I helped someone a few days ago with the 'blank screen, blinking cursor in two left corner' problem. In his case it was due to the nouveau kernel module being loaded by the Sabayon Linux kernel (2.6.37 installed from SL 5.5 LiveDVD), thus stopping the nvidia closed-source kernel module from loading. See my post
Re: Nvidia-Driver 270.41.06 - A little revolution? for the details. To stop this, one could either a) rebuild the kernel to disable the nouveau module, or b) blacklist the nouveau module, which is what I told him to do. That solved the problem.
The culprit was CONFIG_DRM_NOUVEAU=m in the 2.6.37 kernel config:
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$ cat /usr/src/linux/.config | grep NOUV
CONFIG_DRM_NOUVEAU=m
CONFIG_DRM_NOUVEAU_BACKLIGHT=y
$
If you can get to a VT (press Ctrl-Alt-F1) and log in as root, you can check which module is loaded by using the command
lsmod.
As for you ATI GPU guys with the problem of a blank screen with blinking cursor, I wonder if something similar is happening. I notice in the 2.6.37 kernel config for the SL 5.5 LiveDVD that CONFIG_DRM_RADEON=m:
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$ cat /usr/src/linux/.config | grep RADEON
CONFIG_DRM_RADEON=m
# CONFIG_DRM_RADEON_KMS is not set
# CONFIG_FB_RADEON is not set
$
So perhaps if you blacklist that radeon module you could get the closed-source fglrx module to load (assuming your ATI GPU is supported by the fglrx module, that is). If you can get to a VT (press Ctrl-Alt-F1) and log in as root, you can check which module is loaded by using the command
lsmod.
N.B. What I've written above is for an installation to the HDD. If you are getting the problem with the LiveDVD then, from a VT, use
rmmod <undesired module> to unload the open-source module,
modprobe <desired module> to load the closed-source module, then
eselect opengl set nvidia|ati to make sure you're pointing to the correct OpenGL libraries, then
/etc/init.d/xdm restart to start X Windows. Don't know if this would work, but give it a try. Only the KDE and GNOME 5.5 LiveDVDs have the closed-source drivers if I recall correctly, so you would not be able to do this with the Xfce, E17 and CoreCDX LiveCDs.
