I had to do something like that when SPARC Linux first came out. I really learned a lot about Sun's FORTH boot prom doing that.
Oh yeah, it can teach you a lot about computers and the hardware you're on.
It was a lot of fun but I'm just older and generally figure I've paid my dues in blood, sweat, and tears and running #!, Manjaero or something like that is what I have time for these days.
Seidkona on
Mostly just huntin' monsters.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
I tried #! out, but when I booted into it the laptop monitor would just turn off. Recovery mode worked fine, so maybe it was the default display driver it installed?
I was using the stable #!. As my posts have indicated, I've been messing with various distros for the last couple weeks, and #! was one of the first. It worked fine that time.
So I went and tried it again a few days ago, and it gives the black screen issue. No difference in install method.
It may however be related to Optimus. I think the first time I installed I had 'Discrete' selected in BIOS before switching it back to 'Optimus' after install. So maybe that's the difference. Might try to mess around with it again tonight.
At some point I need to settle on a distro to use though.
Best way to find one to settle into is to try them.
You might want to consider grabbing a copy of Vitualbox to throw on a stable machine or partition to go through them quicker. That way you can install more than one distro at a time in a virtual machine and compare and contrast them easier.
Seidkona on
Mostly just huntin' monsters.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
I'm mostly settled on using Arch, because I really want to learn how it all ticks. But in the meantime I need a capable desktop environment. I've been using Mint and it's OK, but just not clicking for me.
#! was neat, but I didn't really spend enough time with it on the first go.
EDIT: I will add, I have thought of going all in on Arch though... I don't really have any personal projects running at the moment, and my phone suffices well enough for browsing and social media stuff. Plus my wife has her MacBook if I need something in a pinch.
I highly recommend that type of experience at some point. I have not done it with arch but as I said earlier I used to bootstrap Gentoo from source (never did LFS though) and I learned a lot at the time.
If you have the time and the want to learn it's a fun way to get to know Linux.
Seidkona on
Mostly just huntin' monsters.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
What's a good tiling WM (or just generally something other than Gnome/KDE/XFCE/LXDE) for someone who hasn't played around with them before? Last time I thought about this, Awesome was the thing but I was looking into them today and there are like a billion little ones around that I'd never heard of so maybe there's something better out there. (Either that, or tiling WMs are like to-do lists in that everyone has their "right" way of doing it and they're relatively easy to program so everyone's rolled their own.) I'd like something preferably that's easy enough to slot into Ubuntu so I can go screaming back to Gnome/Unity if I can't hack it (but it's not a dealbreaker, I can probably hack together a login session if it's not packaged up that way already).
I'd probably still say Awesome as it's a very mouse-friendly tiling wm, so it can really ease the transition. But, the only two I've used at any length are Awesome and dwm, so someone may have other suggestions.
Right now, my work machine is rolling with XFCE. I found that I really hate locking a web browser into a tile, but I LOVE organizing my terminals... with you can do nicely with a large Terminator layout.
I had the open source radeon driver working, but I couldn't figure out how to fix the colorspace for output to my tv, so I tried the fglrx and then everything went wrong
now I can't get the open source radeon drivers working again either, it's just a white screen ;_;
End on
I wish that someway, somehow, that I could save every one of us
hi guys, I am trying to install LinuxMint on my Samsung Series 7 Chronos laptop but every time I try to boot a live USB I just get a black screen and nothing
to be specific, I get a GRUB menu that lets me choose Mint, Mint (Compatability Mode) and some other junk.
If I choose either Mint options, I just get blackness for multiple minutes. I've tried editing the boot command with nomodeset and some other graphics settings tricks recommended for similar errors to absolutely zero fucking avail
I am open to any and all ideas on how to get around this
1. Did you verify that the ISO downloaded correctly by doing an md5sum on it? A corrupted image can cause all manner of oddness.
2. Quick Google found this: http://forum.notebookreview.com/samsung/723676-linux-series-7-2013-ativ-book-8-a.html. I'd check the BIOS settings against this guy's, I'd guess they need to be the same, even though he's dual-booting.
Great little utility, tiny download, big peace of mind.
Another thing I just thought of: when you get to the black screen, hit ctrl+atl+f1. Maybe it's trying to do a graphical boot and failing to render?
linkdead right now
I'll try ctrl+alt+f1
the common thought on the interwebs is that whatever is coming up after the GRUB menu is un-renderable, hence various graphical adjustments in the GRUB command including nomodeset and GRUB_GFXMODE=someresolutionyouknowyourmonitorsupports
but I'll try those keys
also a good reliable USB maker would be nice... seems like a total crapshoot on the internet
UNetBootin should work fine with Mint; it was built for Ubuntu, and Mint's an Ubuntu derivative.
