Failed X Server
 

Hi,
First post here.

I've been fully Linuxed for a couple of years now. Mint is the flavour for me!

I had a play with an Acer One and liked Limpus Lite that was installed.I have a couple of B series Fujitsu Lifebooks for the kids so I have decided to install LInpus on the Lifebooks.
Lifebooks are a real pain to installed an OS on, the easiest way is to take the HD out and install any OS on another computer.

This is where my problems start. When I reinstall the HD into the Lifebook, Linpus boots up but then I get amessage that Xserver has failed and another message that it is not setup correctly.

As I understand it there is some conflict between the setup on my desktop machine that I installed it on and the laptop configuration. To cut a long story short how do I edit the xserver configuration to work on the laptop.

I've installed a few distros in a simillar fashion but never had this problem.

Any help would be appriciated.

You might want to take a look at the xorg.conf file before doing anything to it, so:
You should be looking for a resolution that your laptop's monitor can't support in the modeline sections.
Before you start editing your xorg.conf make a backup:
You'll need to use whatever console-based text editor you like *cough*vi*cough* to edit those lines and you'll need super user to do that:
Where EDITORNAME is replaced with *cough*vi*cough* your preferred text editor. I of course favour no one editor over another. ;-)

If you still have problems, can you post the parts of the X error log where it has said something has failed - or even the full log.

Hehe, I've just been having this problem. For a couple reasons, I used a different computer to load a harddrive with whatever distro I wanted, and then put that hard drive into another computer.

I know its not exactly kosher, but more than half the time it works.

I got that 'x server error" when I installed debian on a system using a dual core processor which was a few years newer than the system I ended up trying to put the harddrive in (which was pentium 4).

Debian works, but no GUI.

Hi, thanks for the replies.

Had a scan through the xorg.conf file. The monitor section is as follows:-

Section "Monitor"

### Comment all HorizSync and VertSync values to use DDC:
Identifier "Monitor0"
VendorName "Monitor Vendor"
ModelName "My Monitor"
### Comment all HorizSync and VertSync values to use DDC:
HorizSync 30.0 - 72.0
VertRefresh 56.0 - 75.0
Option "dpms"
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Videocard0"
Driver "nvidia"
Option "fbdev" "/dev/fb0"
VendorName "Videocard vendor"
BoardName "SiS 660/661FX/M661FX/M661MX/741/741GX/M741/760/M760"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Videocard0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 16
# Modes "1024x768" "800x600" "640x480"
EndSubSection
SubSection "Display"
Viewport 0 0
Depth 24
Modes "1280x1024" "1280x800" "1024x768" "800x600" "800x480" "640x480"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "DRI"
Group 0
Mode 0666
EndSection

The laptop I'm attempting to get it working on.Has an
8MB ATI Rage Mobility M1 and a 10.4" TFT 1024x768 screen.

Obviously the nvidia driver has to be removed but what do I replace it with
is there a generic driver that will work?.

Form the posts on various sites, I've been on Linpus Lite appears to be a bit of an enigma and a pain to work with so I may be wasting my time, although I do like a good challenge.

Thanks for the info. You're quite right - it's the nvidia driver that's making X go all sulky!

Replace "nvidia" with "vga" This driver should already be installed. You're most likely going to end up with 640x480 horribleness or if you're really lucky a whole 800x600 - but at least you'll be able to see if the computer can now get into X.
Use: startx

Let me know how you get on and then we can move on to correctly configuring X.

Oh, final tip - if you get X and can't get out, use CTRL ALT BACKSPACE together which will kill X.

Tried 'vga' got the same results.
Where does the log file hide.
I'll post it if it would help.

The log files should be in /var/log. In the case of Ubuntu and almost everything else, the file is /var/log/Xorg.log or Xorg.0.log

Actually, I've just thought of a nice easy cheat: Go get a live CD of Ubuntu or anything else that's a live CD and boot that. Assuming this gives you a working X, then you could copy the /etc/X11/Xorg.conf file on to floppy or USB stick and try using that.

I am trying to install Linpus on my older IBM laptop. I am trying run the Live CD before installing the whole enchilada and wiping my existing OS. I am pretty sure Linpus does not like my old ati rage video card but I cannot for the life of me get it to boot with vesa or to text mode. I get the xserver failed message and then the GDM not starting message.

I can get to a terminal with cntrl+alt+F1 (or F2) and see where the install has stopped after int 5. I can type on the terminal screen and text shows up but it does nothing.

How can I get to a login terminal and so I can go into /etc/X11 and try editing or swapping out the xorg.conf file and restarting X? I have tried every combination of cntrl+alt+Fkey, but not terminal.

Thanks in advance for any hints.

Hi,
I'm a newbie to the BB and Linux, and like you and had a similar problem initially. I have a FJ B2131 (192mb / 2gb HDD) and have managed to get Puppy 4.1 up and running without too much trouble. My current problem is getting the touchscreen to work, but that is about to become the subject of a new post.

The B2131 will only boot from FDD or HDD as the CDR is external on PCMCIA. The solution to the problem is three fold.
1. Copy PUP_410.SFS from the distro to a USB stick and plug into the laptop. For some unknown reason Puppy / Linux will not find the file on the distro CD.
2. make a new boot floppy with LINLD.COM on it so that it boot's to the A: drive.
3. Create a BAT file on the floppy with the following:
ECHO ON
REM 4.1
SET DRV=D:
SET CFG=A:\IDECD4.CFG
REM %DRV%\INITRD.GZ
A:\LINLD.COM image=%drv%\vmlinuz initrd=%drv%\initrd.gz cl=@%cfg%

This assumes the CDR to be the D: drive.

Finally, insert the Distro CD in the drive, boot from the Floppy and then run the BAT file above.

As part of the installation Puppy will automatically configure the X-server for you, and you can then tune it afterwards if necessary. CTRL+ALT+Backspace will kill the X-server, and Xorgwizard will enable you to reconfigure it.

Regards, Keith.

Hi kgns1,
There's a thread on the puppy forum regarding the touchscreen here:

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=34273.

I've given up on getting the trackpoint and the touchscreen working together, if you have any success can you let us know.