Problem with graphics driver upon boot on Kali Linux (black screen after splash screen, no blinking cursor)

mrpimplotion

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Hello all!
First of all sorry if this might be a bit complex or a not that well formulated question. This is my very first encounter with this forum, and the first time with a Linux outside the VM environment. I have installed Kali Linux on an older drive that was formatted and wiped clean. After a few too many tries, i got it installed on the drive. My issue is now that when i attempt to boot using GRUB, the screen simply turns black after the Kali splash screen, before Kali is loaded. I'm using an amd R9 390 card. Please see attached .txt for all system info.

Using the nomodeset argument i am able to boot into Kali, however there are major screen-tearing issues that i would like to resolve.

I've tried blacklisting both the amdgpu and the radeon kernel seperately. Disabling the radeon driver seemed to stop the os from booting completely with just a blinking white cursor. Both kernels seem to be installed according to the following command
Code:
lspci -k | grep -EA3 'VGA|3D|Display'

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Hawaii PRO [Radeon R9 290/390] (rev 80)
        Subsystem: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. [MSI] Hawaii PRO [Radeon R9 290/390]
        Kernel modules: radeon, amdgpu
01:00.1 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] Hawaii HDMI Audio [Radeon R9 290/290X / 390/390X]

However, they are listed as upgradable in apt list --upgradable
Code:
sudo apt-get upgrade

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
Calculating upgrade... Done
The following packages have been kept back:
  libegl-mesa0 libgbm1 libgl1-mesa-dri libglapi-mesa libglx-mesa0 libxatracker2 mesa-va-drivers mesa-vdpau-drivers mesa-vulkan-drivers
The following packages will be upgraded:
  libdrm-amdgpu1 libdrm-common libdrm-intel1 libdrm-nouveau2 libdrm-radeon1 libdrm2
6 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 9 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/233 kB of archives.
After this operation, 4,096 B of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] y
dpkg-deb: error: archive '/tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/0-libdrm-common_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_all.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/0-libdrm-common_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_all.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
dpkg-deb: error: archive '/tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/1-libdrm2_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/1-libdrm2_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
dpkg-deb: error: archive '/tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/2-libdrm-amdgpu1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/2-libdrm-amdgpu1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
dpkg-deb: error: archive '/tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/3-libdrm-intel1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/3-libdrm-intel1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
dpkg-deb: error: archive '/tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/4-libdrm-nouveau2_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/4-libdrm-nouveau2_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
dpkg-deb: error: archive '/tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/5-libdrm-radeon1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/5-libdrm-radeon1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
Errors were encountered while processing:
 /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/0-libdrm-common_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_all.deb
 /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/1-libdrm2_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb
 /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/2-libdrm-amdgpu1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb
 /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/3-libdrm-intel1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb
 /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/4-libdrm-nouveau2_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb
 /tmp/apt-dpkg-install-Yt3JG7/5-libdrm-radeon1_2.4.109+git2112220500.440e2d~oibaf~j_amd64.deb
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
There seems to be some issue that the (graphics driver kernel?) packages will not install. I do not know if these are critical to the graphics driver or if i am simply nitpicking.


I have tried dozens of different methods for litteraly days now to no avail. If anybody has any advice or experience, that would be highly appreciated. Thank you!
If there is any information you need, i will provide it to you. If i need to elaborate, i will!
 

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Welcome to the Forums,
you have learnt your first lesson, KALI IS NOT FOR THE INEXPERIENCED,
to install and use it, you need to be experienced with Linux and proficient at using the terminal
It is a bare-bones distribution, and doesn't come with propriotry drivers, the Kali community expect you recognise what drivers you may need to find and install them without help [if you look at the Kali forums you will see that they haven't answered many installation support questions in the last 4 months.]
Download and install a complete desktop distribution, learn how it works and become proficient at the terminal, then you can download and install the pen-testing tools to that distribution.
read post 1&3 in the Kali sub forum
 
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On the packages that have been "kept back" you have to install those by themselves
Code:
sudo apt install libegl-mesa0 libgbm1 libgl1-mesa-dri libglapi-mesa libglx-mesa0 libxatracker2 mesa-va-drivers mesa-vdpau-drivers mesa-vulkan-drivers
or you can run
Code:
sudo apt --with-new-pkgs upgrade
 
On the packages that have been "kept back" you have to install those by themselves
The OP hasn't been back since I told him

you have learnt your first lesson, KALI IS NOT FOR THE INEXPERIENCED,
 
The OP hasn't been back since I told him

you have learnt your first lesson, KALI IS NOT FOR THE INEXPERIENCED,
I have noticed that each time someone posts a similar issue with Kali you always comment the same, you said the same in my post about a similar issue to this.

After several tries and errors I have noticed that this can easily be resolved by disabling "silent splash" from the grub.conf file. To do this just simply run $sudo nano /etc/default/grub, where it says "GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="silent"" replace the silent with splash=disable, after that run $sudo update-grub and $sudo reboot now.

Guess it is time for you to change that wizard profile picture. If you are not going to be part of the solution don´t be part of the problem.
 
