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blank screen on switch user

PostPosted: Feb 4th, '14, 19:50
by made_in_womb
Hey ,

New install of Mageia4
Nvidia Geforce 640 ( using propriety Geforce 400 or later driver ) .

So sometimes when I log out and log in with another user name the screen remains blank . I was going to try the xorg driver ,so I went to the set up graphical server and looked at the names under the xorg list ,there is no driver listed that looks obviously nvidia geforce specific .Which one should I use for a Nvidia geforce 640 ? .

Once I do have this blank screen I usually reset the comp . Not good has this has caused my system to be corrupted .Is there a safer method to reboot using just the keyboard that shuts down the system correctly .

Hope this can be resolved as I do want to keep mageia, but the blank screen issue means my system is not reliable .Hopefully the free driver will sort it out .

Re: blank screen on switch user

PostPosted: Feb 4th, '14, 22:14
by doktor5000
For alternative drivers for nvidia, there are nouveau and nv. Not sure if the latter still works, though. And for generic drivers for all video cards you could also try vesa or fbdev.

If you do have a blank screen it depends. That either means no Xserver is running (then you'd actually see console background) or Xserver is running and screen is just off, maybe only locked and you only need to press a key? Also could mean that display brightness is at 0% or completely off.
If the Xserver is running, you can simply press Ctrl+Alt+Backspace and it will immediately restart, taking you back to the login screen.

Apart from that, there's a safer way to restart if kernel is still alive:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_SysRq_key
or viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3044

Re: blank screen on switch user

PostPosted: Feb 4th, '14, 22:39
by made_in_womb
Hi and thanks for the help,

Pressing a key does nothing ,at least Ctrl+Alt+Backspace gets me back to the login screen ( though occasionally the login names /input box doesn't show (just the blue background) and I have to Ctrl+Alt+Backspace again to re-start xserver )
By what I can see it seems that the Xserver does start though does not show the desk top ( black screen with white mouse cursor ).

It's a intermittent bug ,sometimes the desktop shows sometimes not .( always shows on first start-up though )
Anyway, at least I now don't have to reset as the Ctrl+Alt+Backspace does the job :-) thanks .

Re: blank screen on switch user

PostPosted: Feb 4th, '14, 22:54
by doktor5000
Please next time do not use fullquotes, but only use the Reply function. Greatly improves clarity and reading flow ;)
Please mark the thread accordingly by editing the topic of the first post and prefix it by [SOLVED], thanks.

Re: blank screen on switch user

PostPosted: Feb 5th, '14, 17:09
by made_in_womb
Ok about the quotes ,

Though we can hardly mark the issue has solved , I still get this blank screen !.When I sort out the blank screen then it's solved .