Problem with screen after install

[dirtyz]

Hey all - first time......

I took an old laptop from work today and attempted to installed kubuntu today. I was able to get the laptop to run off of the live cd, and then "install"... No problems there!

Started up without the CD in, and had zero problems again. The screen looks great! I noticed in the corner of the window, there was a notice that there are updates that needed to be installed. I click on that, install the updates, and then reboot.

now that I have rebooted, My screen is very blurry, and only the top half of the screen is showing. It's almost if there is a mirror effect, as there 3 different set of icons. The problem is it's sooo blurry, I can't read anything.

Please help - I'm very much a newb.

My system -
IBM Thinkpad T-21
Pentium III
386 mb/ram.

[dirtyz]

Re: Problem with screen after install

I should add this...

I booted up using the live cd, went to the terminal, typed in lspci to look at what it was looking at for the vga.... it says the following

vga compatible controller: S3 Inc. 86c270- 294 Savage/IX-MV (rev 11)..


Just in case..

[dibl]

Re: Problem with screen after install

You're going to have to search on Ubuntu Forum for that S3 video chip for instruction on how to set xorg.conf -- I think there's an S3 (Unichrome ??) driver in the repos to set it up.

[integr8e]

Re: Problem with screen after install

This might help a little. If you can, please open Konsole and post the output of the following command:

cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf

[dirtyz]

Re: Problem with screen after install

Here are the relievant sections of that code:

Section "Device"
Identifier "generic video card"
Driver "vers"
bus id "pci:1:0:0"

section "monitor"
identifier "generic monitor"
option "dpms"
horizsync "30-70"
vertrefresh "50-160"

Section "screen"
identifier "default screen"
device "generic video card"
monitor "generic monitor"
defaultdepth "24"


Also, here is a newb questoin... do I run these commands while in the live cd mode? cause that's where I am now... when I have to edit xorg.conf, do I do that in live cd mode, or do I boot up to a command ?

[integr8e]

Re: Problem with screen after install

You can do either; since you've already booted to the Live CD, I would suggest using that. Do you know which partition you installed Kubuntu to? Editing the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file of the Live CD will only modify the /etc/X11/xorg.conf file of the Live CD until you reboot, it will have no effect on the config on your HD. You can, however, access the file from the Live CD, but you must first identify where it installed, mount that partition, and open the file from there (a few easy steps).

[dirtyz]

Re: Problem with screen after install

I don't have the drive partitioned - Kubuntu takes up the drive...

[integr8e]

Re: Problem with screen after install

OK; to mount your hard drive, you'll need to 1st create a mount point:

sudo mkdir /media/hda1

Then, mount your hard drive to that location:

sudo mount /dev/hda1 /media/hda1

Then, open X.org's config with

sudo kate /media/hda1/etc/X11/xorg.conf

You can make the necessary changes there; if you don't mind, could you post the same sections from that file as the one you did earlier?

[dirtyz]

Re: Problem with screen after install

sorry

when entering the code

sudo mount /dev/hda1 /media/hda1

I get a message that says
mount: special device /dev/hda1 does not exist

[dirtyz]

Re: Problem with screen after install

to try and help, i typed in mount in konsole, and got this....

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ mount
proc on /proc type proc (rw)
sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw)
tmpfs on /lib/modules/2.6.22-14-generic/volatile type tmpfs (rw,mode=0755)
tmpfs on /lib/modules/2.6.22-14-generic/volatile type tmpfs (rw,mode=0755)
varrun on /var/run type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev,mode=0755)
varlock on /var/lock type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev,mode=1777)
udev on /dev type tmpfs (rw,mode=0755)
devshm on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw)
devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,gid=5,mode=620)
tmpfs on /tmp type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev)
/dev/sda1 on /media/disk type ext3 (rw,nosuid,nodev)

[integr8e]

Re: Problem with screen after install

Sorry about that; according to the output of the command you posted, the partition you want is /dev/sda1, and it is already mounted on /media/disk. As such, all you need to do is open the config with

kdesu kate /media/disk/etc/X11/xorg.conf

[dirtyz]

Re: Problem with screen after install

I tried typing in that command, and got this..

the program 'kdesu' can be found in the following packages:
*kdesudo
*kdebase-bin
Try: sudo apt-get install <selected package>
bash: kdesu: command not found

[integr8e]

Re: Problem with screen after install

"kdesu" should be installed, but if not, use "sudo" in its stead. "sudo" is generally used to run command line apps as root, and "kdesu(do)" is used for graphical apps, but they are interchangeable for the most part.