[wplug] gnome display messed up for normal users ok for root

[Carl Benedict]

Too odd.

I just had a very similar problem yesterday.  I am running FC2 with a
custom-built 2.6.6 kernel based on the FC2 .config.  It's been running
perfectly since May.  Then a few days ago, the WM suddenly lost touch
with X.  I had to remotely login and kill the GDM process (parent to the
X session).  This happened a few times.  The display would looked a bit
garbled after killing the process, then it would normalize.  I checked
dmesg and /var/log/messages.  Here's a snippet of what I saw:

Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel: Badness in pci_find_subsys at
drivers/pci/search.c:167
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel: Call Trace:
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<c01c14a4>] pci_find_subsys+0xd4/0xe0
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<c01c14e1>] pci_find_device+0x31/0x40
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<c01c1319>] pci_find_slot+0x29/0x50
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<e0cf90d7>] os_pci_init_handle+0x39/0x68
[nvidia]
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<e0b8d85f>] _nv001243rm+0x1f/0x24
[nvidia]
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<e0c3ea5d>] _nv003797rm+0xa9/0x128
[nvidia]
Oct 18 01:32:30 nano kernel:  [<e0cab4a1>] _nv001490rm+0x55/0xe4
[nvidia]

I was running NVIDIAs proprietary driver v 1.0-5336.  So I thought I'd
try to update the driver.  The newest driver (1.0-6111) installation did
not go well, and I think it either damaged or uninstalled the old
version before failing to complete.  Regardless, I was without X
afterwards.  Attempting to log in with my normal user was simply not
happening, even after editing /etc/X11/xorg.conf and setting the driver
to "nv" or even "vga".  Oddly, root could startx.

The solution(?): I think there were 2 or more problems that occurred at
the same time.  I tried renaming my .gnome2 and some other config
related directories, but to no avail.  I created a new user to test it
out - and I was able to log in with startx.  I ended up renaming my old
home dir to .old and creating an empty one, and now I am running X.org
with the nv (NOT nvidia) driver.

I don't consider anything I did a real solution either.  I'm rather
perplexed.  Very odd that your friend was running GNOME and had a
garbled display, much like I was.  Is he running FC2?  Or maybe kernel
2.6.6??

-- 
Carl Benedict
Pittsburgh Techs
Main:  724-741-0233
http://www.pittsburghtechs.com
cbenedic at pittsburghtechs.com

On Fri, 2004-10-22 at 08:49, John Harrold wrote:
> There is a guy here who's having trouble with gnome. He logged in today to
> find the display somewhat unreadable. Sort of like when your monitor
> resolution is too high --- windows chopped up a bit and appearing in
> multiple locations. The crux is that it looks fine when root logs in. To
> test this he first deleted all of his configuration files and then logged
> in. The same problem was still present. Next he created a new user, logged
> in as that user, and the problem persisted with the new user.