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I have noticed that each time someone posts a similar issue with Kali you always comment the same, you said the same in my post about a similar issue to this.

To be fair, that's exactly the same thing Kali devs say on their site. Kali is not for the inexperienced. It's a very specific use-case distro, not even meant as a regular desktop distro.

Many people, myself included (though I decline to comment most of the time), suggest learning to properly manage a Linux system before diving into Kali. Then, if you really must, Kali is for those looking to learn (or do, as a profession) penetration testing. That's what it's for - and that's all it is for.

Using it otherwise is like trying to use a screwdriver as a hammer. Sure, it might eventually work but it's going to take a bunch of extra effort and time. You're better off using the correct tool for the job - and doing the correct job with the tool.
 
I wonder if the OP solved the problem...Thread being 2 years old.
1714432799490.gif
 
To do this just simply run $sudo nano /etc/default/conf, where it says "GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="silent"" replace the silent with splash=disable, after that run $sudo update-grub and $sudo reboot now.

There is no /etc/default/conf ... I am guessing you are referring to /etc/default/grub ?

Perhaps you could do well to take your own advice?

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz
 
There is no /etc/default/conf ... I am guessing you are referring to /etc/default/grub ?

Perhaps you could do well to take your own advice?

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz
Correct my bad * $sudo nano /etc/default/grub *

I don't use a wizard profile picture because I do not consider myself to be a wizard know it all, just a tinkerer trying to make things work
 
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To be fair, that's exactly the same thing Kali devs say on their site. Kali is not for the inexperienced. It's a very specific use-case distro, not even meant as a regular desktop distro.

Many people, myself included (though I decline to comment most of the time), suggest learning to properly manage a Linux system before diving into Kali. Then, if you really must, Kali is for those looking to learn (or do, as a profession) penetration testing. That's what it's for - and that's all it is for.

Using it otherwise is like trying to use a screwdriver as a hammer. Sure, it might eventually work but it's going to take a bunch of extra effort and time. You're better off using the correct tool for the job - and doing the correct job with the tool.
Some times it is best not to asume. Usually when a person starts to learn pen testing or cyber security they run Kali on a hypervisor like Virtual Box and it works flawless there. But there might be specific cases why pen testers would want to run it bare metal, like in my cases I needed to use GPU to do password brute force attacks. Of course you can install Kali tools on just about any distro, you can even install HashCat on Windows and do a password brute force attack from there. But like you said "use the right tool for the right job".

Kali does not always work well on every hardware, the same goes for other Linux Distro. I had this same issue on my desktop computer with an RTX3090 but managed to solve it on my own after several weeks of tinkering, recently I bought a new laptop with a RTX4050 and it worked flawless on that laptop. But not everyone is going to buy new hardware just because it did not work on theirs.

Many of us understand that Kali is not a daily driver or gaming OS and should be used for what it is. Most ethical hackers have to run reports for clients and due to compatibility issues we tend to use Microsoft Word for our reports. But as mentioned before. There are specific use cases where we need to run Kali as bare metal and not in a hypervisor. The easiest pen testing distro to run on dual boot along side Windows is Kali, ParrotOS and BlackArch are a pain to get working with dual boot. Besides many new ethical hackers are only used to running Kali and telling a Kali user to use a different distro is like telling a Windows user to switch over to MacOS.
 
I don't use a wizard profile picture because I do not consider myself to be a wizard know it all, just a tinkerer trying to make things work
Profile pictures aren't a representation of someone's personality.

Kali does not always work well on every hardware, the same goes for other Linux Distro.
I haven't had hardware issue in years with Linux, but I use mainstream hardware and I don't use old hardware. I used to have the RTX 3090 in my system never had issues with it, so would be curious to know what issues you had and with what distribution?
 
@f33dm3bits :-

Um.....an RV 390 ain't an RTX 3090! It's not even the same manufacturer..... :p

@Thordox :-

It boils down to this. Everybody takes the p**s out of Kali users asking 'basic' questions for one simple reason.....because if you're going to use Kali, it's automatically assumed that you're proficient enough to fix your own problems, and shouldn't NEED to ask questions of anybody.

I generally keep well out of Kali arguments. It's a 'non-subject', as far as I'm concerned; I have no interest in it, so where's the point responding? This post is a very rare exception to the rule.....


Mike. ;)
 
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.....an RV 390 ain't an RTX 3090! It's not even the same manufacturer..... :p
No they are not. But the behaviour OP was having after installing GPU drivers on his Kali Linux box is the same exact behaviour I had when installing my Nvidia drivers.

We all know what assume stands for so better not make ass-umptions
 
@Thordox - My best advice is for you to dial back a little on the defensive attitude, and even consider making friends with a Thread in Member Introductions .

You would be hard put to find a friendlier and more knowledgeable Linux forum than this one.

Our Kali subforum is littered with the carcasses of literally hundreds of threads from wannabes, script kiddies, just take a look for yourself if you are bored.

That can make some of our helpers a bit blase, about people posting here, and I don't blame them particularly.

You've only been here a month. We'd like that to extend to years, if you can work in with people.

Have a think about it.

Wizard
 

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