Help I'm all out of ideas;

Before I start I would like to thank anyone who helps, I realize this is a long post but it is a complicated problem (probably with a simple solution). Any one that submits anything even if it is some brainstorming is much appreciated. Thanks alot

Also, I just would like you to know that I've exhaused all my resources, incluing linuxquestions and google/linux as well as fiddling around.

Running: Red Hat 8

Ok the X display will not show at all, that is when I hit ctrl-alt-f7 I get a blank screen. But I can press ctrl-alt-f[1-6] and get a terminal. So I log onto the terminal type startx and get:

===========================================
Fatal server error:
Server already running for display 0
If this server ... remove /tmp/.X0-lock ...

When reporting a problem ...

Xlib: connection to ":0.0" refused by sever
Xlib: Invalid MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 key giving up.
xinitd: unable to connect to X server
xinit: no such process (errno 3):Server error

==============================================

(Sorry I can't cut and paste exact errors but I am using a different machine right now)

So then I type startx -- :1 to see if I can get X working on an alternate display.... i cant. I switch to ctrl-alt-f8 and I get the black screen, I switch back to the terminal and see that it cant open the display.

But in the midst of some errors I see the log file is /var/log/XFree86.1.log

So I view this (as well as XFree86.0.log) and find the error:

==============================================
Audit: Tue Jun ...: 983 X: client 4 rejected from local host Auth name: MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 ID: -1

===============================================

This error appears in both log files, multiple times.

I checked my /etc/X11/XF86Config file, and all looks well (I have not touched this file in a while).

I have tried other solutions including killing all X-processes, rebooting, deleting /tmp/X0.lock, and a buch of other stuff that I forgot.

One final note, I believe that the last this I was doing before the 'crash' was fiddling around with the automounter. But while trying to find the solution to this problem I disabled automount from staring up by placing a '.' in front of the file name in the rc5.d directory,

e.g. .S29Autofs

Therefore essentially 'blinding' the startup rc file to see this.

Im all out of Ideas and need help Once again I appreciate all the help I can get. I have been running RH8 for a couple of months now and am starting to get comfertable with linux but I am no where near gurudom, so all help is appreciated.

Thank you so so so so so much;
Movitto

I know next to nothing regarding RH, but if it was me the first thing I would try would be to simply reinstall X and all of its packages, that type of "fix" has served me well many times.

As per your error message, see if there's a file called /tmp/.X0-lock (note the . before the file name meaning the file will be hidden, so do an ls -a in /tmp). If there is, remove it and try again. It seems like X may have crashed without cleaning up after itself.

Thanks for all ur replys they are much appreciated.

Slacker_Rex;
I am unfamiliar with the process of reinstalling X. Could you perhaps give me a brief explanation or maybe a link?

btmiller;
I have deleted that file but it does not change anything

Once again thank you very much, all the help is appreciated. I will continue to search for an answer.