passed an undefined mode numberForum: HD Install Topic: passed an undefined mode number started by: qrtback10 Posted by qrtback10 on Sep. 01 2006,07:44
DSL goes fine onto my cpu, or if I wanted, installed to my hard drive but it doesnt load the icons for some reason. I think it has to do with what comes up right at the beginning of the boot which I havent seen before "you passed an undefined mode number" I read to go into setup and run vga=normal, but the same problem persists! Thank you in advance for your help!
Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Sep. 01 2006,14:38
Are you running from a fresh livecd?Run xtdesk from a terminal and maybe you can see the errors there. Posted by qrtback10 on Sep. 01 2006,23:06
Thanks i'll try that. What is 'fresh'? I've used it before on about 10 others.
Posted by kerry on Sep. 01 2006,23:22
try typing> dsl xsetup <when you first start the disk.
Posted by qrtback10 on Sep. 01 2006,23:31
...and then what kerry? It goes into the same setup as before ...you passed an undefined mode number... also, I couldnt find aterminal without the icons being displayed!
Posted by brianw on Sep. 03 2006,22:03
For the aterminal right click on desktop to get the menu then choose one of the Xshell options.As for the icons I have found if you are trying to run at a resolution/colour depth setting that your system can't handle then you won't get icons. I just purchased a dell gx100 pIII 700 and with the grapjics card that is in it I can't run in 1024x768x24. If I choose 800x600x24 the icons show up. Run xsetup until you get the right combo that works. As for the undefined mode number it seems to make no difference after you get the system up and running (just slows down the boot process, when I run the scan it can't seem to find a definate mode number anyway so maybe that is the problem with mine). I also find that this happens if you use vga=7?? instead of vga=normal when booting. Unfortunately if you don't use vga=7?? you can't use Xfbdev. If you are using only Xvesa then you can use vga=normal without a problem but if you try to switch to the Fb device then you will get an X error when you run startx because it can't find a /dev/fb? device. When you boot from livecd it automatically has a vga=7?? so I get that whenever I run from livecd. Not sure if vga=normal will over ride this on livecd or frugal. It does on a regular HD install but then the boot string is customized. Should work with frugal grub/lilo install where the boot line contains vga=normal but I don't use frugal so I can't be sure. Posted by Juanito on Sep. 04 2006,06:53
I had this problem when I first started using DSL.In the end I had to use XFree86 to get around it - I still get the "you passed an undefined mode number" error message but once the boot process has finished at least I get the icons and resolutions/colour depths other than VGA. Maybe the problem is graphics chip/card related - I have a Intel 82852/855GM Integrated Graphics Chip Posted by odradek on Sep. 04 2006,14:31
Try using bootcode vga=771 or vga=773 instead of vga=normal. My laptop (dell inspiron w/ intel 82830 chipset) doesn't like vga=normal, but accepts either of the two settings above. when you use xfree86, the vga=xxx setting only affects the appearance of the text that scrolls by during boot, it has no effect once x starts (but I don't know if that applies to the other x servers)
Posted by qrtback10 on Sep. 05 2006,02:35
thank you all I will try all of these and let you know how it goes. I appreciate the help!
Posted by qrtback10 on Sep. 05 2006,23:33
Ok, here's what I ended up doing to get around it. It's pretty simple. I booted like normal went past all of the 'undefined mode number' to get to the desktop with no icons. Then I selected Xvesa from the menu, and clicked 800x600x16 (all three worked actually but this one I chose because it looked the best). And then installed to hard drive and it installed in that resolution that I set. Thanks again everyone! Hope this helps some people.
Posted by brianw on Sep. 10 2006,01:20
More info on the undefined mode number. During some testing on an HP vectra pIII 733 I ran the scan instead of pressing space to go on (when I pressed enter I was presented with a list of modes and when I ran the scan I was presented with the same list so I assumed that the list was what it had originally found the system could handle). I tested some of the modes (just chose a number 0 then 1 then 2 etc...) and what I found was that the mode was used for the rows and columns for the console terminal (didn't affect the virtual X terminal). I then added the code for 80x25 to the boot line vga=0f00 and the undefined mode problem disapeared. I also tried the 132x80 (not sure if those were the exact numbers or not but close enough for this explanation) and it worked it is just that the text was pretty small (but as I stated it did not affect the 800x600 X terminal once it came up). If I switched to terminal 1 the text was small but when I switched back to vt5 the X terminal was normal.The short version of this is that to get rid of the undefined mode set vga=<whatever mode you want for the console terminal text i.e 0f00 for text screen 80x25>. This will probably only work for hard drive installs because it would appear that the vga code is used by the knoppix scripts to avoid the need for running xsetup at each boot (I may be wrong about that point as I don't run liveCD or frugal so I am not sure about that but I do know that on an HD install this works). Posted by Trog Dog on Sep. 10 2006,06:46
I just tried that on my GX100 and it worked. I think it it has to do with the cutdown xserver that DSL uses, because I previously had Puppy linux installed on this machine and it runs xorg with no problems in 1024x768x24. So far the only other advice I've seen to fix this problem is to use Xfree86 and try to find a configuration from the net, or copy the configuration file from a "full" distro - I haven't had success with either suggestion. Has anybody installed and used xorg with DSL? |