Ctrl+alt+F1 switches to Virtual Terminal 1; typically X and other graphical stuff is on 7, while you can see the boot stuff on 1. Might give you a clue as to what's going wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_console
0
Options
augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
edited March 2014
My main laptop finally crapped out so I'm gonna get an Acer c720 and Chrubuntu that shit.
UNetBootin should work fine with Mint; it was built for Ubuntu, and Mint's an Ubuntu derivative.
Ctrl+alt+F1 switches to Virtual Terminal 1; typically X and other graphical stuff is on 7, while you can see the boot stuff on 1. Might give you a clue as to what's going wrong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_console
Update. CTRL+ALT+Fanything does nothing.
I got UNetBootin and did the checksum and everything looks fine. UNetBootin even configures Grub to run at my screen resolution addressing that concern I had (unsupported resolution)
I have googled the exact model number and service tag of my laptop and there are numerous reports that Ubuntu installed without issue in "UEFI mode"
How can I tell if that's how it's trying to install in my case? I've tried to check BIOS for UEFI settings and haven't found anything conclusive
figured out how to disable Secure Boot, able to boot Linux... mint installer crashed on first attempt leaving a hideous crater of dead partitions and venomous error messages
trying again...
0
Options
augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
but now no boot options to pick Linux. Just straight into windows still. Any way to fix from liveusb?
*edit* apparently i have to install in UEFI mode to do this. finally found a liveusb creator that can pump out a UEFI grub that actually boots... will try again tomorrow with clean slate
i have isolated the issue. everything is mostly working correctly now
My computer only has the more advanced boot partition type (not MBR)... so it was a matter of finding a LiveUSB program that could manage that properly. I finally happened upon Rufus which worked like a charm on try #1
when I used UNetBootin, I had to disable UEFI support and go full blown legacy mode, which allowed me to install Mint but failed to properly update the boot record, as it was trying to update the MBR, and not the newer sexier alternative
I didn't see any way to force this correction in legacy mode, so I remade the stick with Rufus, was able to launch via UEFI, and install mostly properly
For some reason it has two different Linux Mint options now in my Grub menu, but the important thing is at least one of them works and Windows 8 is there as well, and functioning
Very very very few posts and blogs on the linux community forums addressed this problem directly. I wonder where I could share my knowledge.
Only thing I don't know for sure is why other liveusb programs weren't able to operate in UEFI mode... unless those all have to temporarily dick with the boot record even to launch as a liveusb
For some reason it has two different Linux Mint options now in my Grub menu, but the important thing is at least one of them works and Windows 8 is there as well, and functioning
This part is pretty normal; most Linux distributions have a "regular" boot and a "fallback" boot, usually an older, stable kernel; if for some reason, you can't boot after an update, it's your "fallback to a working kernel to get booted and fix it" option. You'll probably never use it.
Congrats on getting it installed!
0
Options
mightyjongyoSour CrrmEast Bay, CaliforniaRegistered Userregular
This may have changed in the last year or so, but I remember that many distros did not support UEFI boot as a form of protest. I think maybe Fedora and one or two others were the only ones who supported it out of the box, everyone else had to do some grub magic.
Its likely that the liveUSBs didn't work because the UEFI bios was preventing it from loading, and not because there was anything wrong with the liveUSB.
This may have changed in the last year or so, but I remember that many distros did not support UEFI boot as a form of protest. I think maybe Fedora and one or two others were the only ones who supported it out of the box, everyone else had to do some grub magic.
Its likely that the liveUSBs didn't work because the UEFI bios was preventing it from loading, and not because there was anything wrong with the liveUSB.
well i was able to load a Rufus USB with UEFI using the same exact ISO as all the others... so I mark that down as Rufus is doing something right and the others doing something wrong
This may have changed in the last year or so, but I remember that many distros did not support UEFI boot as a form of protest. I think maybe Fedora and one or two others were the only ones who supported it out of the box, everyone else had to do some grub magic.
Its likely that the liveUSBs didn't work because the UEFI bios was preventing it from loading, and not because there was anything wrong with the liveUSB.
Goddamnit, distro-managers. This is why we can't have nice things.
So, my experimenting with Arch is over for now. Just did not have the time to go in and configure everything. It was a hell of a lot of fun though, and have learned quite a bit. When things calm down I'll carve out some time to play around with it more.
So, for a working out of the box desktop and a good level of support, I opted to use Xubuntu 13.10. Liking it so far, and have at least got Steam and Bumblebee up and running, as well as fixing some tearing during scrolling. Going to do a bit of theming to get it looking how I want, as well as configuring Conky, and then I can get some Dev tools on there.
Speaking of Xubuntu 13.10, I just figured out that the reason I can't access my company's lab ticketing system was because the Ubuntu family runs dnsmasq as a local DNS resolver/cache, and it refused to play nice with browser redirects to a single-sign-on page, refusing to resolve the IP.
