multiple distros won't run on my laptop

[hannafram]

hi all - am trying to run a dual boot on laptop w/ W XP Pro but have failed miserably to this point...

Have a Dell Inspiron 1526, AMD 64 cpu, 2 Gigs ram w/ XP Pro....i've tried Mint 12 and Ububuntu 10 via Windows Installer with basically the same result: i get stuck at the splash screen. several times i got to the desktop (once even i saw the taskbar!) and then get stuck at that point. i can see and move my mouse pointer but there is nothing to click on...any suggestions would be greatly appreciate!

thanks!
hanna

ps: btw, i installed Mint from the cd and Ubuntu via the Windows Installer.....

[jayd512]

I can't comment on the Windows installer, as I've not used it.
But for the CD, does it boot to a LiveCD environment? On any computer?
Did you check the md5sum?
Did any error appear on screen?

[hannafram]

I can't comment on the Windows installer, as I've not used it.
But for the CD, does it boot to a LiveCD environment? On any computer?
Did you check the md5sum?
Did any error appear on screen?

good thought - yes, the Mint LiveCD does appear to function normally in another computer. therefore, the problem is in my laptop, no? for what it's worth, the laptop once ran Vista but was reformatted with XP Pro reinstalled. any idea what the issue might be in the laptop that would make Mint go no further than the splash screen?

[jayd512]

Do you have any other usable LiveCDs? Try one on this computer.
Let's rule out an issue with the optical drive.

[hannafram]

Do you have any other usable LiveCDs? Try one on this computer.
Let's rule out an issue with the optical drive.

i think i can rule out the optical drive as the source of the problem because when i first loaded Mint, it appeared to installed itself (and Grub) via the LiveCD, so that on subsequent start-ups, i was presented with the dual boot options - without the cd.

and when i decided to try Ubuntu, i had to uninstall Mint via Windows Add/Remove Programs....and when i installed Ubuntu, it was via the Wubi Windows installer, which downloads Ubuntu straight off the internet. however, once Ubuntu was installed, it demonstrated essentially the same problem as Mint. this would rule out the optical drive, no?

thanks for your help with this, btw.

[jonyo]

what windows installer are we talkin here?

you could run linux in vmware

[hannafram]

what windows installer are we talkin here?

you could run linux in vmware

the windows installer is Wubi. but i'm starting to think that the problem is ATI - doesn't seem to work well with Linux. not sure what my options are to fix this...

[jayd512]

ATI has been known to cause issues in the past, but that's become far less frequent these days.
I'd love to have some more detailed information on your hardware, though.
Could you download and burn a copy of Parted Magic?
Strictly speaking, it's a partitioning and rescue tool. But runs as a LiveCD, has outstanding hardware detection and uses generic drivers for most things.

If you can get that to boot up, use these commands in a terminal window and post back the results:

lspci -knn

lsmod

It should help give a better idea of what's going on.

[hannafram]

ATI has been known to cause issues in the past, but that's become far less frequent these days.
I'd love to have some more detailed information on your hardware, though.
Could you download and burn a copy of Parted Magic?
Strictly speaking, it's a partitioning and rescue tool. But runs as a LiveCD, has outstanding hardware detection and uses generic drivers for most things.

If you can get that to boot up, use these commands in a terminal window and post back the results:

lspci -knn

lsmod

It should help give a better idea of what's going on.

ok, here you go:
{\rtf1\ansi\deff0\deftab720{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcha rset1 !DejaVu Sans Mono;}}{\colortbl\red0\green0\blue0;\red255\green2 55\blue255;}
\f0\fs18\cf0 WWelcome - Parted Magic (Linux 3.1.6-pmagic)\par
\par

