Need help with getting Fedora Core 4 to boot

Yoyo77

Member
Jun 30, 2001
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I'm a newbee when it comes to linux and I need some help in getting it to work. I have try posting for help on fedoraforum but there was no respond for few days now. My problem is that I just installed Fedora Core 4 on an old laptop ( IBM T20 ). Before installing FC4, I have win2k install on it. Installation appears to be completed . After installation, I reboot the system. I see the grub bootloader, able to see options to boot windows or FC4. Win2k able to boot without problems

When I try to boot FC4 , it will go through the steps of initaitlzing . storage network audio gets ok. After that the screen just turn black, about 10 secs later, it flash a bit of color of green and blue then it stays black. And I waited 15 mins and still just a black screen. Is it some kind of video card problem? The ibm t20 has a video card that uses the S3 savage chip. If anyone have some advice and suggestion they can give me, I would appreciate it. Thanks.
 

TGS

Golden Member
May 3, 2005
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Can you use a boot cd to edit your /etc/inittab? There should be a line in there about defaultinit:: 5. Change that entry from a 5 to a 3. If you can't finish loading the OS prior to starting the X server, it's most likely a setting either in the XFConfig86-4 that needs to be tweaked.

I'm not particularly certain on the support for that type of card, though it's just an older mainstream part. I wouldn't see why it wouldn't have support.

Edit: Also you should be able to try to manually start the X server. If it still has issues, I'm guessing it will, than it should bomb out and give you an error on screen or at least log it to where ever the X logs default to.
 

kamper

Diamond Member
Mar 18, 2003
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Fedora seems to be a little flaky when it comes to starting x (and it's x.org, not XFree86) on various video cards. It's never played nicely with my 9600p, with fc4, x won't start, just like what you're describing. I haven't really put much effort into running it on the machine with that card though.

TGS points you in the right direction. Start with telling it not to start x on boot and work from there. A live cd that does work properly would probably be a big help (like Knoppix maybe).