[arch-general] Xorg locks/crashes

[Baho Utot]

I purchased a new larger hard drive to install ArchLinux.

Not wanting to erase the existing install from earlier this year.
I booted the 2008-03-1 boot disk and installed the basic install, rebooted.

Then ran pacman -Syy pacman -Su to install updates.  I then proceeded to 
install alsa which when fine. 

Then I did a pacman -S libgl xorg mesa xf86-video-ati.
then Xorg -configure followed by X -config /root/xorg.conf.new.
X started and gave me the X cursor.  

The keyboard and mouse are not responsive and I can not kill X with the 
<Backspace> trick.
ALT+F1...F8 does nothing.  I had to Press the "Microsoft Windows button" to 
gain control of the system.

I know this is not a hardware problem as the previous Arch install runs fine 
with KDEMOD.
  
Has any one experienced this?

Any one with some pointers/Help?