Stuck on TTY - Ctrl+Alt+F7 returns black screen

Question

I'm new to Linux and am stuck on TTY. My Linux distro is Lubuntu 14.04.4 LTS.

I have read some topics and the solutions proposed are not working to me. Ctrl+Alt+F7 returns a black screen with a text entry which, however, I can't write anything. Ctrl+Alt+F1-F6 takes me to normal TTY.

startx returns:

/etc/X11/xinit/service: 3: exec: /usr/bin/X not found 
xinit: giving up 
xinit: unable to connect to X server: Connection refused
xinit: server error

sudo service lightdm start returns:

start: job failed to start

UPDATE: I have studied my current situation a bit and I think that the problem is that "xorg.conf" file is missing or some similar kind of file. I followed instructions on "How to restore xserver?" and couldn't restore it yet.

You removed the X display server, a critical part of the system. How did this happen? That will help us find the best solution for repair. — Seth, Aug 15 '16 at 22:03
actually I was trying to learn more about linux and typed Ctrl+Alt+F1 to understand tty. Then i get stucked. I'm pretty sure i haven't typed anything then. — Yuri Camara Batista, Aug 15 '16 at 22:09
Typing Ctrl+Alt+F1 doesn't do anything on its own, so that cannot be how the problem started. — Seth, Aug 15 '16 at 22:10
I turned off the computer after this hoping that restarting it would make GUI return... The commands I typed then are the writen above — Yuri Camara Batista, Aug 15 '16 at 22:12
Not to my knowledge. I remember linux asked me for updates and I refused. When I typed Ctr+Alt+F1 I was only using firefox to read linux articles. I guess I will have to reinstall linux? — Yuri Camara Batista, Aug 15 '16 at 22:16
Does someone have an idea what to do? I'm still with the problem. I'm considering to format the computer — Yuri Camara Batista, Aug 21 '16 at 13:18
Does this answer your question? Switching between console and GUI — karel, Sep 18 '20 at 20:40

score 8 · Answer 1 · edited Jan 11 '21 at 13:29

8

Had the same problem. Almost got a heart attack. Pressing Ctrl Alt F2 solved the problem for me.

edited Jan 11 '21 at 13:29

Tejas Lotlikar

2,945
5
17
26

answered Jan 11 '21 at 11:40

lilotop

181

1

And wth does that do? – chx101 Apr 03 '21 at 13:20

score 0 · Answer 2 · edited Sep 18 '20 at 20:39

I had almost the same problem as you but I solved it. Here is my solution that works on Centos 7.

To access the tty consoles, I used the command systemctl set-default multi-user.target then reboot. Now I boot online from command line.

To go back to using a GUI, I just did the opposite: systemctl set-default graphical.target and reboot. Then you will start with the GUI.

I hope this helps you!

Translation adapted from Google Translate:

Salut, Je sais pas si je peux t'aider mais je passais par là et j'avais presque le même pb que toi. Il est résolu alors je viens te proposer la même solution. sa peut être un bout de la solution à ton pb, du moins jspr. Déjà j'utilise CentOS 7 coe distribution linux et en fait dans le cadre de mon cours je devais accéder aux consoles tty (ma version est à la base avec interface graphique). Donc pour accéder aux consoles tty, j'ai fait la cmd " systemctl set-default multi-user.target". ensuite reboot et je démarre désormais en ligne de cmd. Sauf que je savais pas comment retourné en GUI (et voilà ou nos pb se ressemblent peut-être). Alors pour retourné en GUI, j'ai juste fait le chemin inverse. "systemctl set-default graphical.target" et reboot. Je démarre désormais en GUI. Voilà, en espérant que sa t'aide!!

Stuck on TTY - Ctrl+Alt+F7 returns black screen

2 Answers2