[gentoo-user] help with xorg-server-1.9.4 and no hal; broken mouse/keyboard/X

[Valmor de Almeida <val.gentoo@gmail.com>]

Hello,

I had a working laptop with xorg 1.7 using hal; including usb mouse
(left hand swapped buttons), synaptics for a mouse pad, hotplug
monitors in a virtual screen, etc. For this to work I had a
hand-configured xorg.conf file and additional hal policy
configurations.

I have just updated xorg to 1.9.4 with USE -hal and removed hal in
this order (also needed to remove hal from the default run level).  I
tried startx using the existing xorg.conf and X does not start
correctly, I have no mouse and a frozen screen (no keyboard) with the
arrow cursor placed in the middle of the screen. I also tried to start
X without an xorg.conf; same problem.

Here are the outputs of some commands:

emerge --info
Portage 2.1.9.25 (default/linux/amd64/10.0, gcc-4.4.4,
glibc-2.11.2.-r3, 2.6.36-gentoo-r5 x86_64)

emerge -pv --newuse --update --tree --with-bdeps=y world
Total: 0 packages, Size of downloads: 0 kB

emerge --depclean -vp
Dependencies could not be completely resolved due to
the following required packages not being installed:

   sys-apps/hal  pulled in by:
       x11-drivers/xf86-input-synaptics-1.2.1

In make.conf  I have:

 USE="-hal ...."

 INPUT_DEVICES="evdev synaptics"
 VIDEO_CARDS="intel"

Thanks for your help.

--
Valmor