[SOLVED] unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

[Gyumaou]

I tried installing the 7.10 x64 version of Kubuntu (DVD text install) on my Acer Aspire 5720ZG (Pentium Dual Core T2310 1.46 GHz, 1GB DDR II SDRAM, GeForce 8400M GS TurboCache, 120GB SATA) and things went well during the installation. But when I select Kubuntu from the GRUB boot menu the screen goes blank and stays that way no matter how long I wait. The notebook seems to be working for the first couple minutes, probably running the startup procedure normally. When I press the power button the notebook behaves as if it was shutting down normally, and powers down as usual after a few seconds. The screen stays blank even during powering down.

Initially this nbook came with vista, and I installed Kubuntu as a second system onto a separate partition on the same drive.

Afterwards I tried booting up from a 7.10 x64 Live DVD and CD, but the same thing happened. The kubuntu progress bar appeared, and once it was complete the screen went blank. I also tried running a live cd for the 6.06 LTS x64 version, and the startup procedure hung after some steps (screen didn't go blank, and kubuntu shut down normally after pressing power button - stopping services, etc).

All cds and dvds of 7.10 had correct md5 sums and passed integrity checks. The 6.06 cd I got at a Linux conference at my school so it was all neat and pressed, no scratches.

I was able to run the 6.06 cd live on my desktop with no problems (Core 2 duo E6600, GF 7950gx2, 2gb ddr2 corsair extr. perf.). Haven't tried others yet.

Oh, I can normally work on vista.

That's about all the details I can give. Hope it's enough 8)

[Fintan]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

First off welcome (almost) to the party

I am not familiar with your machine but could you boot into recovery mode (second boot option in grub) and "tell" us what if any errors are being displayed.

You may have to take a pen and a piece of paper

[toad]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

Fintan, you got there first

I was also wondering about intel dual processors and 64 bit? Is that right? I must have missed something while they have been developing processors!

[dibl]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

This may or may not be relevant to the problem:

http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3085112.0

@toad, YES, I ran Dapper and Edgy 32-bit installations for 6 months on my hardware until I figured out that Intel's EM64T = AMD64.

[Gyumaou]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

hmm... my bad there. got used to the core 2 duo in my desktop and confused T2310 for an x64 cpu
I'll post back after downloading the x86 version. Thanks for bringing this up toad

Fintan: no errors visible aside the AppArmor failure right before the console was brought up (might have missed something in the initial torrent of system messages).

dibl: wikipedia states T2310 (which I have) as x86, so toad was right
still, I'll try what's written in that topic right before obliterating the x64 version.

[dibl]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

Hmmm. I would have expected the installer to puke if the target hardware was not 64-bit. Oh well -- every day is a learning experience, huh?

[toad]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

I've got a K6 hanging around somewhere - the 64 bit version might work on that, too

[dibl]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

Hey, wait Gyumaou -- I think the wiki was wrong! I just Googled your chip and found the Intel description, and it says "EM64T" -- that means it IS 64-bit!

http://processorfinder.intel.com/Det...px?sSpec=SLAEC

So, you didn't necessarily install the wrong architecture, maybe it's just a video or power management issue.

[toad]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

Told you I had missed something...

And nothing on Fintan's suggestions? Odd. Try a normal boot but delete the "quiet" and "splash" bits from the boot option line.

If you don't know how to do it feel free to ask...

[Gyumaou]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

so it really is 64-bit that's good too know

anyway, I managed to try the x86 live cd and couldn't get it to start in either normal or safe graphics mode.

I removed the quiet bit (didn't find splash there) and booted. for a brief second I saw something about allocating memory to some addresses (bottom of the screen) then something about failing to allocate this mem (top of the screen) and back to black screen and unresponsive behavior.

I also tried switching to CLI as specified in here, but the CLI didn't appear (or at least I couldn't see if anything appeared due to the completely black screen). Can the method from that topic be used while in recovery mode?

Oh, and sorry for the late reply, but I got too absorbed in Portal

[Fintan]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

when you boot into recovery mode you will have a root cli. so you run commands from there.
But first try doing:

startx

at the prompt.

This should give you the gui (kde desktop) in root. If it doesn't you deffinately have a x-server problem.

If that is the case dible is the guy you want to talk to. He is the man for 64-bit and nvidea systems.

He also like a good bootle of wine so he is civilised

[Gyumaou]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

startx helped. KDE is now up and running.

I'll try the method from dibl's topic once I get back from school since I'm running a bit late now.

A big thank you for the help up to now

[Fintan]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

No problem and glad to be of some help.

Lets see if we can get the rest sorted.

[Smurphy]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

Having a similar issue with Ubuntu like systems, since Kubuntu 6.06 up to 8.04.
What I have to do - is to remove all quiet and splash statements in the boot line.
As ubuntu systems use grub - you can even do this befire booting, but applying this inside /boot/grub/menu.lst makes it permanent.

As I have a Multicard-Reader in there - I also have to imperatively add: irqpoll
to the boot-command line.

[Gyumaou]

Re: unable to start Kubuntu 7.10

I already tried removing quiet (no splashes). Did nothing.

Fintan: I fell victim to the Adept update problem (here and here) and am unable to install dkms needed to run Envy

Do you know of any way to get around it without having to reinstall (got an allergy to reinstalls after windows...)?

EDIT: got dkms from its homepage. Envy started. Error during installation of the driver: i couldn't copy it (no right click menu in envy terminal and ctrl+c didn't work)

EDIT2: I give up for now... I'll post back once I try all this on a freshly installed Kubuntu.