Confused Neophyte - Help!!! {2nd display and 3d booting}

[SaturnsChoice]

I am brand new to Sabayon, and Linux in general... I just purchased a new PC (asus M2N-MX, AMD 64x2 6000+. 4g 800mhz DDR2 RAM, Geforce 8600gts), it has Vista installed.... which is HORRIBLE! I purchased a few live CDs and decided to install the latest Sabayon.

Everything seemed to install properly, but when I attempt to boot Sabayon it get's about 3/4 of the way and the screen turns black with nothing but an underscore. At that point, all I can do is press the reset button...

I hope someone can help me break free from the man!

Thanks in advance.

-Grant

[WarraWarra]

Hi there and welcome here.

You can try some of the cheat codes in the readme file on the iso / live dvd and a text editor to read from this file. Notepad or similar.

Sounds like it needs a driver or a cheat code to bypass this. Boot time currently is about max 2 mins so if going past this and still nothing then try the cheat codes. You could even remove the pci cards and then try to boot likely one of them wants a specific driver but this way you know what is causing it and can easily find the correct fix for it.

Then at boot menu of the live dvd use up down arrows and press F5 to show text at the bottom.
Then add say "xdriver=nvidia res=1680x1050 dodmraid noacpi " or similar. Some pc's / parts needs extra stuff to boot from. ALso check the wiki top right of this page for help and the search or at gentoo.org forums / wiki you should be able to get info for the specific motherboard as well.

Someone with similar parts will post here soon just hang in there and try some of this.

Hope this helps

Edit:
It could be the build in nvidia 6100 video card needs to be deativated in the bios ?
or just boot with the inbuild video card and later once ready add the 8600gts not sure here.
http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=101&l3=345&l4=0&model=1647&modelmenu=2

[SaturnsChoice]

I've tried doing the acpi=no doapm command that I saw on another thread. I can't get my installed version to get passed the first loading bar... it just goes to a black screen. If I run Sabayon from the LiveCD, I can get to the desktop acceleration page. Whatever choice I make at that point bricks the system.

Within VIsta I have no access to my second hard drive, so I am unable to uninstall my trial Vista and install a full version of XP. Is there any way for me to uninstall Sabayon, and/or gain access to both hard drives in Vista?

I'm typing this on FireFox, using the fluxbox version of Sabayon... the one that you get to during installation. Is there anything I can do in this program to get my installed version up and running?

Thank you for your time.

[SaturnsChoice]

I was finally able to get into the LiveCD Sabayon... I did "nodcc res 1024x768 refresh=60 opengl=nvidia." I was also able to do desktop acceleration. It will still take me a while to get used to everything and understand it all, but so far so good. I have a few more questions now...

How do I use cheat codes (or anything that will get it to boot!) for my actually installed Sabayon? I imagine an installed version runs smoother than one off of a cd...

How can I get my second display recognized? I'm using an old Samsung GXTV through the Geforce 8600s tv out-svideo-rca...

[WarraWarra]

Cheat codes can be added to /boot/grub/grub.conf as this has a similar bunch of text it runs thru to boot . I added to the default "xdriver=nvidia res=1440x900"


Or you can using the /etc/X11/xorg.conf edit it with the correct options how? using nvidia control panel on the desktop it should save the config file to /etc/X11/xorg.conf but does not so instead of saving it open it or save to desktop and open this file + copy and paste or replace the current one after renaming the current /etc/X11/xorg.conf . Then if needed you can get back to it and edit it.

Nvidia + acceleration / aiglx is a bit buggy now we are waiting for the fix so use "no glx" when asked.

See the "res=1024x768" not sure if it would work without the = sign.

Screens and otehr video related check out the wiki top right on this page or the 3d desktop part of the forums as posting this there you would get a better reply than mine , someone has likely already figured the 2nd display thingy out or trying the nvidia control panel should be able to get the 2nd screen working not sure.
viewforum.php?f=53

Actually I will move this to the 3d desktop section then it should be easier for the guy's to answer.