absolute linux no desktop at start up

[freesray]

I am totally new to this. I installed Absolute Linux 12.2.0 on a Dell Optiplex Gx150 pent III. Just a little under a gig hard drive. It goes through the boot sequence, and then the screen is black with a mouse pointer, then flashes weird color horizontal lines, and that's it. It does nothing when I hit ctrl alt F1 etc. I have searched and searched for a solution...but I don't know enough about it yet to know what to do. Any ideas?

[yancek]

If your Absolute Linux is also a Live Cd, load it in the drive, open a terminal/konsole window and enter these commands as root:

grep -i driver /etc/X11/xorg.conf
lspci | grep -i vga

Looks like a video card/driver problem and this should give some useful information.
1 GB hardrive? how much RAM? Run this command: dmesg | grep -i memory

Post that info here.

[freesray]

Thanks for the eply. The cd for absolue is not live, so I downloaded Slax 6, which is, removed Absolute and installed this version. I'm sorry, it has a 20 gb hd. When I enter the commands you gave me I get no such file or directory.

[yancek]

Are you running them as root: Enter "su" or "su -" without quotes before entering commands. Also, the X11 must be an upper case "X", and the xorg must be a lower case "x".

[Dapper Dan]

It might have been a different issue entirely but I tried Absolute on two different machines... two different versions over the last year and got black screens both times. I tried every way I knew to fix it, changing the driver in xorg.conf and refresh rates... all to no avail. In my experience, regular Slackware is an easier install and has consistently at least given me a terminal to work from. Nothing I did would coax Absolute to give me a terminal. I had to do all adjustments from a live CD and still no joy. A pity too because I love Slackware and IceWM and really wanted to be impressed with Absolute. Might have just been my machines...

[freesray]

Thanks for being patient with me as I am learning this.
At prompt: root@slax:~#
I entered su grep -i driver /etc/X11/xorg.config
It returns with Uknown id: grep

[yancek]

If you are already at the root prompt: root@slax:~# ,you do not need to enter su, just type the commands.

[freesray]

Is this what you are looking for?
root@slax:~# lspci -i driver
00:00.0 Class 0600: Unknown device 8086:1130 (rev 04)
00:02.0 Class 0300: Unknown device 8086:1132 (rev 04)
00:1e.0 Class 0604: Unknown device 8086:244e (rev 11)
00:1f.0 Class 0601: Unknown device 8086:2440 (rev 11)
00:1f.1 Class 0101: Unknown device 8086:244b (rev 11)
00:1f.2 Class 0c03: Unknown device 8086:2442 (rev 11)
00:1f.3 Class 0c05: Unknown device 8086:2443 (rev 11)
00:1f.4 Class 0c03: Unknown device 8086:2444 (rev 11)
00:1f.5 Class 0401: Unknown device 8086:2445 (rev 11)
01:08.0 Class 0780: Unknown device 14f1:1033 (rev 0
01:0c.0 Class 0200: Unknown device 10b7:9200 (rev 7

Thanks for helping me out on Christmas Day!

[yancek]

Is this what you are looking for?
root@slax:~# lspci -i driver

NO.

At the root prompt do: lspci | grep -i vga
(When I do it, I get the output below, I have an nvidia graphics card)
0000:01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV11 [GeForce2 MX/MX400] (rev a1)

At the root prompt do: grep -i driver /etc/X11/xorg.conf
According to your last post you had .../xorg.config, not correct, should be ...xorg.conf

Just for clarification, you removed Absolute Linux and installed Slax 6 to your hardrive and still have the same problem?

[freesray]

root@slax:~# lspci | grep -i vga
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 82815 Chipset Graphics Controller (C GC) (rev 04)
root@slax:~# grep -i driver /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Driver "kbd"
Driver "mouse"
Driver "intel"

I removed Absolute and installled Sax 6 to hardrive