Hello there. I am a fresh convert, and have had approximately 2 weeks of experience with Slackware
(or Linux itself, for that matter). However, I've managed, with quite a bit of assistance, to learn some simple stuff.
Like installing drivers and applications from source, install / upgrade packages, setup WiFi, and some other stuff.

But the real nut here for me, that, in these 2 weeks, has broken my system twice, and forced me to start over, is kernel upgrades.

I have upgraded my kernel using the following links: Guide 1 Guide 2

I followed each of the guides pretty accurately, only doing changes that I found necessary for my 64-bit system to accept it,
using correct versions etc, nothing big here, I think.

However, the main and only problem I've had so far, is that after a (seemingly) successful upgrade, I try to restart my system,
choose the new Kernel in lilo, but then it keeps working for approximately 5-10 seconds, then gives me a blank screen.
This is the case with both guides

What bugs me is that both guides have been rather painless, but when it comes to the configuration of the kernel itself,
I feel like an elephant in a glass house. I now assume that there is no "completely correct" way to configure the kernel,
as it has to be custom-tailored to your system, but could anyone please give me a pointer to what might cause this blank screen issue?
I'm ready to dedicate alot of time into upgrading a kernel and getting it good, but I need some pointers along the way.

What is the key elements to a good / successful kernel upgrade?

NB: I have heard that upgrading kernel via slackpkg is a bad idea. Is that still the case (and why)?

Thanks in advance.

Krystah


Some quick specs:

GPU: Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 4500M
CPU: Intel® Pentium® mobile processor T4200
Chipset: Mobile Intel® GL40 Express Chipset

In /etc/lilo.conf make sure to have 'vga = normal', then run 'lilo' as root.

Start over using the kernel you had when you installed.
For your first kernel compile, don't change *anything*. Be sure the kernel sources are installed the same version as you are running. Then cd into the top-level of the sources the link /usr/src/linux should point to the correct full version.
1. Once in there, run the command zcat /proc/config.gz > .config
What that does is copy the exact kernel options you are running into the config file fore the kernel you are about to build.
2. run 'make old_config' which uses that .config file to setup the sources for compiling
3. then start looking at the guides -maybe.
4. run 'make bzImage' to build the kernel itself
4a. do *not* run 'make install'
5. run 'make modules' to build the models
5a. do *not* run 'make mofules_install'
6. follow one of your guides to manually copy your new kernel(bzImage), System.map and the .config file into your /boot directory. USe a slackware-specific guide. You'll want to name these three files conveniently -I'd use something like vmlinuz-2.6.??.??-mine (for the bzImage), then System.map-2.6.??.??-mine and 2.6.??.??-mine.config (for the .config file)
7. once those are manually installed, change the name of the existing kernel modules directory: /lib/modules/2.6.??.?? (should be the exact version you are running, right? add '-old' to the original name.
8. Now, from the toplevel of the compiled kernel sources run 'make modules_install' -that should give you a new directory /lib/modules/2.6.??.??
9. open up /etc/lilo.conf and make a copy of the entry for the running kernel, but add the '-mine' part onto the name of the kernel.
10. run 'lilo' to re-write the MBR
Reboot and choose your new kernel - the one with the '-mine' suffix
11. Now that you've seen how a successful compile and install goes, feel much more confident as you start fooling around with removing or adding options -but do it very slowly -recompiling, installing, running lilo and rebooting each time to avoid confusing breakages. Each time you remove or change an option *write it down on paper*, so if when you try to boot that new kernel and it fails you'll know what broke it. Add that option back and go fishing for more stuff to add or remove.
Lotta trouble this way, but less than any other way -except for using the stock kernels.

1 members found this post helpful.

I seem to remember Pat mentioning a problem with Intel graphics in a recent Slackware release. Perhaps it was in the README.

I don't have much more advice to offer than Gnashley's. That's the way I do my kernels and tend to name them for the target machine (I build packages for them on another box usually) like vmlinuz-2.6.x.x-jabberwok, and the config and System.map the same way.

The biggest thing that can wreak havock is not keeping the old, original kernel installed and in lilo.conf as a backup.

Usual causes for kernel panic are no ramdisk support and not compiling in filesystem drivers (unless you make an initrd and put fs driver modules in that).

The blank screen could be caused by several things but so long as you have the old config of a working kernel to look at you can usually find the issue.

Thanks guys. I will try H_TeXMeX_H's advice now, as I have seen that specific advice on many different forums. I will report back asap!

I just attempted booting into the new kernel, having ucommented "vga = normal" in /etc/lilo.conf and ran lilo after. It still gives me the blank screen, and as earlier,
the entire upgrade process went smooth until now, no errors. Luckily, I saved my old configuration this time, so I could safely boot back into my old config.

Now, where should I start looking? The only shot I've had so far is uncommenting the vga = normal line in lilo.conf, apart from that, I'm clueless. Any pointers? =|

Krys

Which graphics card do you have?
Check the old configuration to see what support was in it for that card (including things like agp module, card drivers, framebuffer console, kms etc).
Apply same settings in new kernel configuration.
Rinse and repeat.

Are you using Slackware 13.1 x64?
Which kernel version are you trying to upgrade to? Where did you get it?
How did you create .config for the new kernel?

By the way, you should also have commented out the old vga= setting in lilo.conf.

Heya! I'm using the latest stable kernel from kernel.org, and I am indeed using Slackware 13.1 64-bit.

I just tried booting into the "non-working" version, and tried carefully typing root and the password, then startx, and judging by the reaction on the machine, it sounded like it worked perfectly, especially since it reacted to my "open konsole" keybind and then properly power-off'd when I (while screen was still black) wrote poweroff in konsole.

Judging by the above, there is apparently just some error on the display part, but changing the vga stuff did not work. No other vga-settings are uncommented.

I don't know if this is the line you're looking for, but I used
And dive, which conf-file are you referring to here:
I guess that most of these questions are pretty dumb, my apologies for that, I just am not that good at this stuff, yet. :/

If you copy the config (found in /boot) for the working kernel into the old stock source (as .config) and do 'make menuconfig' you can see the settings. Exit out of that without saving, cd into you newer kernel source, run 'make menuconfig' again and compare. (or of course have two terminals open so you can see side-by-side.)

Just to be sure, did you run make oldconfig and answer a bunch of questions?

Yes, I ran make oldconfig and pressed "Enter" on link 2 gazillion questions.

I'm afraid I don't really follow these instructions, dive =/ Could you specify which file(s) to copy to what exact location(s)?

Do you mean you want me to compare the contents of config (which points to config-huge-2.6.33.4) and config-custom-2.6.37 (which is the kernel I am updating to)?

I'm sorry for this >_>

Mmm grasping at straws here, but may be you could give us dmesg? If it really works, all but the video, you could log into a tty console blind and save dmesg into a file.