unable to instantiate...

[Horst Leps]

Hallo Kai Staats:

>> > Installation of 4.1 on my MacMini (1.25 GHz) with Lacie-Drive (install
>> > firewire) fails. Anaconda says: Unable to instantiate X.... and then
>> > the screen (Sony SDM-HS74P) turns black.
>
> Thanks Derick for your suggestions, but I fear this is not about the drive 
> partitioning. This usually happens when the video card driver + video card + 
> monitor are not communicating well. W/the Mac mini in particular, we have 
> seen some challenging combinations.
>
> I recommend trying a diff monitor (maybe an LCD or CRT) ... or boot into 
> single user mode, run Xautoconfig, and then experiment w/various settings.
>
> This HOWTO should help:
> http://www.terrasoftsolutions.com/support/solutions/ydl_4.1/video_config.shtml

I did this: 

,----
| # Set your system to default to a shell
| 
| 
|     CTRL-OPTION-F2
|     (login as root)
| 
|     nano /etc/inittab/ [ENTER]
|     (roughly a dozen lines from the top, modify "id:5:initdefault:" to "id:3:initdefault:")
| 
|     CTRL-X (exit and save)
|     reboot [ENTER] 
| 
| 
| ... this resets your computer to default to a command line environment
| instead of automatically starting X. Once you get the graphics
| settings modified to your liking, you can change the '3' back to a
| '5', reboot, and you will be greeted with a graphical login once
| again. 
| 
| 
| # Reset to default configuration
| 
| 
|     Xautoconfig [ENTER]
|     startx [ENTER] 
`----

startx ends with

,----
| **(eggcups:3575):CRITICAL**: couldn't connect to session bus: Unable
| to determine the address of the message bus
`----

and the screen (lcd) turns black. 

Horst