Starting the X server on Linux

[oz]

I've used the reliable startx command for about the last 5 years due to various problems that display managers seem to present at times, and have been happy with that method.

How do you all start the xserver on your own Linux systems?

[reed9]

I gave up on display managers a few months ago. startx for me too.

[oz]

I gave up on display managers a few months ago. startx for me too.

I don't know if it happens with all distributions, but the one thing that I've noticed breaks most often after various updates on Arch is the display manager, and it doesn't seem to matter if it's KDM, GDM, or others. Going with a simple startx seems to sidestep all these issues, or at least it has for me, so far.

[reed9]

Hmm, I never had trouble with the display managers. I just don't need one. I don't use GNOME or KDE, pulling in all the GNOME crap for GDM seems silly, SLIM is alright but it just looks to ~/.xinitrc anyway, so why not just use startx?

I actually just had my first major breakage on Arch with my desktop and nvidia card. (nVidia Corporation G73 [GeForce 7600 GS] [10de:0392])

With the some recent upgrades, I appear to have been struck by this bug. Except downgrading to an older libdrm hasn't worked for me. Nor has downgrading to xorg-server 1.7.4, nor a number of other downgrades.

And both the nv driver and nvidia drivers freeze X with this error

[mi] EQ overflowing. The server is probably stuck in an infinite loop.

The nvidia drivers also give me massive graphics corruption.

So at the moment my desktop is console only. Which I suppose also precludes a display manager.

[rokytnji]

xwin in Puppy Linux.
startx in other Linux Distros for me.

Edit: After reading Hazels responce. I figured I should also elaborate a bit on my answer above.
I also use Slim instead of GDM or KDM. But when I tweak something to the point of beaking something. Those 2 above commands are what I use when I can't get into graphical login.

Slim is very reliable though.

[elija]

Mostly gdm so I voted display managers. I do use startx on some boxes though

[jayd512]

I use gdm for Fedora, but if I happen to have CRUX running it's startx.

[daark.child]

I use display managers to start the X server. I've not had too many problems with them, so have not bothered with the startx method. Ocassionally I will use xinit to start a new X session whilst running another one. This is usually so that I can ssh into another machine and run graphical apps without running them on my main desktop.

[hazel]

I'm puzzled. I've never had any problem with display managers. I currently use slim with both Crux and Debian because it's fast. Logging in at a text console and then starting a gui seems to me a roundabout way of doing things.

[kurtdriver]

Lynx, Alpine, and Jed all work well, who needs X?