Screen black with no prompt after reboot

This is the second time it happened, the first time I had to reinstall after trying to repair x from the disc.(i thought it was video) It was working perfect all day, I installed vlc, opera, thunderbird, and thats about it. I was working in amorak and it was building my library when it froze. I killed the process, rebooted and I get a black screen with a non functioning cursor. I can cntrl alt del.

I believe when it happened yesterday, before i had to format, i was in amorak as well. It would never finish building my library.

Id rather not format again, since I just got it all setup; so any information would be GREATLY appreciated.

Take care all,
mra

I should add that when im runlevel 3 it states system skipped:
boot.md & boot.cycle
do i need to repair fstab?