Hello, I figured I would make a new post for this one, as the more research I do online I find more and more cases of people asking the same question; How do I adjust X Server? I am new to the Linux world, thus me posting on the forum, but I see that the GUI in some/most/all (not sure) Linux distro(s) comes down to something called 'x' and that its "Hardware detection is crap." SO, I have a compaq r4012us laptop that I have unsuccessfully been trying to install Linux of various types on for a few days, with little success. However, Ubuntu got recomended, and I tried it, and it installed! But now, when I start it I get an error message, "X Server (your graphical interface) failed to start. Press enter to veiw the error, then correct the problem and restart." So how do I "configure" this?

What error are you getting, actually?

Anyway, sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg might help (you have to issue that command from the command line, and you'll be asked for your password). Don't rely too much on the automated portions of the setup, choose reasonable settings from the lists that are presented.

Just for the case that you followed MoonMind's tip and the error still remains:

This is basically done within a file named 'xorg.conf'. You will find this in the directory '/etc/X11'

The X-Server startup is logged in the file '/var/log/Xorg.0.log'. Here you will get some detailed information about what was wrong when trying to start X; You will find a lot of stuff there, but most interesting are only the error-lines (beginning with '(EE)') and maybe the warnings '(WW)'. Post those lines here and I'm sure someone will be able to help you.

If the above doesn't help, you can take a look at /boot/grub/menu.lst, on what to add, take a look at http://home.nyc.rr.com/computertaijutsu/grub.html (Ctrl+F for "vga=") - sometimes it's better to call the kernel via GRUB with a percise resolution than to let Xorg manage that bit all by itself... (You should have Xorg configured to meet the desired conditions, though - don't exclude them when configuring it the way I indicated in my first answer, contradictions are not helpful).

ok tried this.. and it ran me through a wizard of sorts which is pry what it was supposed to do. but it still doesn't work.. here is the summed up verion of whats up:

(WW) The directory "/usr/share/x11/fonts/cyrillic" does not exsist.
entery deleted from path
(WW) The directory "/usr/share/X11/fonts/CID" does not exsist.
entry deleted from path.
(WW) The directory "/var/lib/defoma/x-ttcidfont-conf .d/dirs/TrueType" does not exsist entry deleted from path.
(WW) OPEN APM failed (/dev/apm_bios) (no such file or directory)
(WW) Ignoring request to load modual GLcore


these are the errors on the first few dozen pages... only typed what was marked with a (WW).... allot of (ii)'s in there. well n e ways see what you think of that one..

Apart from the fact that there seem to be some fonts missing, there's nothing bad there - if you set your system up to use cyrillic, that's pretty well the reason why I doesn't work, but for the rest of that, I'm at a loss as to why it should prevent X from working. Did you try the GRUB adjustment yet?

Yes, I agree that there is nothing that may prevent X to start up. But you said that these are only the "Errors" (actually these are just warnings) of the first pages; what about the others? If X failed to start, then there should be at least one "real" error, so search the log for "(EE)"..., of course only if MoonMind's Grub-thing didn't work (that was a great tip and I don't want to anticipate).

Try printing the output of grep EE /var/log/Xorg.0.log. This will search the log for all lines with "EE" somewhere on them and output them to the screen.