Can't get to live desktop

[ashley194]

Hi All,

Started using SL way back in 3.26 without any problems.

Starting from the last few releases, I haven't even been able to boot to a live desktop (including the latest 5.4 64bit)

The 'K' DVD has had md5 sum validated & has been burnt in k3b v2.0.1 with 'verify written data' selected successfully.

The hardware I've got is:

Gigabyte GA-MA785GM-US2H - AMD(R) DUAL CORE 6000+ @ 3.00GHz
nVidia Geforce GTX280 - 8GB DDR2 800MHz RAM

Anyone got any ideas why SL refuses to boot to a live desktop

Many thanks

[wolfden]

where does it stop booting at? Use the alt F2 for verbose mode

[ashley194]

Hi wolfden,

Here are the steps taken so far.

1. insert DVD & boot PC

2. Select the 1st choice in list of options

3. splash screen starts

Gets as far as configuring graphic mode, then displays black screen with flashing cursor at top left of screen. Leave it for about 5 minutes, just to see what happens.

When nothing happens, I boot back into my current OS (openSUSE 11.3 x86_64). SL was my very first Linux & as such has a very special place in my heart

I simply wondered why SL won't boot into a live desktop, will report back after trying the 'alt +F2'.

Thanks,

[wolfden]

Well there might be something going on here as viewtopic.php?f=50&t=21903 has no X either. I don't have time to test 5.4 at the moment but the daily is booting fine for me so I would assume 5.4 should be booting.

you can try xdriver=nv in the grub and see if it will boot?

[ashley194]

Hi,

Well I used 'xdriver=nv' in the boot options, alas to no avail

Funnily enough, it boots to the live desktop using Virtualbox.

Perhaps, my nVidia Geforce GTX280 is at fault, but works fine in Fedora, openSUSE, Debian, mandriva etc...

Thanks for the advice.

[Fitzcarraldo]

Have you tried the lowest common denominator video driver, namely the generic VESA driver (xdriver=vesa)? If that gets you to a desktop and you then install to your HDD, you can then boot the HDD and try installing the various NVIDIA dirvers from a console to see if you can get video to work with your NVIDIA GPU.

[ashley194]

Hi Fitzcarraldo,

No haven't tried 'xdriver=vesa' yet, will try that next weekend.

Find it hard to understand why some Linux distro's just work out-of-the-box, whereas some others take more work.

Suppose people just go with what works with their hardware.

Thanks for the advice

[ocinu]

I have the same problem. When booting in verbose mode there is an error loading cosolefont, but the process continues until one faces a gray screen with a blinking cursor

[Fitzcarraldo]

Find it hard to understand why some Linux distro's just work out-of-the-box, whereas some others take more work.

Dunno, ashley194. I suppose it depends on which kernel version a distro ships with, what functionality the developers have enabled or disabled in the kernel configuration, which versions of drivers they ship the distro with (in-kernel drivers or external modules), whether they have opted to use open-source or closed-source video drivers, which version of those drivers they have decided to use, which version of the X.Org Server they have decided to use, whether they have opted to use just ALSA or whether they have opted to use ALSA plus PulseAudio, and a whole host of other variables. When people say "Distro X works on my machine but Distro Y does not", it's because the distros are as similar as apples and oranges. I have been lucky: on the five or so PCs that I have installed SL on to date, all have worked. External factors can also come into play. For example the recent spate of problems with Internet access due to ipv6. Some older routers don't handle it properly, but you won't see a problem if a particular distro happens to use a kernel with ipv6 disabled.