I am dual-booting Zorin OS alongside Windows on my laptop. After experiencing a few hard freezes/crashes recently, Zorin OS is no longer booting into the GUI. I am constantly stuck on a black screen with a blinking underscore/cursor in the top-left corner.
My System Specs:
Device: Lenovo LOQ 15IAX9 Laptop
CPU: Intel Core i5-12450HX
GPU: NVIDIA RTX 4050 Laptop GPU
RAM: 16 GB DDR5
Here are the troubleshooting steps I have already tried (with no success):
Verified Secure Boot in BIOS (it is disabled).
Added "nomodeset" to the GRUB boot parameters (still stuck on the black screen).
Entered Recovery Mode -> dropped to root shell, remounted as read-write, and ran "apt-get remove --purge '^nvidia-.*'" followed by "apt-get autoremove" to completely purge the NVIDIA drivers.
Tried booting with both the latest kernel (6.17.0-40-generic) and the previous older kernel (6.17.0-20-generic). Both yield the exact same result: a black screen with a blinking cursor.
Ran the "dpkg (Repair broken packages)" option from the 6.17.0-20 recovery menu with an active ethernet connection. It successfully upgraded 2 packages, but the system still fails to boot into the desktop environment.
Pressing Ctrl + Alt + F3 (TTY) during a normal boot does not bring up a login prompt; the screen is completely frozen/unresponsive.
How can I bypass this graphics/GDM lock without losing my personal files? If I need to check the error logs from the root recovery shell, which commands should I run to gather the relevant diagnostics to post here?
Thank you in advance for your help!
ı dont know that topic is true
if it have mistakes for english it was translated by ai and ı try to open with ai
I installed Zorin OS without using a USB drive (using a direct disk/ISO method instead), so I currently don't have a physical installation USB ready. if there is a solution without usb ı try , if it didnt work i will already try with usb
How did you make space for Zorin to install alongside Windows and how much space was allocated? I suspectvyou may have to create bootable media to troubleshoot/recover critical data.
I would recommend you to either use Rufus or Ventoy to create bootable media, my personal preference is for the latter.
Are Fast Boot in BIOS and Fast Start-Up in Windows disabled, too?
Could be a Point. Is Your BIOS in UEFI or Legacy Mode? Depending on that, it would be good to set up the Partition Sheme to GPT for UEFI or MBR for Legacy. Because, You have Windows, I can recommend Rufus for creating a Bootstick.
"Actually, I shrank 10 GB of space from Windows and formatted that partition as FAT32 to make space for Zorin When I tried to install Zorin, it gave me an out of space error, so I shrank another 50 GB of space for the installation then ı install. today ı tried extend Unallocated space and 50gb so ı delete 410 gb disk which have windows.ı close computer. when ı tried open the problem exist
I suspect then that you did not select LVM at point of install that would have allowed you to expand your partition.
I recommend that if you have access to another machine you create installation media on USB.
I would also recommend you disable Secure Boot and Fast Boot in the BIOS beforehand and make sure any HDD setting in BIOS is set to AHCI and not RAID.
So, only Linux? Then, Popsicle, Impression or the already mentioned Ventoy would be Options. I personally use Impression when I create a single Bootstick and have made good Experiences with it.
I have a Ventoy Stick, too. But this is more for testing. But the good Thing is: You can there set up GPT or MBR. Impression uses GPT by default and there is no Switch Option - what in Your Case with Your UEFI BIOS wouldn't be an Issue.