screen very dark after bootng

[snork]

I'm new to Tiny Core. Downloaded and booted from CD. After what appeared to be a normal startup, the screen went blank. I waited a long time, but nothing showed up. The room was rather bright so I didn't notice right away that the system booted properly, but the screen was very, very dark. I could barely see the icons on the bottom. I tried to adjust the brightness on the monitor, but it didn't help.

I rebooted, but the same thing happened. I downloaded the iso again, thinking I got a bad download, but same problem. I then tried it on a different computer. Same thing. I tried it on yet another computer, with the same results.

The three computers are (1)old, (2)newer, (3)very new. Each has a different graphic card.

Any ideas? Again, the bootup text shows bright. Other versions of Linux are running on all computers here.

[curaga]

Were all three tries with the same monitor?

If so, there might be something Xvesa doesn't like about it. Xfbdev and Xorg are options.

[^thehatsrule^]

Reducing the resolution (see xsetup) might also help.

[snork]

Thanks for the suggestions.

3 different monitors.

Tried to reconfigure X, but it's too hard to read, it's that dark.

I also tried different boot options, but nothing seems to change the end result. This is really strange. I've never seen anything like this before. It's as if someone turned the brightness and contrast down to almost zero on the monitor.

One computer has a Nvidia card, one has an Intel 945, the other, I'm not sure. I can boot other LiveCDs without any problems. It kind of rules out the computer or monitor. Anything within the setup that might cause this kind of behavior? I can't even think of a setting that might cause this. With the room dark, it looks like the desktop is there, I just can't see it enough to do anything.

[gerald_clark]

I use an intel 945 with NO problems.

[snork]

Downloaded again from the Tinycore website. Checked md5sum. Matched. Burned CD. Booted. Same condition.

In a dark room with my eyes accustomed to the dark, I'm barely able to read things on the screen. Xvesa looks like it's being started just fine. This in processe list:

Xvesa -tr -screen 1024x768x32 -shadow -mouse /dev/input/mice,5 -nolisten tcp -I

At least I think that's what it says.

No errors in Dmesg or anywhere else that I can find. /etc/init.d/rc5 looks fine, starting up Xvesa.

On the plus side, it looks like it automatically configures the network properly and everything else seems to work...except the dark display.

I'm baffled.

[snork]

Made some progress.

I logged out to a prompt. Screen was bright (normal). typed 'startx'. screen came up bright (normal). It came up in 800x600. not what it first booted up in (1024x768). So, ^thehatsrule^ had the right idea. Thank you.

However, is that the limit of resolution? Can't seem to increase the resolution beyond that.

[gerald_clark]

Try 1024x768x16 instead of 1024x768x32

[curaga]

If it's a video ram issue, and other live cd's work, Xorg should fix things.