On Feb 15, 2012 8:13 AM, "leee" <leee@spatial.plus.com> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm frequently experiencing a problem with kdm-trinity (V3.5.12) appearing to
> time out on system start-up.  The following two lines are put into my syslog
> when this happens:
>
> kdm[1966]: X server startup timeout, terminating
> kdm[1966]: X server for display :0 can't be started, session disabled
>
> This is an intermittant problem and doesn't happen every time I start my
> system (I'd guess it occurs about 50% of the time).  When it does I'm left
> with just the basic console.  However, all I need to do to get X up and
> running is to log in on the console and restart kdm-trinity.
>
> The system is running Debian Squeeze on amd64 with an nVidia graphics card
> using the proprietary nVidia driver.
>
> Curiously, I don't recall this happening when I first installed TDE V3.5.12,
> which was quite some time ago now and it only seems to have started occurring
> relatively recently.
>
> Since I first installed Trinity V3.5.12 I have installed a number of Debian
> Squeeze updates but in addition to this I also tried upgrading to TDE V3.5.13
> but then had to downgrade back to TDE V3.5.12 due to a couple of problems
> with V3.5.13.
>
> As I didn't remove TDE V3.5.13 and all of its config files when I downgraded
> back to TDE V3.5.12 I imagine that it's possible that kdm-trinity V3.5.13
> introduced some different configuration settings.  Alternatively, there have
> been a couple of kernel updates during this period (I compile my own kernels
> from the Debian linux-source package and then need to recompile the nVidia
> driver to fit the new kernel.  The kernel updates have all been minor point
> updates so the kernel configs have been unchanged over the period concerned)
> and this may be a factor.  Fwiw, the syslog messages from kdm-trinity appear
> about 15 seconds after the nVidia module load message.
>
> I've also had a look in the Xorg.log files and while there are no clear errors
> or warnings there are differences at the end of the logs between successful
> and unsuccessful start ups as shown below...
>
> Unsuccessful startup:
>
> (**) Option "xkb_rules" "evdev"
> (**) Option "xkb_model" "pc105"
> (**) Option "xkb_layout" "gb"
> (II) Power Button: Close
> (II) UnloadModule: "evdev"
> (II) Power Button: Close
> (II) UnloadModule: "evdev"
> (II) AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Close
> (II) UnloadModule: "evdev"
> (II) ImExPS/2 Generic Explorer Mouse: Close
> (II) UnloadModule: "evdev"
> (II) ACPI Virtual Keyboard Device: Close
> (II) UnloadModule: "evdev"
>
> Successful startup:
>
> (**) Option "xkb_rules" "evdev"
> (**) Option "xkb_model" "pc105"
> (**) Option "xkb_layout" "gb"
> (II) Open ACPI successful (/var/run/acpid.socket)
> (II) Feb 15 11:52:58 NVIDIA(0): Setting mode "1920x1200+0+0"
> (II) Power Button: Device reopened after 1 attempts.
> (II) Power Button: Device reopened after 1 attempts.
> (II) AT Translated Set 2 keyboard: Device reopened after 1 attempts.
> (II) ImExPS/2 Generic Explorer Mouse: Device reopened after 1 attempts.
> (II) ACPI Virtual Keyboard Device: Device reopened after 1 attempts.
>
> The extract from the unsuccessful start up clearly shows that some of the
> devices are being closed but I can't see any reasons why and, as I say, there
> are no errors or warnings: apart from some different time-stamps earlier on
> in the logs they are otherwise identical (according to KDiff3).
>
> Any hints or tips would be appreciated.

My first suggestion is to backup your ~/.trinity directory and do a purge your Trinity packages to get rid of any conflicting config files. From there you should be able to install a fresh 3.5.12 (the ~/.trinity should still be intact). If it still doesn't work, you can try purging/reinstalling Xorg (or try a different version of nvidia driver, though I remember it crashing a lot awhile back).