LinuxQuestions.org - asus A7V8X and NVIDIA drivers...blank screen + freeze

I've already posted this into the general forum, but it may suit better here; sorry for this.
(I spent my wole afternoon recompiling different kernels with no sucess.)

Hi there, I recently bought an Asus A7V8X with VT8235 and KT400; I run a slack9 with at first the out of the box 2.4.20 kernel... worked fine with the nv drivers.... (no glx....)

I then installed the latest nvidia drivers and when I typed startx, I just had a blank screen and nothing happenned. I couldnt ctrl+alt+backsp nor soft reboot...

After a few workaround, I installed 2.4.20-pre7 kernel... recompiled it....put the nvidia drivers...same thing; has a quick look in XFree logs, no error msgs :/ here are my dmesg and a few copy/past from the console...

If anyone has the most insignificant idea, please make me know

cheers

-----------here comes a lot of txt

root@maeva:~/pacool# modprobe agpgart
root@maeva:~/pacool# dmesg
Linux agpgart interface v0.99 (c) Jeff Hartmann
agpgart: Maximum main memory to use for agp memory: 439M
agpgart: Detected Via Apollo Pro KT400 chipset
agpgart: AGP aperture is 64M @ 0xf8000000

root@maeva:~/pacool# lsmod
Module Size Used by Not tainted
agpgart 13968 0 (unused)
usb-uhci 23244 0 (unused)
es1371 27816 0 (unused)
ac97_codec 11048 0 [es1371]
ehci-hcd 17384 0 (unused)
usbcore 40224 0 [usb-uhci ehci-hcd]
ide-scsi 10288 0
scsi_mod 56724 1 [ide-scsi]
natsemi 16960 1
vfat 10636 3 (autoclean)
fat 32408 0 (autoclean)

root@maeva:~/pacool# grep nvid /etc/X11/XF86Config
Driver "nvidia"

root@maeva:~/pacool# modinfo nvidia
// this is the driver before the last one
filename: /lib/modules/2.4.21-pre7/kernel/drivers/video/nvidia.o
description: <none>
author: <none>
license: "NVIDIA"
parm: NVreg_VideoMemoryTypeOverride int
parm: NVreg_EnableVia4x int
parm: NVreg_EnableALiAGP int
parm: NVreg_ReqAGPRate int
parm: NVreg_UpdateKernelAGP int
parm: NVreg_EnableAGPSBA int
parm: NVreg_EnableAGPFW int
parm: NVreg_SoftEDIDs int
parm: NVreg_Mobile int
parm: NVreg_ResmanDebugLevel int
parm: NVreg_FlatPanelMode int

// output of lspci -v (not vey useful actually)
00:00.0 Host bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8377 [KT400 AGP] Host Bridge
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 807f
Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, medium devsel, latency 0
Memory at f8000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=64M]
Capabilities: [a0] AGP version 2.0
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

00:01.0 PCI bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8235 PCI Bridge (prog-if 00 [Normal decode])
Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, medium devsel, latency 0
Bus: primary=00, secondary=01, subordinate=01, sec-latency=0
Memory behind bridge: ee000000-efdfffff
Prefetchable memory behind bridge: eff00000-f7ffffff
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:09.0 Ethernet controller: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401 100Base-T (rev 01)
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 80a8
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 32, IRQ 9
Memory at ed800000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=8K]
Expansion ROM at efef0000 [disabled] [size=16K]
Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 2

00:0b.0 Ethernet controller: National Semiconductor Corporation DP83815 (MacPhyter) Ethernet Controller
Subsystem: Netgear: Unknown device f311
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 9
I/O ports at d800 [size=256]
Memory at ed000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4K]
Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled] [size=64K]
Capabilities: [40] Power Management version 2

00:0e.0 Multimedia audio controller: Ensoniq ES1371 [AudioPCI-97] (rev 08)
Subsystem: Ensoniq Creative Sound Blaster AudioPCI64V, AudioPCI128
Flags: bus master, slow devsel, latency 32, IRQ 10
I/O ports at d400 [size=64]
Capabilities: [dc] Power Management version 1

00:10.0 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB (rev 80) (prog-if 00 [UHCI])
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 808c
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 9
I/O ports at d000 [size=32]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:10.1 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB (rev 80) (prog-if 00 [UHCI])
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 808c
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 9
I/O ports at b800 [size=32]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:10.2 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB (rev 80) (prog-if 00 [UHCI])
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 808c
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 9
I/O ports at b400 [size=32]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:10.3 USB Controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB 2.0 (rev 82) (prog-if 20 [EHCI])
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 808c
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32, IRQ 9
Memory at ec800000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=256]
Capabilities: [80] Power Management version 2

00:11.0 ISA bridge: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT8235 ISA Bridge
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 808c
Flags: bus master, stepping, medium devsel, latency 0
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

00:11.1 IDE interface: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT82C586/B/686A/B PIPC Bus Master IDE (rev 06) (prog-if 8a [Master SecP PriP])
Subsystem: Asustek Computer, Inc.: Unknown device 808c
Flags: bus master, medium devsel, latency 32
I/O ports at b000 [size=16]
Capabilities: [c0] Power Management version 2

