openSUSE on iMac Intel - blank screen after grub loader

English Install/Boot/Login
1

Hello e.o.

I’ve just installed (correctly, I presume) openSUSE 11.2 on my iMac Intel.
The trouble, a scary BLACK SCREEN, suddenly appears after my startup choice, exactly after the “Starting HAL Daemon” console message…

What can I do?

Thank you.

F.V.

2

See if you can start it in text mode. This way, you can verify that it is not the nvidia driver problem.

To start in text mode, type “3” (without quotes) at the grub boot prompt.

3

Thank you S.
If I type “3” at prompt, it’s written in the “BOOT OPTIONS” text field

Selecting “Desktop – openSUSE 11.2 - 2.6.31.5-0.1”

Boot options:
vga=0x345

It still doesn’t work…

4

uhm, I launched the repair mode from install dvd, and many errors were found… initrd module error, boot loader errors and some other…

I have a small spare time, I think I’m going to give up this “dual boot idea”, and go back to my beloved mac os x…

5

I am having the same problem on my new laptop (HP, Core i3 330M). I did an install using a .iso I burned to DVD (64-bit version); everything went smoothly without any hiccups. However, when the system is coming up, it will load the HAL daemon (status listed as “done” in the right column) and then go to a blank screen a split second later. Hard drive activity ceases though I did notice it was spinning up my DVD drive.

Thinking it was a graphics issue myself initially, I tried various graphics options (vga=ask). The result was the same. Next, I tried to boot without a GUI (init=3) and it would still present a blank screen at the same point in the boot. I also tried failsafe mode and still no luck.

I verified the medium using the tool on the install disk. I then tried the repair tool. It detects the install but tells me the filesystems on one of the partitions (I want to say it is the root partition) is no good and asks me if I want to repair. I hit repair but it continues to prompt me with the same message indefinitely. I abort and run the tool again and this time it gets further and get the errors that fullvestito got: bootloader errors, initrd errors, package manager errors. Even in cases where the system claims it repaired the files, when I run the repair tool again it will pick up the same things again.

I did a fresh install, deleting the old partitions and starting new, but the same things happened again. The first time the repair tool is run, it gives me an error with the filesystem. All subsequent times are various errors listed above.

In case it makes any difference, and I don’t know why it would, my first 3 primary partitions are for my Windows 7 install, the 4th being the mandatory extended partition, and then the 3 partitions for my SUSE install immediately underneath. All three partitions are formatted ext4.

I’m not sure where to go from here. There’s nothing wrong with the .iso I used and I don’t get any errors during installation. If someone could provide some insight or at least a nudge in the right direction it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Tim

6

Same issue after upgrading from 11.1. It appears to be YaST2’s first-boot wizard starting at this point which is causing a hard lockup with the system by improperly initializing X11 for the ATI HD 2600 XT in the 2.8 GHz version of the iMac. I’m not sure why the system does a BlackSOD, but it is similar to past issues I’ve had with ATI cards in the past where a race-condition in the driver would lock the system…

7

Same thing with ATI HD2400XT on iMac. I dunno if I might have fixed it by insisting but … exceptionally I gave up and reinstalled 11.1. You can’t win everytime.

8

I have the same problem on a Toshiba A505-S6005, i3 330M. I installed 11.2 32-bit in an extended partition after the first 3 win 7 partitions. I get the black screen after the HAL daemon line, when loading in failsafe mode or normal. The Repair installation option corrects a bunch of problems, but same problem after reboot.

9

So, it happened to me, too. And I got around it :slight_smile:
I did an install of openSUSE 11.2 x86_64 (after 11.1 did not work) on a 20" iMac; and after starting hald the screen went black and I assume the system just stopped. had to do a hard shutdown.
some research showed, that the module dri caused a segfault when starting the x server parallel to/after starting hald, blanking the screen (could be seen in /var/log/messages, btw.).

What did I do to get it running?

  1. when booting, at the grub boot prompt, enter (e.g. after vga=345) another parameter: root=/bin/bash, so the line reads:
    vga=345 root=/bin/bash
    This starts a bash as login shell without ANY restrictions on the user instead of the standard boot procedure with init.
  2. look in /etc/X11 for xorg.conf file. It will most probably not exist. if it does, continue with step 4. otherwise…
  3. tell sax (X configuration tool) to generate an xorg.conf file automatically:
    sax2 -b
    now, /etc/X11/xorg.conf should exist…
  4. edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf, find section for modules, that should look something like this:
    Section “Module”
    Load “dri”
    Load “dbe”
    Load “extmod”
    Load “glx”
    EndSection
  5. comment out some lines:
    Section “Module”

Load “dri”

Load “dbe”

Load “extmod”

Load “glx”

EndSection
6. save xorg.conf
7. for making sure everything got stored, we better to a filesystem sync:
sync
8. now reboot, by typing:
reboot

Then, after booting, the installation process should continue and finish (takes a while).

Later, you can uncomment the lines we commented above. then, the system runs even when loading the modules. seems, there is an initialization problem when installation is not yet finished.

Have a lot of fun! Hope, it works for you, too!

10

maddin-novell, I have the exact same problem you described, on a 20" iMac, the only difference being I installed the 32-bit version of openSUSE. I’ve followed your instructions to get the bash as login shell working, however there are two steps I can’t follow.

  1. The directory /etc/X11 doesn’t even exist,

  2. The command sax2 -b gives me “command not found”

I haven’t found out any other ways to exit xorg.conf, and this looks like the closest problem to mine I’ve found so I thought I’d pursue it. It might be some simple convention I’ve overlooked, I’m very much a novice when it comes to Linux.

Thanks :slight_smile:

11

Hi Nimbl,

it seems that your previous installation didn’t even get to the point when the desktop environment (X11, KDE) was installed. Make sure that the KDE or Gnome packages get installed, this installs automatically the X11 packages by dependency. As well as SaX…

Please check the packages you select in YaST before installing.

Otherwise, I have no idea what else could be the point…

cu

12

It is definitely the ati radeon driver or your video driver. I booted into rescue mode, mounted the system partitions, went into …/etc/X11 and created a blank xorg.conf file. I then rebooted in single user mode and the installation continued.

Once I booted into rescue mode and mounted my partitions, the messages file clearly points to a segfault of the ati radeon driver.

My system is patching now, and we will see what happens after this.

The Open Suse 11.3 KDE live CD works great, so if I have to I will pull the video drivers from it, or just use its xorg.conf…I will…I’m feeling really hopeful this works.

Thanks for the suggestion above…