nomodeset

Note-to-self: About the Ubuntu black screen issue

Here is an explanation of what nomodeset does. (recommended: read the whole thread)

Update: it seems the recommended way is:

Older Intel devices: i915.modeset=1 or i915.modeset=0
Nvidia: nomodeset
Generic: xforcevesa or nouveau.modeset=0
Radeon: radeon.modeset=0

From my observations, setting *.modeset=0 seems to have similar effects with nomodeset.