Breezy Installation and Laptop Display

[Keith Burton]

On Saturday 28 January 2006 13:46, Gregg Fowler wrote:
> Have been an Ubuntu user on my desktop for two weeks and love it.
> Installed on my laptop this morning (Compaq Presario 2100, ATI MOBILITY
> RADEON graphics, 15in TFT active matrix display. It seems to boot
> normally with the graphic display showing. After booting thought the
> screen turns black and the sign in isn't displayed though I here the
> "drum beat". I signed in using terminal and ran through the graphics
> installation step by step and everything seems to be ok. When I try and
> get into the gnome desktop I get a failed notice. I really need some
> help. Reformatted the drive and do not want to put windows back on it. I
> would appreciate if anyone has any guidance. I'll be glad to send any
> more info if required.
>
> Thanks

Several ATI video cards don't seem to work with the built-in ati driver, 
particularly the newer ones.

I recommend trying to install the binary ATI-provided driver.
The HOWTO for installing the ATI-provided binary driver is here:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BinaryDriverHowto/ATI

Another thing you can try is setting the driver to "vesa" instead of "ati".
sudo vim /etc/X11/xorg.conf
Look for the line that starts with: Section "Device".
Within that section should be:  Driver "ati"  (or perhaps "radeon").
Change "ati" to "vesa".  Save the file, and try again.
Running with the Vesa driver won't be as efficient, as it's a generic driver 
that can't take advantage of the ATI accelerated graphics.  However, it works 
as a quick test to see if it's a driver problem.  If "vesa" works, then the 
binary driver will likely work too.

Good luck,
Keith