I have a brand new Dell Studio XPS 8300 desktop with 17-2600 cpu, H67 chipset, 8GB DDR3, 2 1TB HDDs in mirrored RAID, and AMD Radeon 6770.

Dell doesn't support Ubuntu here in Australia so it came with Windows 7 and Windows software. Yes I had to pay for an O.S. and software I didn't want to get hardware I did want, all at a greatly inflated price. It's not all beer and skittles in the land of Oz.

I changed boot priorities in the BIOS to DVD and ran Ubuntu 11.10 64bit from the ISO with NOMODESET. The installation reformatted all partitions to rid me of the dreaded Windows. All was well until until reboot. The BIOS does its thing, then its "The Black Screen of Death" with a blinking cursor; no boot screen, no Grub, no keyboard, no mouse.

I've searched Dell and Ubuntu forums in vain. Can you help? I would be really grateful for any advice which can help turn my big expensive paperweight into a really useful machine.

Thank you in anticipation kind people.

Phil