I'm not sure. This forum mainly focuses on Windows-based problems. We'll help you while you can, but I'd personally suggest that you ask at www.ubuntuforums.org . Almost every Ubuntu question I've had has been covered there, even questions specific to my laptop model. It's a great resource and a great community. Sorry I couldn't help you, and definitely check back to see if others can.

i want to boot to a shell prompt most of the time
i can then startx to start the x window manager anytime i choose to
its quite easy in fedora and suse (edit the /etc/inittab) but i did not find that file in ubuntu.