Hi, I'd just like to say thanks as it appears that I have resolved the problem ... of course 'I' is a bit of misnomer as I couldn't have done it without help! The problem was the installation of SuSE Linux 8.0 on a system with a GeForce 2 MX 400 (specifically a 64Mb ABIT Siluro) video card in it. The spec of my system is: * ASUSTek P4 motherboard with Promise Raid Lite * P4 1.7GHz CPU * 512Mb memory * 60Gb drive (Promise Raid Lite array on 2 x 30Gb drives ... documented in SuSES SDB) * ABIT Siluro GeForce 2 MX 400 64Mb Video However I had a TNT Ultra card in it when I purchased S8 a couple of weeks back ... incidentally I chose S8 on the strength that it supported (natively) the onboard Promise Raid Controller. In the event it turned out to be more complex but, hey, that's life :-) Back to the problem ... I configured it on the raid drive selecting the default with Office install but adding Gnome and the installation proceeded well until the system restarts when, during the graphics detection phase, the system locks (black screen, hard reset required. I got a lot of advice, where to get the drivers & various other solutions none of which, individually, seemed to work too well but yesterday I decided to approach it rationally and apply all the solutions: 1. I replaced my original video card and rebuilt the machine. 2. I edited /etc/inittab to force a max run level of 3 and restarted. 3. I applied the SMP P4 patch (http://sdb.suse.de/en/sdb/html/fhassel_p4.html) 4. I applied the SAX2 detection patches (http://sdb.suse.de/en/sdb/html/wessels_sax2-80.html) 5. I upgraded the nVidia GeForce drivers (http://www.nvidia.com/view.asp?PAGE=linux) 6. Powered down the unit and switched video cards 7. Powered up and ran the command "switch2nvidia_glx" 8. Ran Sax2 as per SuSE SDB (http://sdb.suse.de/en/sdb/html/wessels_sax2.html) 9. Ran X and it worked! 10. Re-edited /etc/inittab to put the run level back to 3 and restarted. That's it. Of course it does beg the question that there may be a simpler method and that not all of those actions may have been necessary but I think the majority probably were. It was also beneficial (in the above) that I actually had a spare AGP card and I am not sure how others in my position would have handled the same problem. Being new to Linux a lot of it is a mystery to me but I'm learning ... one of the positive aspects of getting these kind of problems is that I do learn about how to handle an OS at a level I haven't experienced with Windows since way back in the Windows 3.xx days. Anyway I'd like to thank some people (not just here) for their help ... specifically I'd like to thank: Andrei (my personal Linux mentor <G>) for his invaluable help and encouragement. Peter Taylor, Jonas Helgi Palsson, Dale Kosan & Matthew Johnson of the Suse Linux 'E' maillist CarlyWarly & Thor4Linux of the LinuxNewbie forum Dagda of the LinuxBeginner forum and Black666, Schotty, Segfault & Tyr_7BE of the LinuxJunior forum. Thanks :-) James a.k.a. VampyreUK James C. Rocks Equant Archway House Canary Wharf London E14 9SZ Phone: 0207-5226856 Fax: 0207-5126087 Mobile Phone: 07771-767405 http://www.equant.com