When i login, there is a command prompt at the corner top of the screen, it's usable, but the background of the rest of the window is default color and the gui dosen't boot

Error messages? Distro and version? What happens after you login?

what command did you try to get the gui working? and what default runlevel are you using? is it possible that you are running in runlevel 2 or 3 that is text based and not gui? try typing: does this start your gui? the more information you can give, the better responses you are sure to get. also try pressing Ctrl - Alt - F7. perhaps you are in one of your virtual consoles, though i wouldn't think you would get there after boot without pressing anything...

Yeah, if you would first like to choose your window manager then type:

then after choosing what window manager you want, type:

and that will start the GUI. It looks like you are using Mandrake but I havn't used Mandrake in FOREVER, when I did I thought the GUI started automatically but I may be incorrect. Good Luck!

Erik

I tried to run startx, and it told me that there "was a fatal server error",
then tried to see if I was in a virtual session or whatever, and thet didn't work...

Hi

like the guys say, you seem to be stuck in runlevel 2 or 3. you want to be in runlevel 5. i had this prob with mandrake 9.2. (Now happy with red hat) if this is so, type in
init 5
then press enter. this should do the job. if not let me know. this is ofcourse after you have logged in at the shell prompt.
hope this was of help
GT

The above error indicates your X server is not configured properly. I don't have Mandrake but try the generic configuration program that comes with X by entering the command

xf86config

I'm having the same problem with the default login...

Well, I try to start the X graphical interface, but it reports problems (something like it found no screens, or a problem with NVIDIA - which is the manufacturer of my graphics card), and the only way to login the graphical mode is going through failsafe and then choosing "graphical and network" (or something like it), and it starts up very well... with KDE and all that stuff... just like I wanted it to start...

But I'd still like to know how to change the default login mode, since I tried to configure it to start automatically at Mandrake Control Center > Boot, and obtained no results or changes...

Well, any help would be usefull...
Thanks,
Diogo Baeder

Oh, and I tried some things suggested here at the replies. These are the results:

init 5 : nothing. Just put another line, like if I had pressed ENTER.

Ctrl + Alt + F7 : went to a clear screen, with a small flickering square at the upper left corner of the screen.

startx : I tried it before... just errors... and why do the "graphical mode" from "failsafe" functions normally???????????

Well, still searching for answers... by the way, does anyone know about any good books about how to learn to use Linux, since I'm a newbie?

may i suggest the book Running Linux from O'Reilly. great book to get you up and running.

as for the login question, could you post a few things for me? i'd like to take a look at the files /etc/inittab and /etc/X11/XF86Config. i'm not familiar with madrake, so the paths may be a bit different, but look around. the inittab file is the one that tells the system, among other things, what run level you would like to boot into. at a LATER time i would suggest changing your default runlevel, as it sounds like it may be set at 3. the reason i say later, is that if you change to graphical login when you have a non-functional x server you may be stuck in the position of not being able to boot or shutdown. not a good place to be. there could be a problem with that nvidia graphics card. have you installed the nvidia drivers from their site? i just have too many questions at this point, i should probably just take it a few at a time. also, did you try the command as root? you need to if you didn't.

Hey, I just fixed it!!! I think I found the answer: my graphical interface was starting only through failsafe, but not through normal boot. But, I don't know why (please, call me a stupid guy), I thought the installation of the NVIDIA driver was ok, and when I simply reinstalled it EVERYTHING came back to normal functionality... man, I've spent hours trying to find out the solution, if I just knew it was SO easy...

Well, at the point when I had the problem, my "inittab" was set to boot to level 5 (graphical by default), and I used the xf86config executable then changed the driver name inside XF86Config, for the NVIDIA hardware acceleration to work (also removed the "Load dri" line), and everything was correctly set up...

But I think the problem was somewhere near the difference between the files "XF86Config" and "XF86Config-4" - I think the failsafe mode used a different one if compared to normal boot, and therefore it worked... and then, when I reinstalled the driver again, it had the correct files in the right places consulted by XF86Config... I think... hehehe... that seems reasonable to me...

Well, buddies, thanks a lot for the help!!! I hope this answer contains the solutions for the other guys with the same problem I had... and I'm sorry for my English, if it's too bad... I'm Brazillian... hehehe...

Bye!
Diogo Baeder

good to hear you got it fixed!

Wow diogobaeder your english sounds perfectly fine!! Glad to here you fixed the problem!