The installation went smoothly enough but, after configuration, I loose my virtual terminals. When I <ctrl><alt>F1, I get a blank screen. I can then <alt>F7 back to the X session. I believe the video is I810 or something like that.

I have quite a bit of Debian experience, but this is my first Myth and don't really know what to expect.

Help?

I am having a similar issue with an i810 video based motherboard at the moment.

when it boots i get into the mythtv-setup screen, if i ctrl+alt+f1 i get a terminal but then if i try to ctrl+alt+f7 back to the GUI i just get a black screen.

during installation did you get "invalid mode line returned press space to ocntinue" or something like that??

I suspect it has something to do with the monitor you have hooked up during installation as i have had successful installs using an old shitty 15" monitor, however this time i used my high end 21" CRT and i suspect it may have automatically installed video settings that are too high for the video cards capabilities.

will be reinstalling tomorrow with the old monitor, see if it sorts it.

[quote="soundoff"]I am having a similar issue with an i810 video based motherboard at the moment.

during installation did you get "invalid mode line returned press space to continue" or something like that??
[/quote]

I don't THINK so. I have been using a fairly low quality 1024x768 15" monitor and haven't changed.

I have installed Ubuntu Edgy to replace the KnoppMyth and am looking into a Mythtv install on top of it. I've done now two Edgy installs on these EVO/i810 boxes and haven't had any trouble. But, maybe a Mythtv install will break it.

If I knew what the heck I was doing, I probably wouldn't be concerned about loosing virtual consoles.

Hi,
that should be alt+f7 to return. You may want to try ctrl+alt+f2 to see if a console comes up. If it doesn't work, I would suspect the monitor doesn't like the video output. Lcd monitors are funny about vertical frequency.

If you have an xserver running, why not just use alt x ? Besides you can use the mouse for copy and paste then also. If it disappears on you simply do alt tab, just don't hit the - as it hides in the task bar and you have to esc out of the frontend to get at it

I find Drapper 6.06.1 is better than Edgy as there were a couple of things missing from the tool kit I like to use.

One other tip I have found is that if you install / attempt to install to Ubuntu and you end up with a black screen and a blinking _ , then most likely you have a second video card with your i810. Both KM & Ubuntu have failed me with this in that it chose to use the i810 instead of the nvidia card I had added.

With KM the xserver won't start and you will need to edit the XF86Config-4 to match your card.
In Ubuntu, you get the blinking _, (stops blinking after a while )and you have to edit the xorg.conf file to set the proper driver. note that you also need the bus id of your desired card.

This only seems to happen with an onboard i810 video and a second card. It has done this to me on several Dell's and HP's.

Mike

thanks for the tips

so ctrl+alt+fx creates a new terminal and alt+fx switches to an existing one?

My linux skills are limited to the command line, i know nothing about X

Hi.

ctrl+alt+fx opens the first console and takes you out of x, however x continues to run normally. Once in a console mode you may open other consoles and switch between them with alt f1,f2,f3,f4,f5,f6 & then f7 returns to x. The alt+fx while in x means something else. It is a very flexible world

Mike

Ubuntu Edgy seems not to have this i810 problem.

It's my perception that to switch out of X, one must do <ctrl><alt>f1, f2, etc. To switch back to X on console #7, one can use either <ctrl><alt>f7 or just <alt>f7. It is only convention that there are six virtual consoles plus X on #7. It is pretty easy to increase or decrease the number of virtual consoles by tinkering with /etc/inittab. Well, it USED to be inittab. I guess I don't know where it is in modern Debians.

I just noticed that, while the MythTV screen is up, one can get some of the desktop back with <alt>f1.

Hi,

I don't claim to be all knowing, just shared what I have seen. Typical it is 6 consoles. I have not run into ctl+alt+f7 to return, only the alt+f7 .

If you program the mythweb browser to look at the localhost as a url, there will be a link to the document for the keys (on localhost, network not required) and there you will find MANY keys (not all) that do different things at different stages in the menus.

Mike