Comment 17 for bug 296276

I have found a solution to this problem

post found here : http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=961964 (To give credit to forum member "graham-cracker"

After some web searching and with the help of:
sudo lspci -v

It looks like sisfb (a required module for my graphics card) is not being loaded on startup.

A temporary fix was to:
Switch to a different terminal (Ctrl-Alt-F2)
Log in
Insert the sisfb module (sudo modprobe sisfb)
Switch back to X (Ctrl-Alt-F7)
Restart X (Ctrl-Alt-Backspace)

This appears to fix the problem (until you restart). If this works for you, than add sisfb to your /etc/modeules file so that it is inserted on boot like so:
Open a terminal
type: sudo nano /etc/modules
Add the following line to the end of the file:
sisfb
Save and exit (Ctrl-X)
Restart and see if it works.