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation NV15 [GeForce2 GTS/Pro] (rev a4) (prog-if 00 [VGA])
Subsystem: LeadTek Research Inc.: Unknown device 2842
Flags: bus master, 66Mhz, medium devsel, latency 64, IRQ 11
Memory at ee000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
Memory at f0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=128M]
Expansion ROM at efff0000 [disabled] [size=64K]
Capabilities: [60] Power Management version 1
Capabilities: [44] AGP version 2.0

....And the dmesg :
Linux version 2.4.21-pre7 (root@maeva) (gcc version 3.2.2) #4 Sat Apr 5 13:47:44 CEST 2003
BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 000000000009fc00 (usable)
BIOS-e820: 000000000009fc00 - 00000000000a0000 (reserved)
BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)
BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 000000001fffc000 (usable)
BIOS-e820: 000000001fffc000 - 000000001ffff000 (ACPI data)
BIOS-e820: 000000001ffff000 - 0000000020000000 (ACPI NVS)
BIOS-e820: 00000000fec00000 - 00000000fec01000 (reserved)
BIOS-e820: 00000000fee00000 - 00000000fee01000 (reserved)
BIOS-e820: 00000000ffff0000 - 0000000100000000 (reserved)
511MB LOWMEM available.
On node 0 totalpages: 131068
zone(0): 4096 pages.
zone(1): 126972 pages.
zone(2): 0 pages.
Kernel command line: BOOT_IMAGE=2421 ro root=341 hdc=ide-scsi
ide_setup: hdc=ide-scsi
Initializing CPU#0
Detected 1533.426 MHz processor.
Console: colour dummy device 80x25
Calibrating delay loop... 3060.53 BogoMIPS
Memory: 516044k/524272k available (1383k kernel code, 7840k reserved, 487k data, 88k init, 0k highmem)
Dentry cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
Inode cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)
Mount cache hash table entries: 512 (order: 0, 4096 bytes)
Buffer-cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
Page-cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
CPU: L1 I Cache: 64K (64 bytes/line), D cache 64K (64 bytes/line)
CPU: L2 Cache: 256K (64 bytes/line)
Intel machine check architecture supported.
Intel machine check reporting enabled on CPU#0.
CPU: After generic, caps: 0383fbff c1c3fbff 00000000 00000000
CPU: Common caps: 0383fbff c1c3fbff 00000000 00000000
CPU: AMD Athlon(TM) XP 1800+ stepping 00
Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.
Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
POSIX conformance testing by UNIFIX
mtrr: v1.40 (20010327) Richard Gooch (rgooch@atnf.csiro.au)
mtrr: detected mtrr type: Intel
PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xf1720, last bus=1
PCI: Using configuration type 1
PCI: Probing PCI hardware
PCI: Using IRQ router VIA [1106/3177] at 00:11.0
Linux NET4.0 for Linux 2.4
Based upon Swansea University Computer Society NET3.039
Initializing RT netlink socket
Starting kswapd
Journalled Block Device driver loaded
ACPI: Core Subsystem version [20011018]
ACPI: Subsystem enabled
ACPI: System firmware supports S0 S1 S4 S5
Processor[0]: C0 C1
ACPI: Power Button (FF) found
ACPI: Multiple power buttons detected, ignoring fixed-feature
ACPI: Power Button (CM) found
vesafb: framebuffer at 0xf0000000, mapped to 0xe0809000, size 65536k
vesafb: mode is 1024x768x16, linelength=2048, pages=0
vesafb: protected mode interface info at c000:bca0
vesafb: scrolling: redraw
vesafb: directcolor: size=0:5:6:5, shift=0:11:5:0
Console: switching to colour frame buffer device 128x48
fb0: VESA VGA frame buffer device
pty: 256 Unix98 ptys configured
Serial driver version 5.05c (2001-07-08) with MANY_PORTS SHARE_IRQ SERIAL_PCI enabled
ttyS00 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
ttyS01 at 0x02f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A
Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
Uniform Multi-Platform E-IDE driver Revision: 7.00beta-2.4
ide: Assuming 33MHz system bus speed for PIO modes; override with idebus=xx
VP_IDE: IDE controller at PCI slot 00:11.1
VP_IDE: chipset revision 6
VP_IDE: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
VP_IDE: VIA vt8235 (rev 00) IDE UDMA133 controller on pci00:11.1
ide0: BM-DMA at 0xb000-0xb007, BIOS settings: hdaMA, hdbMA
ide1: BM-DMA at 0xb008-0xb00f, BIOS settings: hdcMA, hddMA
hda: IC35L060AVV207-0, ATA DISK drive
hdb: MAXTOR 6L040J2, ATA DISK drive
blk: queue c0311300, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
blk: queue c031143c, I/O limit 4095Mb (mask 0xffffffff)
hdc: IDE-CD R/RW 16x10A, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
hdd: PIONEER DVD-ROM DVD-115, ATAPI CD/DVD-ROM drive
ide0 at 0x1f0-0x1f7,0x3f6 on irq 14
ide1 at 0x170-0x177,0x376 on irq 15
hda: attached ide-disk driver.
hda: host protected area => 1
hda: 120103200 sectors (61493 MB) w/1821KiB Cache, CHS=7476/255/63, UDMA(100)
hdb: attached ide-disk driver.
hdb: host protected area => 1
