Tried to fix volume control-reboot--NO LOGIN-BLACK SCREEN can't get DESKTOP

Hi lycheetea (or are you carolyn?)

As nobody else has tried to help you yet, I will try to give you a bit of help. I don't know too much about Dell laptops with Ubuntu on them. I hope they are much the same as any other laptop running Ubuntu. If anything I suggest sounds totally foreign, let me know.

First of all, there is some direct support available from Dell. What you need is your 'service tag'. You might be able to get some help that way. Here is a link

http://support.dell.com/support/index.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~ck=mn

Then there is a forum for Linux on Dell at

http://www.dellcommunity.com/supportforums/board?board.id=sw_linux

We will also try to answer your problem here, but we could do with some more information. What is you laptop model? What exactly did you do to get into this state (you said 'I looked up codes and all that for the terminal, and I did one thing'). What files did you modify, or what program did you run, etc.

As for what you describe, your machine has booted into a command console (tty1). Normally it boots into the graphical mode (tty7). Ctrl-Alt-Fkeys are used to switch consoles, so try Ctrl-Alt-F7 to see if it goes to your familiar graphical interface.

There usually is a recovery mode available. I'm not sure how you get to it on your Dell. Maybe pressing Esc at the appropriate time. If you can get into it, you will find an option to fix a broken Xorg configuration (Xorg is the underlying graphical manager). You should try this.

By the way, there is nothing particularly dramatic in what is happening before you get the login prompts. It just probes for a suitable screen resolution for the boot time splash screen then looks to see if there is a 'hibernate' image to load from.

Let us know is any of this helps, and if not, help us with the information I have asked for above.

Tony

Hi Tony,

(Yes, Carolyn is fine :) )

My model of Dell is the Inspiron 1420 (with Intel Centrio inside and N series if thats of any relevance). So, after I upgraded to Hardy, my sound was completely gone, so I went looking at faqs and such and I first did this:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=3633314&postcount=11

and then I went to another form, but I can't find the link (im going to keep looking for it, but I think I skipped a step or something...) It was a lot of steps that you had to do in the Terminal and the last part was to reboot, and when I did, there was no login.

I read a little more and used this code at the end: startx, and that brings my screen gray with a X curser in the middle, so I can at least use my laptop. The login is completely gone, and so is the restart and shutdown icons.

Sound is also not available to my dismay...

Thanks,,
Carolyn

Also, when I did recovery mode, two new options came up:

Ubuntu 8.04, memtest86+

and

Reinstall Operating System (WARNING: all Hard Drive data will be LOST ->

Hi Carolyn

I seem to remember following some instructions some time to do with sound which, as a side effect, removed some rather important packages (gdm and ubuntu-desktop). Possibly you have followed the same instructions, so try this

Boot up and login as you did in your problem description, then enter this command

sudo apt-get install gdm ubuntu-desktop

you will need to give your password when prompted.

When it has finished installing the gdm and ubuntu-desktop packages, you can reboot with

sudo shutdown -r now

It won't hurt if the gdm and ubuntu-desktop packages are already installed.

Tony

Hi Carolyn

Here's a link to another possible fix. Although it deals with a problem noticed in upgrading from 7.04 to 7.10 on 1420's, it is related to the problem that you have (i.e. the Gnome display manager(gdm) isn't starting)

http://linux.dell.com/wiki/index.php/Ubuntu_7.10/Issues/No_Gnome_Display_Manager

Tony,

Thank you so much! The sudo apt-get install gdm ubuntu-desktop worked! I really appreciate all your help. Thank you again!!!

I was wondering though if you knew away to get the sound to work? I'm a bit hesitant to try and type in some more codes...

Hi Carolyn

I'm really glad we have got your desktop back. We are half way to sending you off to college with a functioning machine.

Turning to the sound problem. There is a known problem with the sound being lost on resume from hibernate or suspend. If you are one of those people who just shuts the lid and never really shuts down, this may be your problem. Also make sure you actually do have sound enabled, ie you haven't just pressed your laptop' s mute button.

If you have checked things like that out and they are not the poblem, then we will have to work through the advice at

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SoundTroubleshooting

This is where I went to sort my sound out. Start with the test at the top and let me know if that is your problem.

Tony

Tony,

I did the top part, rebooted, and still no sound. It continues to say this when I try to open volume control:

No volume control GSteamer plugins and/or devices found.

I do sometimes keep my laptop on and shut the lid, but only if I'm in the middle of something and need to go somewhere quick. I do normally use the Shutdown icon.

Carolyn

-- Please be sure all needed kernel modules are installed to make this check and install them:
  So open a Terminal from the menu Applications->Accessories->Terminal and type:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install linux-ubuntu-modules-$(uname -r)

reboot your pc.

If this don't works below some common checks and hints to solve sound issue

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Audio trouble with Ubuntu 8.04 some common checks

-- If you are using a laptop, your laptop may have a keyboard function to manipulate your sound.
   Check that. Your laptop may have a keyboard control to mute, increase and decrease sound.
-- Please check your sound devices volumes are to a high level double click on the top right loudspeaker icon you will see a mixer
-- Please make common test from menu System->Preferences->Sounds
   if you are using PulseAudio please read: http://www.pulseaudio.org/wiki/PerfectSetup or try if using ALSA things go better
-- If you have two audio cards - please disable the on board audio card using BIOS setting, please check with this terminal command:

   lspci | grep -i audio

-- Please be sure your pc are starting with the generic kernel press ESC at boot when you see the GRUB row then select the "kernel.... - generic" row
-- Please be sure all needed kernel modules are installed to make this check and install them:
  So open a Terminal from the menu Applications->Accessories->Terminal and type:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install linux-ubuntu-modules-$(uname -r)

give your user password when requested, you don't see nothing when you type it, then press enter.

Then reboot your pc.

-- Be sure your user is member of audio group
Then open a Terminal from the menu Applications->Accessories->Terminal and type:

sudo adduser $(who am i | cut -d" " -f 1) audio
sudo chmod 660 /dev/snd/*

give your user password when requested, you don't see nothing when you type it, then press enter.

-- Please try to watch what audio cards are detected on your system please type:
asoundconf list

if more than one sound cards is detected by your system to set the default soundcard

asoundconf set-default-card PARAMETER

change PARAMETER with the name of a one detected sound card

-- Please try to delete making a backup copy of this conf files
mv .asoundrc .asoundrc_old
mv .asoundrc.asoundconf .asoundrc.asoundconf.old
sudo mv /etc/asound.conf /etc/asound.conf.old

Please take a look at this http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=205449

-- Please try to discover if there are any process they are keeping the /dev/dsp locked
ps -edalf | grep -i dsp

kill them using this command:

kill -9 number_of_pid

Reboot your pc to see to check if you sound now work.

---------

If you microphone seems don't record your voice please open a terminal and type

alsamixer

and press tab to switch in view to [Capture] section, and then pressing space on mic and mic boost aid

If you are using Pulseaudio and you have some sound issue with sound apps for example with flash contents please read http://www.pulseaudio.org/wiki/PerfectSetup and this http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=4928900

Hope this helps