9.0 Mandrake install trouble nvidia goes black on boot
 

I have just reinstalled Mandrake 9.0 on an AMD 1100 processor with a NVIDIA GFORCE video card. It appears the install correctly identified my card and installed the correct driver, however on boot, the install gets to the first step after time synchronization and the display gets reset. The display clears, makes some lines like its thinking about setting the video display and then it goes black. It sounds as if the boot continues normally. I am fairly new to Linux and certainly Mandrake so any and all help to troubleshoot and get fixed would be greatly appreciated. I know the monitor and card are both fine because I can boot Windows XP against the hardware and it works just fine. Please help even to point me in the right direction. Thank you

:(

Sounds like the driver doesn't support the card.

Ctrl+Alt+F1 should give you a command line/terminal.
log in
su to root
and type
vi /etc/X11/XF86Config-4
and scroll down to the line where it says
driver "nv" or
driver "nvidia"
if it says "nvidia" then change it to "nv"
place cursor over first character to be deleted (using arrows on k/board) and use x to delete
Esc followed by :wq tells vi to save and exit
then press Ctrl+Alt+F7 to go back to X
(in case you need to quit vi without saving - Esc :q! )
if it says "nv" then the driver won't support your card, follow the steps above and delete nv and insert (press i to go insert mode) and type in "vesa"

probably worth getting either the latest nvidia drivers or a more up to date version of mandrake

If Ctrl+Alt+F1 doesn't give you a terminal. Reboot and choose "failsafe".
When you see the message "entering single user mode"
type in
init 3
wait for it to present you with a login prompt
then go through above steps

there are LOADS of posts on this site regarding nvidia cards and editing the XF86Config-4 file
worth reading a few before you start

hope this helps
don't hesitate to ask any questions you want to

Thanks salparadise...Got some reading to do.

OK Folks, here's the deal....
Trying the replacement of the "nvidia" with nv led to similar problems. Replacing with vesa allowed me to at least see a desktop and move on, although advanced graphics programs were hosed up, TV card came up 8 bit gray scale so I know we have a driver issue here. I have a Gforce3 and I know there are allot of threads out there.
Since I'm new to this, we do we go from here?

OK Guys, thanks for hanging in there with me. Here is what I have been up to and where I am now:
Tried the following:
1. Downloaded and installed the latest driver from nvidia by
a. editing the XF86Config-4 file setting nvidia to vesa. This got me to at least a desktop although the high res graphics were hosed, at least I could see something
b. Went to Nvidia and downloaded the package for the latest driver
c. Followed the instructions and it appeared to successfully load the new nvidia driver
d. Went back and reeditied the XF86Config-4 file and added back the "nvidia" option
e. Rebooted and it got me some different results, flashing the screen three times before coming back to the blue load sequence and going then into text signon.
f. I performed - service dm stop
g. Then did XFdarke and this time I got something!!!!!!!! a screen with video options I could try. Yea
h BUT every option tried I get:

An error occurred:

(EE) NVIDIA(0) Failed to Initialize the NVIDIA kernal module!
(EE) NVIDIA(0) *** Aborting ***

This occurs on EVERY option, various monitor selections, etc. Any guesses where to go from here. At least I'm getting XFDrake to run.