(CLOSED) New install now problems with synaptic will not open

[Cressida]

I am setting up my new HD with only PClinux - or that was the plan anyway.   The install from the CD was normal and the system rebooted from the Grub menu just fine.   Then I did the first update from synaptic.   This was a major update that took about 2 hours and there were several error messages after all the packages updated -  too many to try and read them all and I didn't understand them anyway.   I checked again for any updates from synaptic and got none the second time so I assumed I had an updated system at this point.   There is no USB or wireless devices at this point.  No other OS on the system - just trying to do the basic installation from the CD.  (The checksum on the CD is good and it is the same CD that I loaded PLC 2010.07 onto my wife's computer a month ago.)

After the update finished I rebooted and now the Grub menu screen appears but after that, it boots up to what looks to me to be a terminal (black) screen with "local host login:".   I can log in using my user name and run terminal commands.  I switched to root mode and did a fdisk -l and CPUinfo, and memory check and it all looked normal to me.  

When I tried to shutdown in the terminal using the "shutdown now" command the system goes to a "single user mode" and will not shutdown from there.  I have to manually power it off.     If this helps any I do note a message "Starting Udev_post:  failed "  when it is trying to shutdown.

I read something about redoing the MBR from the LiveCD but there is no such option on the CD.   I have loaded PCL "/" to my SDA2 partition on the HD and it is mounted as "/".  (I have an SDA1 partition that is set up but unused.)   All partitions are EXT4.

Can anyone point out how i can get Grub to load PCL like it should ?     Or see anything else that went wrong in this rather basic attempt to install the OS...      

[djohnston]

The shutdown command is shutdown -h now. It sounds as though you have a video driver problem after the update. What kind of video card do you have (manufacturer)? Is there a vesa mode option in the GRUB menu you can try?

[zafran]

Try read also this thread.
http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,81337.0.html
I began it just for the same problem [solved]

[Cressida]

You both are correct it was related to the video card driver.   Thanks for pointing that out (and the link)!  

I elected to start off again so I reformatted the disk and did another new install.  

Looking through Synaptic I found a Nvidia driver that was for the GeForce 2-4 cards that I selected to use vs. another Nvidia driver that was loaded by default.    It seems to be working OK now and I immediately noticed an increased in response time in loading pages from the web.  

I still have more updates to do from Synaptic as I have been doing a few at a time to try and make sure something doesn't mess up this install.   I see others are reporting problems after their first big updates too.

[johnmart]

I still have more updates to do from Synaptic as I have been doing a few at a time to try and make sure something doesn't mess up this install.   I see others are reporting problems after their first big updates too.

I think you take a risk of bigger problems by doing updates piecemeal.
Better to update fully, and face problems if they come up.
 

[Cressida]

I still have more updates to do from Synaptic as I have been doing a few at a time to try and make sure something doesn't mess up this install.   I see others are reporting problems after their first big updates too.

I think you take a risk of bigger problems by doing updates piecemeal.
Better to update fully, and face problems if they come up.
 

Well it didn't take long for more problems to come up.   Now I cannot get Firefox to open at all.  It appears to try to open but nothing.

And when I try and open Synaptic Package Manager it will not open either.   Here is the error message:

" Command '/usr/bin/synaptic' not found."

Should I be looking for another distribution or what ?      I guess I better quit for another day and try and again in the morning as I'm getting too frustrated.  

Update:  I ended up doing another reformat and reinstall since I never could get Synaptic to work.

[djohnston]

Johnmart's advice is right on the money. See http://www.pclinuxos.com/forum/index.php/topic,63200.0.html.

That is the proper way to update your system.