Re: Please explain X strangeness

[Camaleón <noelamac@gmail.com>]

On Fri, 01 Oct 2010 14:56:04 -0400, Mark Neidorff wrote:

(...)
>  Yesterday, I unhooked the 3rd PC
> from the monitor (but left the cable hooked to the monitor with an
> unattached end).  Today when I tried to start X, even when I see the
> output of the debian box on the monitor, I got an "out of range" error. 
> Tapping ctrl-alt-backspace restarts X, but does not allow X to start. 
> Here is the part I would like an explanation for....I pulled the video
> cable (that is attached to nothing) off of the connector on the monitor,
> tapped ctrl-alt-backspace, and X started just fine.  Why does the
> presence of a disconnected cable give X a problem?

In brief, you are experiencing weirdnesses with a headless system and 
your xorg/vga drivers/monitor, right?

I would start by reviwing the Xorg log file (/var/log/Xorg.0.log) to get 
any clue. You can upload its whole content (it does not contain sensitive 
data) to any online service such www.pastebin.com.

Greetings,

-- 
Camaleón