Recent Xserver update broke X

Cerpin Taxt

Lifer
Feb 23, 2005
11,940
542
126
So just last weekend I was notified of some updates for my Ubuntu (Gutsy) MythTV system. I've never had a problem with the updates in the past so I downloaded and installed them without thinking twice. On this occasion it prompted me to reboot, and after that I haven't succeeded in getting the X server to start with anything but the vesa driver, with which the system runs in "low graphics" mode at like 640x480 only.

Now MythTV won't work properly and I have no idea how to fix it.

I've run dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg several times trying different parameters with no success. I've also run nvidia-xconfig as root after the restricted driver was supposedly enabled. Nothing works.

Can anybody help me? Should I try to roll back my version of xserver-xorg? I don't even know how to do that. Nobody on #ubuntu was helpful either.

Thanks in advance.
 

silverpig

Lifer
Jul 29, 2001
27,703
12
81
I had a similar problem with my laptop a few weeks ago. I installed the updates, then when logging in, I just got a black screen. Reboot, same. Reboot, same.

I was able to get graphics using the "failsafe terminal" login session. Using this session I created a new user account and logged in with that. It worked fine. I tried with my old account again and it didn't work fine. After a few tries though my old account magically worked again.

So try a new account and if it works, pray that your old account starts working like mine did.
 

Nothinman

Elite Member
Sep 14, 2001
30,672
0
0
If the X server isn't starting at all look in /var/log/Xorg.0.log and see what it says at the end. Either the nvidia kernel module isn't loaded or there's a version mismatch between it and the X driver.