root@PartedMagic:~# lspci -knn
00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 Host Bridge [1002:7910]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel modules: ati-agp\par
00:01.0 PCI bridge [0604]: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 PCI to PCI Bridge (Internal gfx) [1002:7912]\par
        Kernel modules: shpchp\par
00:05.0 PCI bridge [0604]: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 PCI to PCI Bridge (PCI Express Port 1) [1002:7915]\par
        Kernel driver in use: pcieport\par
        Kernel modules: shpchp\par
00:06.0 PCI bridge [0604]: ATI Technologies Inc RS690 PCI to PCI Bridge (PCI Express Port 2) [1002:7916]\par
        Kernel driver in use: pcieport\par
        Kernel modules: shpchp\par
00:12.0 SATA controller [0106]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 Non-Raid-5 SATA [1002:4380]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ahci\par
        Kernel modules: ahci\par
00:13.0 USB Controller [0c03]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI0) [1002:4387]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ohci_hcd\par
        Kernel modules: ohci-hcd\par
00:13.1 USB Controller [0c03]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI1) [1002:4388]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ohci_hcd\par
        Kernel modules: ohci-hcd\par
00:13.2 USB Controller [0c03]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI2) [1002:4389]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ohci_hcd\par
        Kernel modules: ohci-hcd\par
00:13.3 USB Controller [0c03]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI3) [1002:438a]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ohci_hcd\par
        Kernel modules: ohci-hcd\par
00:13.4 USB Controller [0c03]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB (OHCI4) [1002:438b]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ohci_hcd\par
        Kernel modules: ohci-hcd\par
00:13.5 USB Controller [0c03]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 USB Controller (EHCI) [1002:4386]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: ehci_hcd\par
        Kernel modules: ehci-hcd\par
00:14.0 SMBus [0c05]: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 SMBus Controller [1002:4385] (rev 14)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: piix4_smbus\par
        Kernel modules: i2c-piix4, sp5100_tco\par
00:14.1 IDE interface [0101]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 IDE [1002:438c]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: pata_atiixp\par
        Kernel modules: pata_atiixp\par
00:14.2 Audio device [0403]: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 Azalia (Intel HDA) [1002:4383]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: snd_hda_intel\par
        Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel\par
00:14.3 ISA bridge [0601]: ATI Technologies Inc SB600 PCI to LPC Bridge [1002:438d]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
00:14.4 PCI bridge [0604]: ATI Technologies Inc SBx00 PCI to PCI Bridge [1002:4384]\par
00:18.0 Host bridge [0600]: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] HyperTransport Technology Configuration [1022:1100]\par
00:18.1 Host bridge [0600]: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Address Map [1022:1101]\par
00:18.2 Host bridge [0600]: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] DRAM Controller [1022:1102]\par
00:18.3 Host bridge [0600]: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] K8 [Athlon64/Opteron] Miscellaneous Control [1022:1103]\par
        Kernel driver in use: k8temp\par
        Kernel modules: k8temp\par
01:05.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: ATI Technologies Inc RS690M [Radeon X1200 Series] [1002:791f]\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: radeon\par
        Kernel modules: radeon\par
01:05.2 Audio device [0403]: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon X1200 Series Audio Controller [1002:7919]\par
        Subsystem: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon X1200 Series Audio Controller [1002:7919]\par
        Kernel driver in use: snd_hda_intel\par
        Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel\par
03:07.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL-8139/8139C/8139C+ [10ec:8139] (rev 10)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: 8139too\par
        Kernel modules: 8139cp, 8139too\par
03:09.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394) [0c00]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller [1180:0832] (rev 05)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: firewire_ohci\par
        Kernel modules: firewire-ohci\par
03:09.1 SD Host controller [0805]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C822 SD/SDIO/MMC/MS/MSPro Host Adapter [1180:0822] (rev 22)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: sdhci-pci\par
        Kernel modules: sdhci-pci\par
03:09.2 System peripheral [0880]: Ricoh Co Ltd R5C592 Memory Stick Bus Host Adapter [1180:0592] (rev 12)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: r592\par
        Kernel modules: r592\par
03:09.3 System peripheral [0880]: Ricoh Co Ltd xD-Picture Card Controller [1180:0852] (rev 12)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Device [1028:0230]\par
        Kernel driver in use: r852\par
        Kernel modules: r852\par
0b:00.0 Network controller [0280]: Broadcom Corporation BCM4312 802.11b/g LP-PHY [14e4:4315] (rev 01)\par
        Subsystem: Dell Wireless 1395 WLAN Mini-Card [1028:000b]\par
        Kernel driver in use: b43-pci-bridge\par
        Kernel modules: ssb\par
root@PartedMagic:~# 2A2B2B\par
sh: 2A2B2B: command not found\par

