7.10 and Thinkpad T22 display (solved)

[Occam]

On Wed, 24 Oct 2007 08:12:48 Occam wrote:
> Using the alternative CD it took a _really_ long time for Kubuntu 7.10 to
> install on the T22 (hanging at 40% and 60% of looking at repositories for
> more than 30 minutes - probably more than an hour).
>
> Now booting into recovery more works ok - but a normal boots results in a
> blank screen, after a line telling that kdm is started and one more line
> (which goes so quickly that I cannot read it) are displayed.
>
> I suspected X (of course) but where is the x log? nothing about x in
> syslog. Normally I use mc to check through directories and files - but mc
> "is not found" when I try to apt-get it.
>
> Any hints on
> a) what went wrong?
> b) how I can fix it?
> c) where (the equivalent of) Xorg.log can be found?
> d) how I can get mc onto the Kubuntu system?

After several hours of work, I have found the answers (I believe) and give 
them here for the possible benefit for others with the same, or similar, 
problems.

a) Kubuntu created a bad xorg.conf
b) in recovery mode, run X -configure and follow through - finally replacing 
the Kubuntu-generated xorg.conf.
Finally comment out the "Option" "dri" line.
c) when X has not started yet, the info can be found in /var/log/kdm.log
d) activate the appropriate repository and do an update. Then mc is found.