Nvidia apparently made some bad chips... http://www.nvidiasettlement.com/affectedmodels.html http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1013947/why-nvidia-duff-chips-shoddy-engineering
Even if your Dell isn't on the Official List, it might still have the affected GPU. I solved the problem by replacing an old-but-just-purchased "G86" GeForce 8400GS with a new-and-just-purchased "G98" 8400GS. The key is to look for an 8400GS with 512MB RAM. The 128MB cards are definitely old and the 256MB cards *might* be old. Another indicator is that only the G98 cards are PCIe v2 x16, whereas the older ones are v1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nvidia_PureVideo#Table_of_PureVideo_.28HD.29_GPUs -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/663463 Title: Blank screen on boot unless nouveau was disabled. -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs