I am unable to see anything on the screen while using any version of Ubuntu

Question

Every time i install Ubuntu either 12.10 or any version of Linux mint it install well but i cannot be able to see anything on the screen on when i use a DESKTOP screen by connecting on a VGA that time i see from a different screen.

Identify your hardware, including video card, and see the link I gave you. — Panther, May 30 '14 at 22:40
i am using a mobile intel(R) 4 series express chipset Family — Geoffrey Githaiga, May 30 '14 at 22:56
Can you be more specific please? Open up "Terminal", and type: lspci | grep VGA or identify the card in another OS — Panther, May 30 '14 at 22:59
do you have the cmd command to determine the graphics card that is in windows os — Geoffrey Githaiga, May 30 '14 at 23:01
http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000258.htm or http://superuser.com/questions/268901/how-do-i-determine-which-graphics-card-im-using . It should go without saying, it is highly probably your video card is incompatible with Linux and you may need to replace it. — Panther, May 30 '14 at 23:03
You can get linux compatible video cards inexpensively , google search ;) Sometime you can even get them from other people's old hardware. — Panther, May 30 '14 at 23:09
12.10 is an obsolete development version of Ubuntu. Try 12.04LTS or 14.04LTS. Also try updating your laptop BIOS and have a look at this relevant bug — bain, May 30 '14 at 23:10
The Intel 4 series is Linux compatible. Also see Ubuntu forums thread. — bain, May 30 '14 at 23:11
could the grub be the issue or what? then when you say Intel 4 is compatible that meens mine should be compatible — Geoffrey Githaiga, May 30 '14 at 23:17

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered May 31 '14 at 01:58

Based on the card you've listed I'm assuming you are using a laptop with an external vga monitor, and at boot up both screens are black. I have what sounds like the same problem with my laptop, and I've found two work-arounds for it. These may or may not work for you.

Option #1:

If their is a proprietary driver that can be installed for your card that may fix it. For example I have AMD graphics so installing fglrx-updates fixes it for me. I'm not familiar with your specific card so I don't if there are drivers for it, but I found a tool made by Intel. You can see a list of supported cards by the tool here: https://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?DwnldID=13815 . The tool can be downloaded from: https://01.org/linuxgraphics/downloads .

Option #2:

Don't plug the vga cable into your laptop until after you've logged in. Then go to your settings and enable the vga monitor. What happens for me is the computer turns off the laptop monitor as it boots up, because it thinks the vga monitor is going to be used, but the vga monitor doesn't get used because Ubuntu is configured to clone display 1 to display 2 by default and display 1 is currently off.

I am unable to see anything on the screen while using any version of Ubuntu

1 Answers1

Option #1:

Option #2: