no console available

[repsakkgn]

after latest updates i've got none of the consoles(clrl-alt F1-F6) working. it's just an empty screen i see.. what happened&how to fix?
P.S. ubuntu 9.10

[lykwydchykyn]

What kind of video card do you have? If you aren't sure, run this command and post the output here:

lspci|grep -i vga

[repsakkgn]

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation G96 [GeForce 9400 GT] (rev a1)
driver installed from official nvidia site/
this may probably be a grub issue. i have GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=" vga=773" set, but i have the widescreen monitor 1440x900. tryed
GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX=" vga=normal ,but that didnt help.

[lykwydchykyn]

I've not had this problem with nvidia cards. I'm currently using the (proprietary) driver from the repositories with my 8400 GS, is there a reason you downloaded one from Nvidia instead?

[repsakkgn]

the one from the site is newer. thats the only reason. newer doesn't mean it's better though...

[lykwydchykyn]

the one from the site is newer. thats the only reason. newer doesn't mean it's better though...

Very often not, I'm afraid.

I'd try the one in the repos, see if it works better. Or you can see if there's an even newer one on Nvidia's site. What I suspect is that an update to Xorg is not liking whatever version of the driver you have.

[repsakkgn]

Is there a chance for the last official driver to be older than the one in the repos? I doubt it. What about the absense of consoles?

[lykwydchykyn]

Is there a chance for the last official driver to be older than the one in the repos? I doubt it. What about the absense of consoles?

What I'm saying is that the newer version on Nvidia's website may be having a problem with your current version of Xorg. There was an update to Xorg that went out in the last day or two, in theory this could be where the problem started.

When they (Ubuntu) test a package update like this, it's going to be tested against the video drivers in the repositories, not the latest ones from Nvidia. So if there is a bug between the latest Nvidia driver and the new Xorg package, nobody's going to see that. So it's worth trying the OLDER driver package in the repos to see if it's more compatible.

It may have nothing to do with your consoles, but it's where I'd start troubleshooting first. I've had problems in the past (not with Nvidia cards, but with older SiS and intel chips) where the VT's disappeared or became garbled after starting X. It was a video driver issue.

[repsakkgn]

ok. thanx, i'll try the driver from the repos, but the thing is that when i do /etc/init.d/gdm stop there's no console too. Just the blank screen. I believe this command stops the x server...

[lykwydchykyn]

ok. thanx, i'll try the driver from the repos, but the thing is that when i do /etc/init.d/gdm stop there's no console too. Just the blank screen. I believe this command stops the x server...

You may have to select "recovery mode" from the GRUB prompt at boot to get to a console. If my suspicions are correct, the consoles should work as long as X doesn't get launched.