xdm doesn't start on the first go

DONAHUE · Posted: Sat May 01, 2010 4:21 pm Post subject:

experiment:
if you have "splashimage" in grub.conf, comment it out as in: #splashimage (hd0,0)/boot/grub/splash.xpm.gz

nordic bro · Guru Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 585

thought I'd add my two cents because this was v annoying. I never had this happen before, was last using 2.6.31 zen 9, nvidia 185-something, fbsplash, xdm isn't installed (I use e17's login mgr entrance).

few weeks ago I loaded 2.6.33 zen1, patched with latest fbcondecor (maybe, the patch file is there but don't recall if it was needed) and had to update nvidia to 195.36.15 for 2.6.33.

then for the first time in ages boot finishes, starts entrance but instead I just had the b/w speckled bg like for twm w/just a big x cursor. kill X, restart entrance and things work ok. what seemed weird was even if I logged in to a console and manually started entrance, it just wouldn't work - X always had to be started/killed once then restarts worked fine.

found this "remove fadeout" tip here and now everything works again.

isolationism · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 01 Nov 2004 Posts: 127

nordic bro · Guru Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 585

MAN this is fkn annoying. remove fadeout worked so upgraded 2.6.33 zen1 to 2.6.33 zen2. make oldconfig to start, installed, re-emerge'd same nvidia and now entrance/X fails to start again the first time. reboot to 2.6.33 zen1 and entrance/X start.

rebuilt the splash theme I boot with after starting 2.6.33 zen2, reboot and still fails.

reboot to 2.6.33 zen1 and now it fails.

remade splash theme again, boot 2.6.33 zen1 and it again works. brother.

edit: fwiw if I boot w/o fbsplash then 2.6.33 zen2 sees X/entrance start fine. I diff'd the zen1,2 sources wrt fbsplash and they're the same.

grub.conf zen2 entry was a copy of zen1's so if removing fadeout worked for zen1 I don't understand why it didn't for zen2. I realize fbsplash isn't everyone's cause but it seems to have something to do with my problem.

nordic bro · Guru Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 585

I never should've put my first reply in this ticket

incredibly, last night after booting w/o fbsplash and seeing things work then posting, today I boot up the same cfg that worked last night and big shock, the problem is back.

isolationism · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 01 Nov 2004 Posts: 127

I'm still dealing with this problem daily, and as I said, I now have no bootsplash whatsoever of any kind. The only reason I'm not freaking out is that it's little more than an inconvenience; I just hit Alt-F1, sign in, and sudo /etc/init.d/xdm restart and it's fixed. Annoying, but thankfully not as crippling as, say, not having XWindows at all.

DONAHUE · Posted: Mon May 03, 2010 9:21 pm Post subject:

https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=295918

baselayout2?

possible fix is start consolekit before hald see https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-6268348.html#6268348

nordic bro · Guru Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 585

yeah in the scheme of things it's no big deal

however I've been waiting for ages to upgrade to 2.6.32/3 for this intolerable 64b i/o prob I've had for ~2 yrs now.

2.6.31 zen x had super fixes in this regard however the timer settings I had been using now cause vbox to run at 40% cpu when idle, and a particular win app drives up cpu temp by 5C. one big thing fixed, new little things messed up

so I thought I'd give 2.6.33 a try which of course now vbox modules won't compile w/o being patched so I jump through that hoop. proprietary nvidia also won't compile so had to go to 195 which performs worse than 18x I was using; and both seem to require manually linking autoconf.h in src tree.

*finally* ready to give everything a looksee and now bang, entrance/X no longer start. so it's true this one thing is a small matter but trying to get rid of this damn i/o prob is turning out to be a bigger headache than just suffering with it.

Gankfest · Posted: Mon May 03, 2010 11:45 pm Post subject:

Da Fox · Guru Joined: 06 Jul 2005 Posts: 341

first off, sorry for the late reply. I was waiting to see if there would be any progress on the bug-report,
but it is eerily quiet on the gentoo bug tracker lately (and not just for this bug...).

No, I don't have policykit installed:

isolationism · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 01 Nov 2004 Posts: 127

This issue mysteriously stopped happening to me about a week ago after some package upgrades. I'm still suspicious as I suspect above all else it is simply an issue of timing. I'm going to keep watching the thread in the event it does rear its ugly head again.

nordic bro · Guru Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 585

nordic bro · Guru Joined: 25 Oct 2003 Posts: 585

might as well add this is resolved for me. I patched nvidia 185 to compile with 2.6.34, removed libvdpau that 19x installs and my login mgr is back to starting x just fine. if it is a timing-related thing, something about those two nvidia items seems to be involved (in my case anyway).

ahgblopes · Posted: Wed Feb 20, 2013 9:09 am Post subject:

three years later... this is happening to me now, after i removed wicd and installed networkmanager...