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Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 16:20
by mimosa
No, you press TAB before that, at the Lilo screen; you only have a second or two to do so, but once you have pressed a key, you can compose the text you want to input at your leisure.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 17:20
by fizzy-logic
mimosa wrote:No, you press TAB before that, at the Lilo screen; you only have a second or two to do so, but once you have pressed a key, you can compose the text you want to input at your leisure.
I pressed TAB before the texts roll, still zilch.
On my boot set-up LILO is installed in / of the slave drive. Grub boots from the primary in opensuse and salix is an entry there. I'm not sure if this makes a difference, but thought you should know. I don't see a lilo screen, just bios text,
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 19:52
by mimosa
So are you booting from Lilo or Grub? If grub, I'm sure there's a similar way to boot into runlevel 3, but I'm afraid I don't know grub at all. Google knows, though
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 21:26
by fizzy-logic
mimosa wrote:So are you booting from Lilo or Grub? If grub, I'm sure there's a similar way to boot into runlevel 3, but I'm afraid I don't know grub at all. Google knows, though
My desktop boots from grub2; however when booting salix, it is then using LILO.
So LILO is installed in / ; not MBR of the salix drive. But everythig starts from GRUB2.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 21:43
by mimosa
Unless you set the delay to 0 seconds, you should definitely be seeing the lilo screen immediately after BIOS, with a message to "Press TAB for boot options" or words to that effect. The standard delay is 5 seconds, so you do have to be reasonably quick. I always change mine to 30 seconds.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 22:41
by fizzy-logic
mimosa wrote:Unless you set the delay to 0 seconds, you should definitely be seeing the lilo screen immediately after BIOS, with a message to "Press TAB for boot options" or words to that effect. The standard delay is 5 seconds, so you do have to be reasonably quick. I always change mine to 30 seconds.
Good News now that you mentioned it, I do believe I set the delay to 0 on the installation of salix. Sooo
I guess a reinstall with the standard delay is in order.
Thanks again.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 30. Dec 2013, 23:51
by mimosa
A reinstall might have other beneficial effects too
However, I recommend checking the md5sum first.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 31. Dec 2013, 02:21
by gaucho
Hi, fizzy-logic,
In case it might help you, I'll paste a couple of configuration files which you can use for comparison. It sounds like your boot setup is somewhat similar to mine ... My MBR is controlled by GRUB2 (it's from Fedora 19 Xfce Spin), and I have LILO installed on Salix's root partition (/dev/sda12 in my case; the Salix /home partition is on /dev/sda13).
Here is the GRUB2 stanza for my Salix Xfce 14.0 installation (32-bit) generated by GRUB's os-prober:
Code: Select all
menuentry 'Slackware Linux (Slackware 14.0) (on /dev/sda12)' --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os $menuentry_id_option 'osprober-gnulinux-simple-e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd' {
insmod part_msdos
insmod ext2
set root='hd0,msdos12'
if [ x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root --hint-bios=hd0,msdos12 --hint-efi=hd0,msdos12 --hint-baremetal=ahci0,msdos12 --hint='hd0,msdos12' e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd
else
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd
fi
linux /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda12 ro quiet vt.default_utf8=1 vga = normal
}
submenu 'Advanced options for Slackware Linux (Slackware 14.0) (on /dev/sda12)' $menuentry_id_option 'osprober-gnulinux-advanced-e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd' {
menuentry 'Linux (on /dev/sda12)' --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os $menuentry_id_option 'osprober-gnulinux-/boot/vmlinuz--e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd' {
insmod part_msdos
insmod ext2
set root='hd0,msdos12'
if [ x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root --hint-bios=hd0,msdos12 --hint-efi=hd0,msdos12 --hint-baremetal=ahci0,msdos12 --hint='hd0,msdos12' e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd
else
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd
fi
linux /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda12 ro quiet vt.default_utf8=1 vga = normal
}
}
Below is the custom GRUB2 stanza I manually added in /etc/grub.d/40_custom :
Code: Select all
menuentry 'Salix Xfce 14.0 (on /dev/sda12)' --class gnu-linux --class gnu --class os $menuentry_id_option 'osprober-gnulinux-simple-e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd' {
insmod part_msdos
insmod ext2
set root='hd0,msdos12'
if [ x$feature_platform_search_hint = xy ]; then
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root --hint-bios=hd0,msdos12 --hint-efi=hd0,msdos12 --hint-baremetal=ahci0,msdos12 --hint='hd0,msdos12' e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd
else
search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root e3103027-de1e-48f7-8a06-96c5ada400cd
fi
linux /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda12 ro quiet vt.default_utf8=1 vga = normal
}
And, finally, this is how Salix's /etc/lilo.conf file looks:
Code: Select all
# LILO configuration file
# generated by 'liloconfig'
#
# Start LILO global section
# Append any additional kernel parameters:
append="quiet vt.default_utf8=1"
boot = /dev/sda12
# Boot BMP Image.
# Bitmap in BMP format: 640x480x8
bitmap = /boot/salix.bmp
# Menu colors (foreground, background, shadow, highlighted
# foreground, highlighted background, highlighted shadow):
bmp-colors = 255,20,255,20,255,20
# Location of the option table: location x, location y, number of
# columns, lines per column (max 15), "spill" (this is how many
# entries must be in the first column before the next begins to
# be used. We don't specify it here, as there's just one column.
bmp-table = 60,6,1,16
# Timer location x, timer location y, foreground color,
# background color, shadow color.
bmp-timer = 65,29,0,255
# Standard menu.
# Or, you can comment out the bitmap menu above and
# use a boot message with the standard menu:
#message = /boot/boot_message.txt
# Wait until the timeout to boot (if commented out, boot the
# first entry immediately):
prompt
# Timeout before the first entry boots.
# This is given in tenths of a second, so 600 for every minute:
timeout = 50
# Override dangerous defaults that rewrite the partition table:
change-rules
reset
# Normal VGA console
vga = normal
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x64k
# vga=791
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x32k
# vga=790
# VESA framebuffer console @ 1024x768x256
# vga=773
# VESA framebuffer console @ 800x600x64k
# vga=788
# VESA framebuffer console @ 800x600x32k
# vga=787
# VESA framebuffer console @ 800x600x256
# vga=771
# VESA framebuffer console @ 640x480x64k
# vga=785
# VESA framebuffer console @ 640x480x32k
# vga=784
# VESA framebuffer console @ 640x480x256
# vga=769
# End LILO global section
# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/vmlinuz
root = /dev/sda12
label = Linux
read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends
Hopefully these will give you a frame of reference, if you need to do additional troubleshooting.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 31. Dec 2013, 13:10
by fizzy-logic
thanks gaucho,
the problem isn't in booting the system. I reinstalled salix and changed the boot delay from 0 to 5 seconds. then when booting in (no salix screen) just text, i pressed TAB but still a dark screen. So I'm still at square one.
trying to get to a console or desktop enviroment, so i can download the nvidia driver and install it.
Re: Dark screen
Posted: 31. Dec 2013, 14:53
by mimosa
Do you mean you still don't see the lilo screen (inviting you to press TAB for boot options, which won't do anything after the boot process starts)?
What exactly do you see? How do you select Salix rather than one of the other OSs on that machine? Then what happens? WHen does everything turn black?
I appreciate it's probably hard to describe, but at the moment, it's difficult to undertand what may be going on at your end