[xubuntu-users] non-rebooting 14.04 blank screen problem...

Steve Litt slitt at troubleshooters.com
Wed Jul 2 02:45:44 UTC 2014


When you talked about hardware based intermittents, you got me thinking
of a box of mine that would either intermittently reboot just for the
fun of it, or boot part way and die. Turned out I could toggle the
symptom by removing and reattaching the power and boot switches. If I
booted it with a screwdriver it worked every time.

So I went to Home Depot, bought a $2.00 2 wire doorbell switch (without
a light, the light would have caused failure), and wired that to the
pins for the power switch. Never had a problem again, and my computer
was soooooo stylish!

Here's the story, if anyone's interested:
http://troubleshooters.com/tpromag/200807/200807.htm

Anyway Rob, you bring up the excellent point that whenever you get an
intermittent, you shouldn't discount hardware.

SteveT

Steve Litt                *  http://www.troubleshooters.com/
Troubleshooting Training  *  Human Performance




On Wed, 02 Jul 2014 10:54:25 +1000
Rob Ward <rl.ward at bigpond.com> wrote:

> 
> My XUbuntu was booting erratically also.  I tracked the problem to a 
> cheap SATA splitter power cable I had sourced "from the internet". I 
> believe I had overloaded one of the leads from the power supply, too 
> much plugged in (3 hard drives + CD) plus a cruddy lead.  Cutting a
> lead with 3 SATA power plugs off a dead PC case, removing a lead with
> three standard power plugs from this machine and soldering the SATA
> lead in its place.  Problem solved!!  Nice quick, clean boots every
> time.  No more pauses or stalling.
> 
> Worth consideration?  Any hardware changes recently?
> 
> Rob
> 
> 
> On 02/07/14 03:07, Joshua O'Leary wrote:
> > Does it boot with nomodeset (add it as an option in grub)? Maybe it
> > is a buggy graphics driver.
> >
> > Joshua
> > On 30/06/14 20:04, Gary Charvat wrote:
> >> Giving you a heads up -- I previously write that my 14.04 would
> >> not boot and went to a blank screen.
> >>
> >> Well, I goofed around with all the possible boot-options -- got to 
> >> the point of frustration and let it sit for a n hour or so - then 
> >> tried again.
> >>
> >> I finally got to a point where I got the message  -- where the
> >> "OK" was in BLACK,
> >>      "Starting Load Fallback Graphics Devices        [OK]"
> >> Then another message
> >>      "Starting Load Fallback Graphics Devices [FAIL]"  -- where
> >> the "FAIL" was in RED
> >>
> >> At that point I felt the frustration and just powered down. When I 
> >> was finished with another project I thought I'd try again -- hit
> >> the power switch & "Wall-ah" everything came up perfectly...
> >>
> >> Just thought I'd alert you to a possible problem...
> >> -- 
> >> Regards,
> >> Gary
> >>
> >>
> >> Gary P. Charvat
> >> 50 Greystone
> >> Shelton, CT  06484
> >>
> >> (203) 929-9187
> >> eMail:g.charvat at snet.net
> >>
> >> <<<<>>>>
> >>
> >> IMPORTANT NOTICE:
> >> Please excuse any typos as the individual entering this message
> >> has Parkinson's disease... THANK YOU!!!
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> 






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