i had a user logged in fine then this morning when i tried to startx the screen flickered like it was going in then a bucnh of lines came up w/ "WAITING FOR X SERVER TO SHUT DOWN" and then puts me back to $.

my only fix to this is to log into root delete the user and create a new, but same thing happened after i logged in 3 times.

Sounds to me like XFree86 is not being automatically started up and/or it is not in synch with your video card set up.

If you haven't already, get into the video setup section of Mandrake control Center. Switch to 'expert' mode. Don't be intimidated, 'expert' simply means you can see what is going on.

Make sure you test your resolution and color-depth, and opt to have X started up upon boot if that isn't now the case. The system will show you the various video attributes, including the XFree86 server which is probably set to SVGA if you are using 1024x768.

As long as you always test the video settings before accepting them, you can't really do much harm.

thanks alot. i think that was what it was. monitor was 1024x768 and card 800x600. now i can log in

Glad I could help. Its the 'little things' that cause the problems most of the time. Had one myself with a sound card, so don't feel bad about it.

George