LiveCD Screen Unreadable

[tonitone]

To djohn.:  I am trying to boot the LiveCD from the hard drive. The "boot line" is in the Grub menu (Grub4Dos).
When it tries to boot I get the text output from the boot processes and then when it tires to go into a graphic mode it makes a pleasant but unusable design on the screen.

The screen is basically white with a horizontal and vertical line pattern then a dark reddish blotch appears and grows on the screen. This develops until finally the screen is almost black with the outline of a dark square border with a wavy right side.  No text, no menus, no recognizable graphic.  (I don't know how to brake out to the command line so I am just trying things.)

Same Screen problem with two different ISOs.  LXDE and OpenBox
So I am trial and erroring my way through the grub boot menu adding stuff like fbdev and other graphic card related things.

T. 

[Just18]

I am trying to boot the LiveCD from the hard drive.

By what arrangement?

Have you installed the LiveOS to the HDD?

Have you some other arrangement made?

[tonitone]

Hi Just...
This is the setup I have:
The Iso is extracted to a Fat32 partition.
Grub4Dos boot from a menu entry that looks like this...

title PCLinuxOs LiveCD
kernel (hd0,4)/isolinux/vmlinuz livecd=livecd initrd=initrd.gz
root=(hd0,4) acpi=on splash=verbose fstab=rw,auto
initrd (hd0,4)/isolinux/initrd.gz

At which point Grub does something and then the PCLinuxOS iso begins to load. Detecting  hardware, starting systems etc.  at the end of which- I get the muddled graphic

T.

[Just18]

Hi Just...
This is the setup I have:
The Iso is extracted to a Fat32 partition.
Grub4Dos boot from a menu entry that looks like this...

title PCLinuxOs LiveCD
kernel (hd0,4)/isolinux/vmlinuz livecd=livecd initrd=initrd.gz
root=(hd0,4) acpi=on splash=verbose fstab=rw,auto
initrd (hd0,4)/isolinux/initrd.gz

At which point Grub does something and then the PCLinuxOS iso begins to load. Detecting  hardware, starting systems etc.  at the end of which- I get the muddled graphic

T.

Try using Ctrl+Alt+Backspace to get out of the Graphic mode.

That should give you a prompt to log in and try some of the previous suggestions.

[tonitone]

Ctrl+Alt+Backspace breaks out of the graphics mode but it immediately restarts.  I need to do that several times until the display mode times out for two minutes.  I was then able login and FXdrake but the changes made no difference.  I wouldn't know the syntax of "safemode" or "safeboot" because the machine is already booted and vesa by itself has no effect either. 

I read somewhere that older laptops have a problem with apic and I am trying to tweek the grub boot line but sofar I can't get apic to turn off.  Seaching the web I example that only contain fragments of the syntax.  I guess I have to refine my search to try to single out results that have a full context of a grub title hoping it works for this version.  Oh, I just read that I have to look at the distibution for the correct boot sytax.
Ok the search goes on.

T.

[Just18]

there should be threads on this forum concerning the use of

noapic
nolapic
noacpi


searching the forum for one of those might throw up something useful

[tonitone]

I was able to establish that it is a driver problem by experimenting with other distros. I was able to boot SilTaz with no problem. Installation however failed because it tried to mount the non-existing cd.  (remember this is a livecd boot from harddisk.)  After that i tried a wubi install in windows but with the same distorted graphics but found out from a forum that the graphic are ok on an external monitor.  From the booted LiveCD and external monitor, I was able to install the correct nvida driver and set resolution to 1400X1050 and get the laptop screen to work.  However, the install wizard crashes when run.  I tried running the live cd with the install boot line appended this just stops during a reboot.  I guess it is looking for a non existent cd.

Any suggestions of how i can install from a running LiveCD from the command line with reference to an .iso or kernel on the harddisk?




 

[Just18]

....
  From the booted LiveCD and external monitor, I was able to install the correct nvida driver and set resolution to 1400X1050 and get the laptop screen to work.  However, the install wizard crashes when run.
....

Run the install wizard from the command line ......  when it crashes it may show why .....


draklive-install

[djohnston]

(remember this is a livecd boot from harddisk.)  After that i tried a wubi install in windows but with the same distorted graphics but found out from a forum that the graphic are ok on an external monitor.  From the booted LiveCD and external monitor, I was able to install the correct nvida driver and set resolution to 1400X1050 and get the laptop screen to work.  However, the install wizard crashes when run.  I tried running the live cd with the install boot line appended this just stops during a reboot.  I guess it is looking for a non existent cd.

Any suggestions of how i can install from a running LiveCD from the command line with reference to an .iso or kernel on the harddisk?
 

Are you still running this from a "live CD" that is actually an iso image on a USB drive? If so, is there some reason why you are not using an actual CD? What method (unetbootin or other) did you use to put the iso on the USB drive? When you boot from the USB, do you have a persistence mode option that allows you to save changes to the USB drive?

[tonitone]

Run the install wizard from the command line ......  when it crashes it may show why .....
 draklive-install

Can't locate object method "new" via package "ugtk2" at /usr/sbin/draklive-install: line 107....corrected.
Problem rebooting. partition numbers changed....
Ok got beyond that now partitioning drive.  

IT'S INSTALLING!   Now I just have to figure out how to configure grub so I can boot the new installation.
Ok, I  reinstalled and the grub is working. 
Just have to solve my Graphic Card driver problem...
 
Thanks for your help.

[tonitone]

Are you still running this from a "live CD" that is actually an iso image on a USB drive?

I am loading the kernel and filesystem from files extracted from the .iso to a fat32 partition and booting with Grub4Dos (no CDplayer, no USB Boot support)  Correction: booting the livecd squash file.