Booting live Wily image results in black screen with or without random text

This bug has been reported on the Ubuntu ISO testing tracker.

A list of all reports related to this bug can be found here:
http://iso.qa.ubuntu.com/qatracker/reports/bugs/1489147

Slightly different text displayed when the 20151019 Ubuntu GNOME image freezes during boot, please see attached picture. Also, whereas the earlier images would boot OK from the advanced boot menu, now the latest images just boot to a black screen with no text whatsoever if booted from the advanced boot menu.

I'm now getting this even with the third set of hardware on the 20151019 Ubuntu GNOME images with a slightly different text displayed, but at least I can boot ot live DE OK if using the advanced boot menu.

The Ubuntu 20151019 amd64 image is not affected so this appears to be specific to Ubuntu GNOME.

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

I'm getting this same sort of thing in both virtual and real live sessions.

And a picture from the live session.
This happens on the live CD when I want to try out Ubuntu gnome. Never makes it to a working desktop.

This appears to be fixed in the Ubuntu GNOME 20151020 images.

Using Ubuntu GNOME 20151021 amd64 the only way I can boot to a working screen is using the nomodeset boot parameter on this hardware:

AMD Sempron Processor LE-1250 @ 2.2 GHz
nVidia C61 [GeForce 7025 / nForce 630a] (rev a2)
nVidia MCP61 High Definition Audio (rev a2)
nVidia MCP61 Ethernet (rev a2)
2GB DDR2 RAM

Of course instead of the desired 1366X768 resolution I have to live with 1024X768 but it's sufficient for installing.

I could not get X reconfigured to allow anything above 1024X768 after installation so i tried the nvidia driver which seemed to work for just a moment, but then the screen freezes within just a minute or two of usage, so installing using nomodeset maybe isn't so smart.

I moved on to testing a totally different set of hardware:

Intel Atom CPU 230 @ 1.60GHz
Intel 82945G/GZ Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 02)
Intel N10/ICH 7 Family High Definition Audio Controller (rev 01)
Realtek RTL8101E/RTL8102E PCI Express Fast Ethernet controller (rev 02)
2GB DDR2 RAM

Booting from the standard boot menu results in this bug, but booting from the advanced menu works OK with that Intel chip.

Upgrade from vivid amd64. Similar problem here. Background light switches on and off every two seconds. Same for external monitor.

CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4710MQ CPU @ 2.50GHz
Graphics: GM107M [GeForce GTX 860M] NVIDIA Corporation

It is not the kernel, booting an old kernel results into the same problem.

Sometimes there are two junk characters on the screen, sometimes the following error message is displayed:

[drm:intel_dp_start_link_train] *ERROR* failed to enable link training
[drm:intel_dp_complete_link_train] *ERROR* failed to start channel equalization

@ Karl Kastner, I suspect you're experiencing a different bug. It looks like you have hybrid graphics (Intel + nVidia):

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/HybridGraphics

I have very little experience with such but I think you should file a new bug report. Maybe you could ask either at Ask Ubuntu or Ubuntu Forums regarding how to file the bug report since I'm not sure what package to file against.

This bug affects me too. Some computers work, but a Dell with P4 is affected.

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dim4600/en/4600i/sm/specs.htm

Is this bug squashed for Xenial Xerus?

I should add information about the graphics card in the Dell with P4.

nvidia NV34 (GeForce FX 5200)

Same on Sony Vaio VGN-CS11Z, NVidia G98M

One way I've worked around it is to keep pressing the up-key during boot and use the grub menu to choose 'try ubunu'

Wily is long past EOL. If anyone is still experiencing this bug with a supported version it would probably be best to open a new bug report.

Thank you for reporting this bug to Ubuntu.

Ubuntu 15.10 (wily) reached end-of-life on July 28, 2016.

See this document for currently supported Ubuntu releases:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases

We appreciate that this bug may be old and you might not be interested in discussing it any more. But if you are then please upgrade to the latest Ubuntu version and re-test. If you then find the bug is still present in the newer Ubuntu version, please add a comment here telling us which new version it is in.

[Expired for casper (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]