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20030529: help request for RedHat 9.0 Linux problems

>From: Gilbert Sebenste <address@hidden>
>Organization: NIU
>Keywords: 200305292134.h4TLY8Ld000862

Hi Gilbert,

>Just wondering if you could help me out with a problem.
>
>I just upgraded weather.admin.niu.edu to RedHat Linux 9. No problems, 
>except...the monitor doesn't work! The Xfree config causes the whole 
>machine to crash when I boot. So, when I moved the file so that it would 
>have to run Xconfigurator...it couldn't figure out what the monitor sync 
>rate was, etc. And, then, the monitor would go black...and not return to 
>anything useful. I'd have to reboot by logging through ssh and then 
>"shutdown -r now".

We do not have a RedHat 9 system here at Unidata, so we are not
intimately familiar with possible quirks with the OS.  I have an
exchange with a user in Australia who upgraded to RH 9 and was running
McIDAS on it with no problems, so I have to believe that there is some
strange incompatibility between your video/monitor and the version of
Xfree86 being distributed with the OS.

A question:

When you upgraded, did the installation make you run the configurator
for the monitor?  If not, the config file that should have been used
would be the old one -- that worked --.  Correct?

Another question:

Does the machine you upgraded have the same video card as your other
machines?  If not, you could try swapping harware between systems to
see if the RH 9 Xconfigurator will recognize the other hardware.  Since
you already tried a different monitor, the problem has to either be a
bad Xconfigurator, a drop of support by RH for your particular video
card, a video cable that is bad (was it kicked, etc.; the cable could
have been good when Xconfigurator was run in your last OS install and
then got damaged so that now one of the lines that is needed to sense
your monitor capabilities is not working), or some subtle problem with
the RH 9 installation.

Did you go out to Google Groups (tm) and do a search for video
problems being reported for RH 9?

>I'm now running out of runlevel 3, non-graphics mode. Running 
>redhat-config-xfree86 causes the monitor to go black as it probes...and 
>then it hangs. Also, as far as I can tell, all of the 
>redhat-config-xfree86 processes disappear. Maybe, but I dunno. I can't 
>find them.

Hmm...

>So, I can't run X windows or McIDAS until I figure out what's wrong. 
>Swapping monitors from my current ViewSonic E 90 to a Trinitron from Dell 
>doesn't fix things, either. Any clues?

The three things above came to mind.

>If you're curious: login for ...

The problem with logging on is that we can't see the monitor.  I have
never run Xconfigurator from a session that is not looking at the
system console, so I am not sure what this would tell us.

Our system administrator did a Google Groups search for any video
problems being reported by RH 9 users, but he did not find anything
that sounds like what you are seeing.

I also talked with Mike about logging onto weather to see what we
could see, and he thought that this might be a good idea.  We'll
see if we can get to this later today.

Tom