Debian Blank screen

[Jev0704]

Hi jledhead,

It sounds like you know what my pb is !

I have installed for the first time linux Debian 4.0 on my machine. The installation went well but when I boot linux I get a blank screen (shut down)...

So as you advised I hit ctrl-alt-F1 and ... (suspense) ... yes I get the login prompt!

I am now logged as root but I don't really see what I can do to solve my display issue. I'm used to work with unix/linux as a user but I'm not familar with such installation/system issue.

Can you please give me some pointers to move forward?

Regards,
Jev

[jledhead]

Hi jledhead,

It sounds like you know what my pb is !

I have installed for the first time linux Debian 4.0 on my machine. The installation went well but when I boot linux I get a blank screen (shut down)...

So as you advised I hit ctrl-alt-F1 and ... (suspense) ... yes I get the login prompt!

I am now logged as root but I don't really see what I can do to solve my display issue. I'm used to work with unix/linux as a user but I'm not familar with such installation/system issue.

Can you please give me some pointers to move forward?

Regards,
Jev

I hate to fork the thread but here goes

when you get the prompt login with root and the password you setup during install. To reconfigure X in debian you need to do the following:
#dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

It should walk you thru a couple steps to reconfigure you video. Some things you can try and change when going thru the steps are to use a vesa video driver instead of ati/nvidia. Also when you get to your monitor, you can lower the values that your monitor can use, like go no higher then 1024x768 (just for testing)

after you have finished configuring do ctrl-alt-F7 and then ctrl-alt-BACKSPACE

that should switch to the graphical session and then restart X

If that doesn't work you can play with the settings again, or check the log files for specific errors. report back with more problems.

[devils casper]

I hate to fork the thread but here goes

I agree. I dont like Thread hijacking either. Posts moved and started new thread.

[Jev0704]

Thanks jledhead and sorry for the fork. I believed the topics were the same.

Ok, so I was looking in the right direction. Thanks to "dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg" I managed to tune the xserver and get the gnome login screen.

Now, something I do not understand is that my graphic card is not detected by "dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg". I have a GeForce FX 5200 (pretty old card).

When doing an lspci, it is detected @03:00.0, and when looking in /var/log/Xorg.0.log, i can see it is properly identified:

(II) Primary Device is: PCI 03:00:0
(--) Chipset GeForce FX 5200 found

... bottom line is that my card is finally detected but there might be something wrong with the auto detect of "dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg".


Now, the next step for me is to set the screen refresh rate. I want 1280x1024@75Hz (which, by the way, is detected as a supported rate based on xorg logs) but i'm stuck at 60Hz . xrandr:

SZ: Pixels Physical Refresh
*0 1280 x 1024 ( 339mm x 271mm ) *60
1 1024 x 768 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75 70 60
2 800 x 600 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75 72 60
3 640 x 480 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75 73 60
4 1280 x 960 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
5 1280 x 800 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
6 1152 x 864 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75
7 1280 x 768 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
8 960 x 600 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
9 832 x 624 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75
10 840 x 525 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
11 700 x 525 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 70 60
12 640 x 512 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
13 720 x 450 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
14 640 x 400 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
15 576 x 432 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75
16 640 x 384 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 60
17 512 x 384 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75 70 60
18 416 x 312 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75
19 400 x 300 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75 72 60
20 320 x 240 ( 339mm x 271mm ) 75 73

Do you have any idea?

Thanks again for your time.

Regards,
Jev

[devils casper]

If 1280x1024 is working fine @60Hz then you should not force it to 75Hz. Is there any particular reason for 75Hz? Why do you want to set that?

[Jev0704]

devils_casper, my screen is a CRT. At 60Hz, my eyes are crying.

[devils casper]

Ok. Check Manual of your Monitor for supported range of HorizSync and VertRefresh Rates. Set correct values in Section Monitor of /etc/X11/xorg.conf file.

su
nano /etc/X11/xorg.conf

In case it doesn't work, execute this

grep "Driver" /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Post output here.