10.10 does not boot - blank screen

[dmurphy787]

I upgraded 10.10 from 10.04 from the update button from within the update manager. It seemed to upgrade ok but after I shut down and turned it back on it goes to a blank screen. If I then hold the power button to turn it off and back on it then loads to a boot screen where about 6 options with recovery option are listed. The top 2 options do not work as they just go to a blank screen but the bottom 2 give me some other choice including seeming to boot up to a normal Ubuntu environment.
How can I fix it so that it boots to a normal Ubuntu 10.10 Please.
Many thanks in advance for any help.

[s3MA00RRNY]

This is really complicated, so get ready.

Insert your Live CD and boot to the desktop.

Open a terminal and mount your boot drive. Replace sdXX or sdX with the name of your partition or drive.

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/myDrive
sudo mount /dev/sdXX /mnt/myDrive
sudo mount --bind /dev /mnt/myDrive/dev
sudo mount --bind /proc /mnt/myDrive/proc
sudo mount --bind /sys /mnt/myDrive/sys

If you have any separate partitions, mount those as well. For example:

sudo mount /dev/sdXX /mnt/myDrive/boot
sudo mount /dev/sdXX /mnt/myDrive/home

and so on.

Then run:

sudo chroot /mnt/myDrive
grub-install /dev/sdX
update-grub

[sikander3786]

It might simply be a graphic driver issue. Which graphics card are you using?

If you don't see the Grub menu automatically, press and hold down Shift key from the Bios menu until you see Grub. Highlighting the first entry, press 'e' to edit it. Navigate to the lines "quiet & splash", delete them and type "nomodeset" in their place. Press Ctrl + X to continue boot. Can you see the desktop now?

If yes, go to System > Administration > Additional Drivers and activate the drivers for your graphics card (if listed there).

If you don't have an Nvidia card, replace nomodeset with the one from following list e.g, radeon.modeset=0 for ATI cards.

Courtesy of forum member oldfred.

* Older Intel video card: i915.modeset=1 or i915.modeset=0
* nVidia: nomodeset
* Generic: xforcevesa or nouveau.modeset=0
* Radeon: radeon.modeset=0

[sikander3786]

This is really complicated, so get ready.

Insert your Live CD and boot to the desktop.

Open a terminal and mount your boot drive. Replace sdXX or sdX with the name of your partition or drive.

sudo mkdir -p /mnt/myDrive
sudo mount /dev/sdXX /mnt/myDrive
sudo mount --bind /dev /mnt/myDrive/dev
sudo mount --bind /proc /mnt/myDrive/proc
sudo mount --bind /sys /mnt/myDrive/sys

If you have any separate partitions, mount those as well. For example:

sudo mount /dev/sdXX /mnt/myDrive/boot
sudo mount /dev/sdXX /mnt/myDrive/home

and so on.

Then run:

sudo chroot /mnt/myDrive
grub-install /dev/sdX
update-grub
OP doesn't seem to have a problem with Grub as OP can successfully boot into recovery mode. And even if it is a problem with Grub, I am sure this is not the right method to re-install Grub. Not Recommended as there is an easier method to this ;-)

[s3MA00RRNY]

My apologies. I did not read the post thoroughly.

I had recently reinstalled Windows, so unless my memory is extremely poor (and it very well could be :)) this should be the right way.

[sikander3786]

My apologies. I did not read the post thoroughly.

I had recently reinstalled Windows, so unless my memory is extremely poor (and it very well could be :)) this should be the right way.
No problem. But the simplest and most effective method is mentioned here.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2#Reinstalling%20from%20LiveCD

Just 2 commands and you'r done.

[dmurphy787]

Thanks for your input, I tried the suggestions in Ubuntu help and it totally left me up the creak without a paddle this time. I fixed it by reinstalling 10.04 and I'll wait until its a bit more stable.
I still love Ubuntu and Canonical's fantastic product and their efforts to continue the Open Source Community.

[exploitations]

If its a graphic driver problem,
what I did to fix it, was I booted into recovery mode, then selected the one about low graphics or something. Then, I removed the graphics driver, then rebooted, and it seemed to work.
I'll explain my self better if you didn't understand

[dmurphy787]

This issue is not related to your blank screen, sorry. I think that it is a video driver issue, can you please resubmit into the correct area so that you can receive more detailed help.
Regards Darren