[rhn-users] FC4 yum update killed video - dell laptop

Wed Sep 21 14:49:13 UTC 2005

Red Hat Network Users List writes:
> Hey all, running a Dell Inspiron 300m, did a large yum update (several x
> packages) and on restart run level 5 is dead. I can barely make out the
> bios/boot screen.

We had the same trouble here (Fedora Core 4 running on Gateway E4300s and
E4100s).  My student assistants determined that the latest YUM update of
Xorg packages caused the problem.  Our first fix was to run
system-config-display, which mostly worked (the equivalent for RedHat is
redhat-config-display).  Later, we were able to determine that the
"driver" specified in /etc/X11/xorg.conf had changed to "i810" and when we
changed it to "vesa," X11 worked again.  Your mileage may vary, of course.

Good luck!

Scott

-- 
Scott D. Anderson
Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts
Scott.Anderson at acm.org
http://cs.wellesley.edu/~anderson/