Can't boot following update

Hi. I just finished installing openSUSE 11.3 off the (downloaded) DVD. All was good. Then the Online Update recommended a huge swathe of patches and I accepted them. Now when I try to reboot, it gets as far as started to display (fade in) the main window, and then freezes - mouse and keyboard are dead.

Rebooted several times - same problem every time.

I can boot to the console if I so choose from the Menu on the login screen.

I guess some part of the update is bad. any idea how I can find out which part and fix it?

Thanks :frowning:

Boot the console
login, then become su -

do: zypper up

see if anything gets updated
reboot

If no updates or it doesn’t help, boot with failsafe. Does that get you to the desktop?

Hi.
Thanks.

zypper up updated “pullin-msttf-fonts”.

It didn’t make any difference though.

Booting with failsafe from the boot menu gets me into the desktop. (Selecting failsafe from the menu on the login page does not.)

OK
Did you install a video driver
I suggest you re-install it,
From a failsafe boot you should be able start Yast > Software Management > View by Repo and select the ATI or nVidia repo and mark the packages there for update

Hi.

I didn’t install a video driver (at least, not that I am aware - but the list of recommended patches was huge, so it’s possible a driver was hiding in there somewhere I suppose?).

I did install the Flash player though - could that have anything to do with it?

I’ve been into YaST-> Software Management, but there are no ATI or nVidia repositories - only the following:
@System
Upates for openSUSE 11.3 11.3-1.82
openSUSE-11.3 11.3-1.82
openSUSE-11.3-Non-Oss
openSUSE-11.3-Oss

Still a puzzled penguin :}

Open a terminal and copy and paste the following and then copy and paste the output here:

/sbin/lspci -nnk

Incidentally, how is failsafe working? Is it lacking in any way?

Hi.
Unfortunately I can’t paste the output here as I am using a different (windows) machine and i can’t think how to copy a file between them :frowning:
Failsafe seems ok, except that I can’t get to this forum using Firefox (I get a Database Error page) otherwise I would continue this thread there :frowning:

Can you tell me what you would be looking for in the output?

So your not using the machine or is it not connected to the internet?
If your machine is isolated from the NET - can you use a pendrive to save a text file to.

Hi.
It’s on the net, it was just that page that I couldn’t get to. Linux can’t write to my windows pen drive. Haven’t created a Linux pen drive yet but don’t suppose Windows could read it …

Anyway - I’ve logged out from my other machine and eventually got here now though, so I’m not sure what was going on.

here is the output :slight_smile:

00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation 82915G/P/GV/GL/PL/910GL Memory Controller Hub [8086:2580] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: agpgart-intel
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 82915G/GV/910GL Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:2582] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company DC7100 SFF(DX878AV) [103c:3006]
00:02.1 Display controller [0380]: Intel Corporation 82915G Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:2782] (rev 04)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
00:1c.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) PCI Express Port 1 [8086:2660] (rev 03)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1c.1 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) PCI Express Port 2 [8086:2662] (rev 03)
Kernel driver in use: pcieport
00:1d.0 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #1 [8086:2658] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.1 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #2 [8086:2659] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.2 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #3 [8086:265a] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.3 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB UHCI #4 [8086:265b] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: uhci_hcd
00:1d.7 USB Controller [0c03]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) USB2 EHCI Controller [8086:265c] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: ehci_hcd
00:1e.0 PCI bridge [0604]: Intel Corporation 82801 PCI Bridge [8086:244e] (rev d3)
00:1e.2 Multimedia audio controller [0401]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) AC’97 Audio Controller [8086:266e] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company DC7100 SFF(DX878AV) [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: Intel ICH
00:1f.0 ISA bridge [0601]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FR (ICH6/ICH6R) LPC Interface Bridge [8086:2640] (rev 03)
00:1f.1 IDE interface [0101]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) IDE Controller [8086:266f] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: ata_piix
00:1f.2 IDE interface [0101]: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FW (ICH6/ICH6W) SATA Controller [8086:2651] (rev 03)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company Device [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: ata_piix
05:09.0 Network controller [0280]: RaLink RT2561/RT61 rev B 802.11g [1814:0302]
Subsystem: D-Link System Inc Device [1186:3a71]
Kernel driver in use: rt61pci
40:00.0 Ethernet controller [0200]: Broadcom Corporation NetXtreme BCM5751 Gigabit Ethernet PCI Express [14e4:1677] (rev 01)
Subsystem: Hewlett-Packard Company DC7100 SFF(DX878AV) [103c:3006]
Kernel driver in use: tg3
phil@linux-lp5n:~>

So you have an Intel 915 graphics chip.
I’m not entirely sure what your problem is, but if it were me I would try rolling back the kernel to the Original from OSS repo 2.6.34-12.3
It’s fiddly to do if you are new to it, but basically - Open Software Management > search for kernel
Then highlight your kernel and use the radio button switch in the version TAB to select the original kernel.

It could be there was also some display packages updated that is causing issues.

Hi.

Thanks.

I rolled back the kernel as you suggested. There was a conflict with the preload-kmp-default, and I selected the option to downgrade that too.
It worked :slight_smile:

Only thing is, I think the screen res is lower now :frowning:

I can’t find a way of looking up the current screen res either. How can I do that?

Can’t see my last reply, but forget the Q about screen res. I can see that according to the boot loader it is 1280 x 1024, so I think it must be my imagination :slight_smile:

Let us know if you need assurance or advice further.

Hi.

thought I’d update you with the latest on this :slight_smile:

Reading the release notes got me thinking - they talk about 11.3 using Kernel Mode Setting, and how if it causes issues with Intel, ATI or nVidia graphics chipsets you can disable it using nomodeset, and leave it to XWin. So, after finding, installing and using Clonezilla to backup my system (!) I once again downloaded the latest Kernel. Once again the boot process froze just as it was about to display the desktop window. So I booted in failsafe mode and added nomodeset to the kernal options.

How about that - the problem went away! Sure, I get instant display changes now - no more sexy fade-ins-and-outs. But I can live with that!

What’s more I can now set the vga option to 1280x1024 and it works fine at that resolution. Previously (it wasn’t my imagination after all) the best I could get was 1024x768.

I’m a happy penguin now :wink:

Happy times… :wink: