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Specs: Intel Pentium III @ 933 MHz, 512MB`PC133 SDRAM, 128MB GeForce FX5200, Maxtor 20.5GB IDE HDD, Ubuntu 9.10

Hi all, so I just installed Ubuntu 9.10 (from CD) on this machine after trying out Xubuntu. So, I did what I usually did, and blacklisted a certain driver to make my wireless adapter work. After a restart, I went to the Update Manager to get all the updates and it finds 227 update packages.

So the first time I was installing updates, the screen turned off, due to power management settings and I was AFK while it was installing updates. Upon arriving home, I try moving my mouse, typing in the keyboard with no response. So I forced it to shut down and restarted. I get a message and essentially I can't boot Ubuntu anymore.

So, I reinstall Ubuntu 9.10, following the same procedure as before, except that on first startup, I changed settings to keep my screen on. While doing software installation after updates were downloaded, Ubuntu eventually froze, while installing gcalctool. Mouse and keyboard were irresponsive, and I had no clue what was wrong. After a force reboot, I get the same message.

Why is Ubuntu freezing on me during updates installation?

Edit 1: I think that I may not be getting my wireless adapter to work properly, causing my machine to freeze. What I usually do it connect the adapter to USB after first startup, go to Terminal and type sudo gedit /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.conf, add blacklist rt2800usb to the end, save, and restart. Wireless works upon restart... however, I think there is a more proper way to do it. Seems like this is the official way to get the wireless adapter running, will update.

Edit 2: So I have set up my wireless adapter differently this time, using Ralink's driver (rt2870sta) rather than a community-written driver (rt2800usb). Once again, I will try to download the important security updates ONLY.

Edit 3: Important security updates successfully downloaded and installed. Now, where do I go from here? Install all recommended updates?

Thanks in advance.

Wesley
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2 Answers2

1

Do the freezes happen at other times as well or only during updates? System freezes can be caused by wonky drivers and bad hardware, and can be difficult to diagnose.

Consider booting to the console and running your updates from there.

  • Choose a "recovery mode" in the boot menu. If your system is giving you that boot error, see if there's an older kernel version in the boot menu and use that. (If you don't see the boot menu, hold down Shift after your BIOS screen to make the menu appear.)

  • When the system presents you with a recovery menu, choose the netroot option.

This gets you to a root prompt. Be careful; you're the superuser now.

  • Run aptitude update and let it finish. This updates the cache of available packages.

  • Run aptitude full-upgrade. This will install all available package updates, so if your system freezes are due to the update itself, your system will freeze here. If not, your system should be completely updated once this finishes.

Now try rebooting.

If you get the same error at boot, choose an older kernel from the boot menu and run this in a terminal:

sudo update-initramfs -u

(source) (from bug #1 and bug #2)

If the system does freeze during your console session upgrade, try upgrading a few packages at a time. You can attempt this in the console (run the aptitude command by itself to get a console GUI; select a few packages to upgrade with +) or in Xwindows (by selecting only a few packages at a time in Update Manager). If the update complains about missing dependencies, go ahead and install those too.

quack quixote
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0

Well, impossible to diagnose, but this seems like a bug in Ubuntu.

Your best bet is probably to report it to Ubuntu as a bug, with the exact steps to reproduce (as above). Then there's a fair chance it will get fixed.

Also, you could try redirecting the output of the update to a file (if this is possible in Update Manager), so you get a log that tells you where exactly the system crashed. That will help fixing the bug.

Also, try to use the hint from the bug report you linked, to get the system to boot even after the problem occured. Then you can probably collect more logs from the system.

sleske
  • 23,525