Comment 2 for bug 42467

here's the workaround, which does NOT resolve this bug:
1. open /etc/X11/xorg.conf
2. add this line
 Load "dbe"
so it looks like this:
Section "Module"
        Load "i2c"
        Load "bitmap"
        Load "ddc"
        Load "dri"
        Load "extmod"
        Load "freetype"
        Load "glx"
        Load "int10"
        Load "type1"
        Load "vbe"
        Load "dbe"
EndSection

--note: your section may be different

3. Restart gnome/X
In Dapper LiveCD Beta2, I couldn't stop X with
$sudo /etc/init.d/gdm stop
so I ended up doing
$ sudo killall gdm
and start X again with
$ startx

Just to repeat myself, this doesn't solve this bug in conky, this is just a workaround.