Linux Format forums

Ace Frehley · Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2012 10:10 pm Post subject: grub menu

Please forgive the first time linux user. How do I access the grub menu, thank you for the help. Please remember linux is not keeping the backlight on.

nelz · Posted: Sat Feb 11, 2012 12:55 pm Post subject:

If this relates to your previous question, it would have been better to keep it in the same topic.

Some distros show the boot menu everytime, some hide it and go straight into the boot process after a few seconds. If yours is one of the latter, hold down the shift key when booting to show the GRUB menu. If the problem is what I think it is, the backlight doesn't turn off until after Linux has started loading, so the screen is still usable at this point.
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Unix is user-friendly. It's just very selective about who it's friends are.

Ace Frehley

The problem is the backlight turns off. The screen is unuseable.

nelz · Posted: Sat Feb 11, 2012 2:26 pm Post subject:

At what point does the backlight turn off? The most common cause of this doesn't occur until after the kernel has loaded. has loaded, the bootloader comes up much sooner, before any operating system.

If the backlight turns off that early, you either have a hardware fault or a seriously misconfigured bootloader, which is unusual (but not unheard of).

The boot sequence

1) The BIOS loads and runs some checks
2) The BIOS loads the bootloader from the boot disk
3) The bootloader either gives you a menu or waits a few seconds before booting
4) The bootloader loads either the operating system you selected or a default

Linux is not loaded until stage 4, the backlight is likely to be turning off a short while after that. You need to hold down the shift key between 2 and 3.
_________________
Unix is user-friendly. It's just very selective about who it's friends are.