hdb: 78177792 sectors (40027 MB) w/1819KiB Cache, CHS=4866/255/63, UDMA(133)
hdd: attached ide-cdrom driver.
hdd: ATAPI DVD-ROM drive, 512kB Cache, UDMA(33)
Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.12
Partition check:
hda: hda1 hda2
hdb: hdb1 hdb2 < hdb5 hdb6 hdb7 hdb8 >
Linux Kernel Card Services 3.1.22
options: [pci] [cardbus] [pm]
NET4: Linux TCP/IP 1.0 for NET4.0
IP Protocols: ICMP, UDP, TCP, IGMP
IP: routing cache hash table of 4096 buckets, 32Kbytes
TCP: Hash tables configured (established 32768 bind 65536)
ip_conntrack version 2.1 (4095 buckets, 32760 max) - 292 bytes per conntrack
NET4: Unix domain sockets 1.0/SMP for Linux NET4.0.
ds: no socket drivers loaded!
EXT3-fs: INFO: recovery required on readonly filesystem.
EXT3-fs: write access will be enabled during recovery.
(recovery.c, 256): journal_recover: JBD: recovery, exit status 0, recovered transactions 1474 to 1527
(recovery.c, 258): journal_recover: JBD: Replayed 1265 and revoked 3/15 blocks
kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
EXT3-fs: recovery complete.
EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
VFS: Mounted root (ext3 filesystem) readonly.
Freeing unused kernel memory: 88k freed
EXT3 FS 2.4-0.9.19, 19 August 2002 on ide0(3,65), internal journal
kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
EXT3 FS 2.4-0.9.19, 19 August 2002 on ide0(3,69), internal journal
EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
natsemi dp8381x driver, version 1.07+LK1.0.17, Sep 27, 2002
originally by Donald Becker <becker@scyld.com>
http://www.scyld.com/network/natsemi.html
2.4.x kernel port by Jeff Garzik, Tjeerd Mulder
PCI: Found IRQ 9 for device 00:0b.0
eth0: NatSemi DP8381[56] at 0xe4837000, 00:09:5b:0a:02:06, IRQ 9.
SCSI subsystem driver Revision: 1.00
hdc: attached ide-scsi driver.
scsi0 : SCSI host adapter emulation for IDE ATAPI devices
Vendor: IDE-CD Model: R/RW 16x10A Rev: B1.4
Type: CD-ROM ANSI SCSI revision: 02
eth0: link up.
eth0: Setting full-duplex based on negotiated link capability.
usb.c: registered new driver hub
PCI: Found IRQ 3 for device 00:10.3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.0, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.1, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.2, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.3, have irq 9, want irq 3
ehci-hcd 00:10.3: VIA Technologies, Inc. USB 2.0
ehci-hcd 00:10.3: irq 9, pci mem e485d000
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
PCI: 00:10.3 PCI cache line size set incorrectly (32 bytes) by BIOS/FW.
PCI: 00:10.3 PCI cache line size corrected to 64.
ehci-hcd 00:10.3: USB 2.0 enabled, EHCI 1.00, driver 2003-Jan-22
hub.c: USB hub found
hub.c: 6 ports detected
es1371: version v0.32 time 13:54:55 Apr 5 2003
PCI: Found IRQ 10 for device 00:0e.0
es1371: found chip, vendor id 0x1274 device id 0x1371 revision 0x08
es1371: found es1371 rev 8 at io 0xd400 irq 10
es1371: features: joystick 0x0
ac97_codec: AC97 Audio codec, id: CRY19(Cirrus Logic CS4297A rev A)
usb-uhci.c: $Revision: 1.275 $ time 13:55:14 Apr 5 2003
usb-uhci.c: High bandwidth mode enabled
PCI: Found IRQ 3 for device 00:10.0
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.0, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.1, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.2, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.3, have irq 9, want irq 3
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0xd000, IRQ 9
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 2
hub.c: USB hub found
hub.c: 2 ports detected
PCI: Found IRQ 3 for device 00:10.1
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.0, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.1, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.2, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.3, have irq 9, want irq 3
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0xb800, IRQ 9
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 3
hub.c: USB hub found
hub.c: 2 ports detected
PCI: Found IRQ 3 for device 00:10.2
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.0, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.1, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.2, have irq 9, want irq 3
IRQ routing conflict for 00:10.3, have irq 9, want irq 3
usb-uhci.c: USB UHCI at I/O 0xb400, IRQ 9
usb-uhci.c: Detected 2 ports
usb.c: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 4
hub.c: USB hub found
hub.c: 2 ports detected
usb-uhci.c: v1.275:USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver

p.s.: got a conflict with usb hub, but I dont care for the moment....
p.p.s.: the ac_97_codec.c from 2.4.21.pre7 seems broken, I didnt manage to compile it as a module or in the kernel...copied back the 2.4.20's one...
p.p.p.s: sorry for my poor english, Im french :)