root@PartedMagic:~# lsmod\par
Module                  Size  Used by\par
ipv6                  183308  18 \par
snd_seq_dummy            916  0 \par
snd_seq_oss            20799  0 \par
snd_seq_midi_event      3455  1 snd_seq_oss\par
snd_seq                33483  5 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq_midi_event\par
snd_seq_device          3457  3 snd_seq_dummy,snd_seq_oss,snd_seq\par
snd_pcm_oss            26025  0 \par
snd_mixer_oss           9297  1 snd_pcm_oss\par
bluetooth              57599  2 \par
nfsd                  177403  0 \par
exportfs                2507  1 nfsd\par
dm_mod                 47070  0 \par
fuse                   45792  1 \par
cpufreq_ondemand        3560  1 \par
speedstep_lib           2412  0 \par
powernow_k8            10024  1 \par
freq_table              1722  2 cpufreq_ondemand,powernow_k8\par
mperf                    871  1 powernow_k8\par
isofs                  23836  0 \par
b43                   262857  0 \par
mac80211              154305  1 b43\par
radeon                572333  2 \par
cfg80211              106053  2 b43,mac80211\par
r852                    7145  0 \par
sm_common               6277  1 r852\par
dell_laptop             5908  0 \par
ttm                    36913  1 radeon\par
bcma                   11113  1 b43\par
nand                   34258  2 r852,sm_common\par
sg                     16200  0 \par
rfkill                  9446  3 bluetooth,cfg80211,dell_laptop\par
ohci_hcd               15688  0 \par
drm_kms_helper         17569  1 radeon\par
firewire_ohci          19744  0 \par
8139too                13136  0 \par
drm                   125332  4 radeon,ttm,drm_kms_helper\par
nand_ids                4085  1 nand\par
sdhci_pci               5708  0 \par
ssb                    32659  2 b43,ohci_hcd\par
snd_hda_codec_hdmi     16990  1 \par
r592                    6988  0 \par
mac_hid                 2100  0 \par
processor              20025  1 powernow_k8\par
video                   8842  0 \par
thermal                 5640  0 \par
battery                 7696  0 \par
ac                      2184  0 \par
ata_generic             2088  0 \par
joydev                  6376  0 \par
i2c_algo_bit            3382  1 radeon\par
sdhci                  15396  1 sdhci_pci\par
sp5100_tco              3084  0 \par
thermal_sys             9188  3 processor,video,thermal\par
dell_wmi                1032  0 \par
dcdbas                  3179  1 dell_laptop\par
firewire_core          32747  1 firewire_ohci\par
mii                     2888  1 8139too\par
nand_ecc                2984  1 nand\par
rtc_cmos                5652  0 \par
sparse_keymap           1945  1 dell_wmi\par
button                  3154  0 \par
ahci                   16308  0 \par
snd_hda_codec_idt      36068  1 \par
memstick                4143  1 r592\par
mmc_core               49935  3 b43,ssb,sdhci\par
wmi                     5851  1 dell_wmi\par
ati_agp                 3596  0 \par
pata_acpi               1804  0 \par
mtd                    18570  2 sm_common,nand\par
psmouse                37911  0 \par
evdev                   5932  14 \par
snd_hda_intel          15364  1 \par
agpgart                18272  3 ttm,drm,ati_agp\par
libahci                12422  1 ahci\par
snd_hda_codec          48886  3 snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_codec_idt,snd_hda_intel\par
i2c_piix4               6504  0 \par
k8temp                  2320  0 \par
serio_raw               2620  0 \par
snd_hwdep               3566  1 snd_hda_codec\par
pata_atiixp             2364  0 \par
snd_pcm                43526  4 snd_pcm_oss,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec\par
hwmon                   1030  3 radeon,thermal_sys,k8temp\par
snd_timer              11766  2 snd_seq,snd_pcm\par
snd                    33383  14 snd_seq_oss,snd_seq,snd_seq_device,snd_pcm_oss,snd_mixer_oss,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_codec_idt,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,snd_hwdep,snd_pcm,snd_timer\par
ehci_hcd               27236  0 \par
soundcore               3392  1 snd\par
pcmcia                 23641  2 b43,ssb\par
shpchp                 17119  0 \par
pcmcia_core             7670  1 pcmcia\par
snd_page_alloc          4909  2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm

thanks again!

[jayd512]

Okay, that served 2 purposes.
First, you confirmed that the optical drive works!
And second, your hardware is fairly standard... nothing exotic that should be causing issues.

That points my suspicions back to the CD itself. I'd advise downloading it once more. Straight from the source, if you didn't get it there before: Download - Linux Mint
Check the md5sum again, and burn at the slowest possible speed.