Commented it's startup out of /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf, and now I can resolve the name properly.
This is what I miss about Arch; I knew every god damn nook and cranny of my OS and how it was configured. This "trusting the distro" shit is trouble, I tells ya! TROUBLE!
Is there any non-buntu OS that's stable, simple, and hotness these days?
#!'s not bad, I've been running it in a VM at home, but dunno if I'm ready for a workplace commitment. And yeah, it's Debian based now.
If I could have gotten Archbang to work properly, that's the route I would have gone. Unfortunately I kept getting some kind of key error when using pacman, so wasn't able to install or update anything.
#!'s not bad, I've been running it in a VM at home, but dunno if I'm ready for a workplace commitment. And yeah, it's Debian based now.
If I could have gotten Archbang to work properly, that's the route I would have gone. Unfortunately I kept getting some kind of key error when using pacman, so wasn't able to install or update anything.
Reading on it, it doesn't address my biggest complaint with Arch: being a rolling release, it was CONSTANTLY updating packages that broke each other, removing packages in favor of other packages, and requiring manual intervention to fix broken links, broken configs, etc. on every update. And since I'm kinda lazy about updating, I'd often do an update only to find that I have to comb through 7 different work-arounds on the mailing list for packages they changed that intentionally break things.
I think #! may be the happy medium then. If I had a bit more time to figure out my blank screen issue on boot (pretty sure it's a resolution thing) I would have opted to go that way.
It also has a pretty good community around it, and OpenBox is just very neat and tidy.
Did a Google to see what Arch has broken recently. I can't help but think that they'd improve their user relations several times over if, instead of relying on everyone reading the mailing list, major changes (like when they replaced initscripts with systemd) should cause a notification IN PACMAN prior to actually saying "yeah, update that, yo".
I know it likes to throw notices in when that package installs, but that's no good. If I run pacman -Syu and you're going to do a major change that requires me to go reconfigure shit, say something before going ahead.
Ok, done venting.
I really love Arch, I do, but rolling releases are a young man's game, and I just can't keep up anymore. ;-)
Posts
I had to do something like that when SPARC Linux first came out. I really learned a lot about Sun's FORTH boot prom doing that.
Oh yeah, it can teach you a lot about computers and the hardware you're on.
It was a lot of fun but I'm just older and generally figure I've paid my dues in blood, sweat, and tears and running #!, Manjaero or something like that is what I have time for these days.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
So is that a case of going in on recovery and changing a config file? If so, how would I do that? Grub perhaps?
So I might not be the best person to field this question as most of the internals have changed.
Edit: Did you use stable or the newest alpha?
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
I can't find any evidence that #! has an alpha atm.
I follow a few distros and got them mixed up.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
So I went and tried it again a few days ago, and it gives the black screen issue. No difference in install method.
It may however be related to Optimus. I think the first time I installed I had 'Discrete' selected in BIOS before switching it back to 'Optimus' after install. So maybe that's the difference. Might try to mess around with it again tonight.
At some point I need to settle on a distro to use though.
You might want to consider grabbing a copy of Vitualbox to throw on a stable machine or partition to go through them quicker. That way you can install more than one distro at a time in a virtual machine and compare and contrast them easier.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
#! was neat, but I didn't really spend enough time with it on the first go.
EDIT: I will add, I have thought of going all in on Arch though... I don't really have any personal projects running at the moment, and my phone suffices well enough for browsing and social media stuff. Plus my wife has her MacBook if I need something in a pinch.
If you have the time and the want to learn it's a fun way to get to know Linux.
XBL:Phenyhelm - 3DS:Phenyhelm
Right now, my work machine is rolling with XFCE. I found that I really hate locking a web browser into a tile, but I LOVE organizing my terminals... with you can do nicely with a large Terminator layout.
I had the open source radeon driver working, but I couldn't figure out how to fix the colorspace for output to my tv, so I tried the fglrx and then everything went wrong
now I can't get the open source radeon drivers working again either, it's just a white screen ;_;
to be specific, I get a GRUB menu that lets me choose Mint, Mint (Compatability Mode) and some other junk.
If I choose either Mint options, I just get blackness for multiple minutes. I've tried editing the boot command with nomodeset and some other graphics settings tricks recommended for similar errors to absolutely zero fucking avail
I am open to any and all ideas on how to get around this
Thanks
2. Quick Google found this: http://forum.notebookreview.com/samsung/723676-linux-series-7-2013-ativ-book-8-a.html. I'd check the BIOS settings against this guy's, I'd guess they need to be the same, even though he's dual-booting.
*edit*
3. Make sure your model isn't one of these: http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Booting-Linux-using-UEFI-can-brick-Samsung-laptops-1793958.html
That is roughly my model of laptop on #3 but that bug has been patched and I have the patch
Haven't looked into the ISO.. but I've never had these problems before when downloading
Great little utility, tiny download, big peace of mind.
Another thing I just thought of: when you get to the black screen, hit ctrl+atl+f1. Maybe it's trying to do a graphical boot and failing to render?
linkdead right now
I'll try ctrl+alt+f1
the common thought on the interwebs is that whatever is coming up after the GRUB menu is un-renderable, hence various graphical adjustments in the GRUB command including nomodeset and GRUB_GFXMODE=someresolutionyouknowyourmonitorsupports
but I'll try those keys
also a good reliable USB maker would be nice... seems like a total crapshoot on the internet
Ctrl+alt+F1 switches to Virtual Terminal 1; typically X and other graphical stuff is on 7, while you can see the boot stuff on 1. Might give you a clue as to what's going wrong.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_console
Update. CTRL+ALT+Fanything does nothing.
I got UNetBootin and did the checksum and everything looks fine. UNetBootin even configures Grub to run at my screen resolution addressing that concern I had (unsupported resolution)
I have googled the exact model number and service tag of my laptop and there are numerous reports that Ubuntu installed without issue in "UEFI mode"
How can I tell if that's how it's trying to install in my case? I've tried to check BIOS for UEFI settings and haven't found anything conclusive
trying again...
but now no boot options to pick Linux. Just straight into windows still. Any way to fix from liveusb?
*edit* apparently i have to install in UEFI mode to do this. finally found a liveusb creator that can pump out a UEFI grub that actually boots... will try again tomorrow with clean slate
My computer only has the more advanced boot partition type (not MBR)... so it was a matter of finding a LiveUSB program that could manage that properly. I finally happened upon Rufus which worked like a charm on try #1
when I used UNetBootin, I had to disable UEFI support and go full blown legacy mode, which allowed me to install Mint but failed to properly update the boot record, as it was trying to update the MBR, and not the newer sexier alternative
I didn't see any way to force this correction in legacy mode, so I remade the stick with Rufus, was able to launch via UEFI, and install mostly properly
For some reason it has two different Linux Mint options now in my Grub menu, but the important thing is at least one of them works and Windows 8 is there as well, and functioning
Very very very few posts and blogs on the linux community forums addressed this problem directly. I wonder where I could share my knowledge.
Only thing I don't know for sure is why other liveusb programs weren't able to operate in UEFI mode... unless those all have to temporarily dick with the boot record even to launch as a liveusb
This part is pretty normal; most Linux distributions have a "regular" boot and a "fallback" boot, usually an older, stable kernel; if for some reason, you can't boot after an update, it's your "fallback to a working kernel to get booted and fix it" option. You'll probably never use it.
Congrats on getting it installed!
Its likely that the liveUSBs didn't work because the UEFI bios was preventing it from loading, and not because there was anything wrong with the liveUSB.
well i was able to load a Rufus USB with UEFI using the same exact ISO as all the others... so I mark that down as Rufus is doing something right and the others doing something wrong
Goddamnit, distro-managers. This is why we can't have nice things.
So, for a working out of the box desktop and a good level of support, I opted to use Xubuntu 13.10. Liking it so far, and have at least got Steam and Bumblebee up and running, as well as fixing some tearing during scrolling. Going to do a bit of theming to get it looking how I want, as well as configuring Conky, and then I can get some Dev tools on there.
Commented it's startup out of /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf, and now I can resolve the name properly.
This is what I miss about Arch; I knew every god damn nook and cranny of my OS and how it was configured. This "trusting the distro" shit is trouble, I tells ya! TROUBLE!
Is there any non-buntu OS that's stable, simple, and hotness these days?
Crunch is no longer based on Ubuntu but on Debian, right?
What about one of the Red Hat derivatives? What's Fedoras rep?
If I could have gotten Archbang to work properly, that's the route I would have gone. Unfortunately I kept getting some kind of key error when using pacman, so wasn't able to install or update anything.
Reading on it, it doesn't address my biggest complaint with Arch: being a rolling release, it was CONSTANTLY updating packages that broke each other, removing packages in favor of other packages, and requiring manual intervention to fix broken links, broken configs, etc. on every update. And since I'm kinda lazy about updating, I'd often do an update only to find that I have to comb through 7 different work-arounds on the mailing list for packages they changed that intentionally break things.
And I ain't got time for that shit.
It also has a pretty good community around it, and OpenBox is just very neat and tidy.
I know it likes to throw notices in when that package installs, but that's no good. If I run pacman -Syu and you're going to do a major change that requires me to go reconfigure shit, say something before going ahead.
Ok, done venting.
I really love Arch, I do, but rolling releases are a young man's game, and I just can't keep up anymore. ;-)