Cannot boot to updated kernel - FC14

[vhradice]

I am unable to boot with kernel 2.6.35.13-92.fc14.x86_64 which was installed while applying software updates. It hangs with the last message issued "Registering binary handler for Windows Applications". Searching led to it being related to a problem with the nvidia drivers. I followed the directions in several posts - delete /etc/X11/xorg.conf, reboot, run nvidia-xconfig, reboot and all is fine, but not in my case. The first reboot works but the screen is wrong. There is a 1 inch wide black border around the presentation window. If I then do the nvidia-xconfig and reboot, i am back to where I was before - boot hangs after issuing "Registering...". If I boot to the last good kernel, everything works fine. This happened to me once before and I was able to fix it by rebuilding the nvidia kernel (I think that was what I had to do), but I can't find out how to do that. I have akmod and kmod installed which are supposed to take care of this problem. I booted to kernel 13-92 recovery mode, deleted the xorg.conf file and ran nvidia-xconfig from there. Still fails. I don't know what to list here, but I will do my best to supply whatever is necessary.

Thanks in advance.

[atreyu]

Yeah, it sounds like you need to use Nvidia's binary driver installer. Note that doing that will break you currently working kernel's graphics, so going that route can be dicey.

See this link which explains the ways you can install the Nvidia drivers in Fedora, including how to use 3rd party repos to install it.

See this link for pretty good instructions for installing the binary Nvidia driver.

[vhradice]

Thanks for the response. The problem is I have the most recent nvidia drivers installed but I cannot boot the updated kernel. I use grub as a bootloader. There are 6 choices. These are the 3 most recent kernel in normal mode and the same 3 in Recovery mode. The three versions are
2.6.35.11-83
2.6.35.12-90
2.6.35.13-92

If I boot 2.6.35.13-92 in normal mode, it fails.
If I boot 2.6.35.12-90 in normal mode, it works.

It looks like I need to make some sort of nvidia file for 2.6.35.13-92 but I cannot find out how.

[atreyu]

Hmmm...I see no updated nvidia drivers in F14's updates repo. Again, I think you might have to install the binary driver from Nvidia's website.

You'd need the kernel headers for that version of the kernel:

yum install kernel-devel

Then download the nvidia installer. It will be something like NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-280.13.run. Then once you've downloaded it, you run it (as root) like:

sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-280.13.run

in runlevel 3, of course.

If it doesn't find your kernel headers, you may have to point it in the right directory.

If all this doesn't work, you can always put back your original drivers via yum.

[vhradice]

I had to boot to runlevel 3 and then run the install. That was the missing piece - runlevel 3. Not being a Linux expert, I tried to install without that step assuming it didn't matter.

Thank you for the help.