I have a laptop on which I run Linux. When I first bought it, it had pre-installed Windows OS on in, and, in general, manufacturer only guaranteed support for Windows operating system. However, due to nature of my work, I simply had to reinstall it and put Linux OS instead. I picked up Ubuntu distribution simply because I have been using it for some time, but I strongly believe most of the things mentioned below would be same or very similar with any other Linux distribution - Debian or RedHat based.
Even though almost everything worked right out of the box, I did have some issues with graphical card. Card I have installed is NVIDIA GeForce GT 540M (yeap, laptop is a bit old by now). During system installation process I was able to find, download and install proper legacy binary drivers for it and it performed beautifully.
However, from time to time, update comes along that simply messes up graphical card drivers which renders it unusable. Symptom is usually always the same one: system starts booting up normally, even the login screen is displayed perfectly, but then, after successful login (you can hear appropriate sounds confirming successful login) screen completely goes blank. As if you simply shut off the monitor. Clear indicator that graphical card drivers are not fine.
It happened to me few times already so, when it happened last night, I simply decided to record quick steps how to recover from this problem so next time it happens, I can fix problem within minutes.
Of course, there are several different ways one can solve this problem, but after several times dealing with this issue, I found the following procedure the quickest.
Step 1: Reboot machine and boot in textual mode
To boot machine in textual mode simply wait for bootloader to display boot options, use arrows to select latest option available and then press 'e' key to enable boot option edit.
In options, find line with kernel options and replace 'quiet splash' option with 'text'.
In some cases, instead of 'text' option 'nomodeset' might work and should be able to start graphical interface in default mode, but in situation like this, when I have problematic graphical driver, I always prefer text mode only.
Step 2: Remove graphical drivers you have on machine
Since problem is wrong / faulty graphical driver, my quickest solution was to simply remove all installed drivers. In my case, I simply do:
Use any tool to locate and install correct drivers for your graphical card (e.g. Additional Drivers). After installing and applying correct drivers, everything should get back to normal. I also tend to do one more system reboot just to make sure my changes were not temporary and that system will indeed now work as expected.
Even though almost everything worked right out of the box, I did have some issues with graphical card. Card I have installed is NVIDIA GeForce GT 540M (yeap, laptop is a bit old by now). During system installation process I was able to find, download and install proper legacy binary drivers for it and it performed beautifully.
However, from time to time, update comes along that simply messes up graphical card drivers which renders it unusable. Symptom is usually always the same one: system starts booting up normally, even the login screen is displayed perfectly, but then, after successful login (you can hear appropriate sounds confirming successful login) screen completely goes blank. As if you simply shut off the monitor. Clear indicator that graphical card drivers are not fine.
It happened to me few times already so, when it happened last night, I simply decided to record quick steps how to recover from this problem so next time it happens, I can fix problem within minutes.
Of course, there are several different ways one can solve this problem, but after several times dealing with this issue, I found the following procedure the quickest.
Step 1: Reboot machine and boot in textual mode
To boot machine in textual mode simply wait for bootloader to display boot options, use arrows to select latest option available and then press 'e' key to enable boot option edit.
In options, find line with kernel options and replace 'quiet splash' option with 'text'.
In some cases, instead of 'text' option 'nomodeset' might work and should be able to start graphical interface in default mode, but in situation like this, when I have problematic graphical driver, I always prefer text mode only.
Step 2: Remove graphical drivers you have on machine
Since problem is wrong / faulty graphical driver, my quickest solution was to simply remove all installed drivers. In my case, I simply do:
sudo apt-get remove nvidia-*sudo apt-get purge nvidia-common nvidia-settings-319-updates nvidia-319-updates
Whichever option you have chosen, after removing wrong / faulty drivers, you should be able to move on.
Step 3: Reboot machine and install correct drivers
Simply reboot machine. It should be able to fully boot up using default graphical drivers. Sure, picture you get might not be the perfect one but at least it will get you to your home ground and all familiar GUI tools you use.Use any tool to locate and install correct drivers for your graphical card (e.g. Additional Drivers). After installing and applying correct drivers, everything should get back to normal. I also tend to do one more system reboot just to make sure my changes were not temporary and that system will indeed now work as expected.
