8.10 install fails - black screen

[John]

8.4 runs OK. 8.10 will sometimes run from live CD but crashes quickly (attempting to use NVidia drivers or run Nautilus - ??). Install to HDD invariably fails with black screen though something seems to be running underneath

Asus motherboard with twin core AMD

Would make comment if this were my first try at Linux, I would have given up and told all my friends not to bother

[goto (gotolaunchpad)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. Unfortunately, we can't fix it because your description didn't include enough information. You may find it helpful to read "How to report bugs effectively" http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~sgtatham/bugs.html. We'd be grateful if you would then provide a more complete description of the problem.

We have instructions on debugging some types of problems at http://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingProcedures

At a minimum, we need:
1. the specific steps or actions you took that caused you to encounter the problem,
2. the behavior you expected, and
3. the behavior you actually encountered (in as much detail as possible).
Thanks!

[John (jw-resthaven)]

Afraid as a novice, there isn't much I can add. Tried cutting two CDs and both run on my laptop so not that, presumably my hardware. I can attempt to follow any suggestions you wish to make to get out a log or system dump if the live CD feels like running long enough - otherwise pls just note there is one more case (my researches revealed fellow sufferers but no solution - or at least not for mere mortals).

[goto (gotolaunchpad)]

So the CDs are not bad, because they are working in your notebook.
Okay, what do you mean by "sometimes live cd works". Can you explain what you mean? And what mainboard model do you use? And what graphics chip? Thanks.

[John (jw-resthaven)]

Right

Board = Asus M2N (AMD socket 2 - Nvidia nForce 430) Part
no:90-MIB020-GOEAYGZ
CARD = gEFORCE 8400 gs pci-e

This is now several weeks ago but:-

Went for the version update thing in 8.4 Synaptic to 8.10. Pulled down 1.7
gb of stuff, chattered away doing what one expects, but around 95% of the
way through just froze with a black screen. Rebooted after a good wait (an
hour maybe) but loaded and froze again. Used the laptop to have a look
around the forums and found I wasn't the only one .

Cut a live CD which did load into GUI but crashed at any attempt to fire up
Nautilus (strange but true) or after trying to load the Nvidia drivers (less
strange and I did try loading all the options on offer - if indeed one can
install them in live CD scenario?). Repartitioned HD and tried an install
from CD which failed (same black screen). Did get a command prompt once
following some instructions from the forum, but the further advice was
beyond my humble skills. Gave up but when box finally failed to reboot
properly from CD (same black screen thing) - which again seems strange, but
true. Since my monitor would report loss of VGA input, something must still
have been running.

So I wiped the HDD and put 8.4 back (which is fine, Nvidia video drivers
work, all hardware detected etc.).

Don't think I can tell you much more

One has to suspect hardware incompatibility, but a more graceful failure
(ideally message "upgrade aborted because of x, system restored") and/or a
road back from the "upgrade" in Synaptic (an extra line in Grub menu?) would
be good - after all the upgrade didn't just not work, it trashed my
computer (at least, from a novice perspective). No data lost by me, but
could have been a disaster for many punters.

2008/12/15 goto <email address hidden>

> So the CDs are not bad, because they are working in your notebook.
> Okay, what do you mean by "sometimes live cd works". Can you explain what
> you mean? And what mainboard model do you use? And what graphics chip?
> Thanks.
>
> --
> 8.10 install fails - black screen
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/308136
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>
> Status in Ubuntu: New
>
> Bug description:
> 8.4 runs OK. 8.10 will sometimes run from live CD but crashes quickly
> (attempting to use NVidia drivers or run Nautilus - ??). Install to HDD
> invariably fails with black screen though something seems to be running
> underneath
>
> Asus motherboard with twin core AMD
>
> Would make comment if this were my first try at Linux, I would have given
> up and told all my friends not to bother
>

--
John & Wiebeke (Mai)

[Clint Byrum (clint-fewbar)]

Closing this bug report, as 8.10 is no longer supported.

John, please submit a new bug report if you encounter this problem on a currently supported release.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases