -r now to reboot or substitute -h in the command to shutdown the system immediately.

I'll try the reconfigure, but in the mean time here's the bottom of my version of the XF86Config-4 file. The layout section at the top refers to screen 0. This was extracted from my Slackware system which runs from another partion on this same mahine.

# ************************************************** ********************
# Monitor section
# ************************************************** ********************

Section "Monitor"

Identifier "Micron"
HorizSync 30-95
VertRefresh 50-120

Modeline "1280x1024" 135.00 1280 1296 1440 1688 1024 1025 1028 1066 +hsync +vsync
Modeline "1024x768" 94.50 1024 1072 1168 1376 768 769 772 808 +hsync +vsync
Modeline "800x600" 56.30 800 832 896 1048 600 601 604 631 +hsync +vsync

EndSection


# ************************************************** ********************
# Graphics device section
# ************************************************** ********************

Section "Device"
Identifier "Video Card"
Driver "ati"
EndSection

# ************************************************** ********************
# Screen sections
# ************************************************** ********************

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen 0"
Device "Video Card"
Monitor "Micron"
DefaultDepth 16

Subsection "Display"
Depth 8
Modes "1280x1024" "800x600" "1024x768"
ViewPort 0 0
EndSubsection
Subsection "Display"
Depth 16
Modes "1280x1024" "1024x768" "800x600"
ViewPort 0 0
Virtual 1664 1260
EndSubsection
Subsection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024" "800x600" "1024x768"
ViewPort 0 0
EndSubsection
EndSection

Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection
-------------------------------------------------------

The black screen & hang also occurs if I do nothing but replace the "vesa" with "ati" in the driver line in the original file. When I'm in the black screen, ctrl-alt-bksp has no effect. Niether does ctrl-alt-del or anything else, and the mouse doesn't move the "X". When I reboot after the hang, the X log file is very short (about one screen or less), but I don't have an example right now.

When there are no screens defined, the sever complains & returns without hanging.

Back before programmable monitors were invented, I used to create my own modelines in order to center the display, so I'm familiar with things like keystrokes and the normal way things work, although I don't know debian-specific things.

This particular machine runs Slackware and WinXP in other partions, and both work fine.

I think the next thing I'll try first is to put this hard drive in another machine to see if it's just some obscure hardware thing that somehow excapes when other systems are running. I'm leaving on a trip, so I'll be out of touch till the end of the week.