[SOLVED] Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

[hansdevr]

Hi. As of a few weeks, Kubuntu sometimes freezes at the moment it displays the splash screen during boot. Then I reboot and it freezes again. And again. And then I reboot and it works fine. I can see when it will work, because the splash screen "flashes" once, for a very short moment of time.

What could be wrong?!?

[dibl]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

On the boot menu, press "e" when your Kubuntu menu item is highlighted, then cursor to the end of the kernel line and delete the word "splash", then press Enter, then with the same line highlighted press "b" to boot it. Observe the messages -- there should be some indication of what is going on when it stops.

[hansdevr]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

Thnx, dibl, going to try that (when I get home from work)!!

[hansdevr]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

OK, I made a note of the messages I got:
udevd[426]: SYSFS{}= will be removed in a future udev version, please use the ATTR{}= to match the event device, or ATTRS{}= to match a parent device, in etc/udev/rules.d/80-canon_mfp.rules:32

That line was produced 16 times, with the last number changing from 2 to 32.

Next message:
/dev/sda2 has been mounted 27 times without being checked, check forced.

Hope that makes any sense? Only Canon device present is the MP540 scanner/printer, but I used to have a flatbed scanner before that.

[dibl]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

udevd[426]: SYSFS{}= will be removed in a future udev version, please use the ATTR{}= to match the event device, or ATTRS{}= to match a parent device, in etc/udev/rules.d/80-canon_mfp.rules:32

That's an oldie: http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=559289

I'm not even sure it's an error, more like a notification.

Next message:
/dev/sda2 has been mounted 27 times without being checked, check forced.

This is telling you that fsck needs to run. Did you let it run to completion? Did the system continue booting after fsck was finished? You have to allow this periodic file system check to run to completion. Do that, and then shutdown/reboot and let's see how long it takes.

You didn't say how you were restarting the system when it was "hanging". I hope you used Alt-SysRq RSEIUB. Please don't push the power button if you hope to keep your filesystem and data intact.

http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3088251.0

[hansdevr]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

I let the system finish the check. Ahem, I indeed did always use the power button to shut my PC down... Never knew it could harm anything..

Anyway, here is the contents of that Canon file:

# 80-canon_mfp.rules

ACTION!="add", GOTO="canon_mfp_end"
SUBSYSTEM=="usb_device", GOTO="canon_mfp_start"
SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ENV{DEVTYPE}=="usb_device", GOTO="canon_mfp_start"
GOTO="canon_mfp_end"

LABEL="canon_mfp_start"
# Canon MP160
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1714", MODE="666"
# Canon MP510
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1717", MODE="666"
# Canon MP600
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1718", MODE="666"

# Canon MP140 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="172b", MODE="666"
# Canon MP210 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1721", MODE="666"
# Canon MP520 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1724", MODE="666"
# Canon MP610 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1725", MODE="666"

#MP190 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1734", MODE="666"
#MP240 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1732", MODE="666"
#MP540 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="1730", MODE="666"
#MP630 series
SYSFS{idVendor}=="04a9", SYSFS{idProduct}=="172e", MODE="666"

LABEL="canon_mfp_end"

Now, should I replace all of the SYSFS commands with ATTR or with ATTRS?

BTW, system rebooted without any problems this time. Thank you for helping me!!

[dibl]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

BTW, system rebooted without any problems this time. Thank you for helping me!!

Cool. Having achieved this level of success, I'm hesitant to go further ....


Is your Canon MP540 working correctly? If so, just ignore the silly boot message.

[hansdevr]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

It's working like a charm! OK, I'll leave that file as it is. Ignoring something is always easier than editing it away...

[GreyGeek]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

I let the system finish the check. Ahem, I indeed did always use the power button to shut my PC down... Never knew it could harm anything..
....

The default setting for EXT4 is to "allocate-on-flush", which will DELAY writing out data blocks to the HD in order to improve performance. A manual fsync will force a buffer flush. Since the 2.6.30 kernel certain conditions which leave file handles open are detected and their blocks are allocated immediately. That reduces the risk but it is still there. Like you I have, on occasions, been forced to use the power button to regain control, usually because I was testing some of my software or because I was testing an alpha release (like two days ago when my guest OS Maverick locked up after the latest update). But, never forget that when you hit the power button to shut down you are playing Russian roulette with your data. You've been lucky. So have I.

Question: How often should I back up?
Answer: How much data do you want to lose?

The more often you back up the less data you will loose, and the less money you'll lose if you employ people to enter it. The more data the clerks have to re-enter the more it will cost to recover that data. Never backup and you'll risk it all. Once a month and you risk a month's worth of data. Once a week puts a weeks worth of data at risk. Once a day risks a days worth. Twice a day risks only half a day's data.

But, making backups takes time. The more the data the longer the time. And, you can't backup some files if they are still open. The backup software will either ignore an open file (it's ALWAYS the ignored file that is needed during a restore!) or stop the backup. If you come in on Friday and your weekly Thursday night backup process reports that it stopped 5 minutes into a 45 minute process you know that you will either have to rerun it Friday night or risk two weeks worth of data.

One solution is to do a total backup, say once a week on the week end, and an incremental backup, which is a LOT faster, each evening. If things go south sometime on Thursday you restore from Wednesday's incremental backup and re-enter data that was entered up to that time. I had my workstation do incremental backups at noon and at the end of the workday. My bash scripts labeled my tar files with a timestamp, which made keeping their sequence in order a snap.

[hansdevr]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

Thanks for those suggestions, GreyGeek! I am doing daily backups already.

I will mark this thread as solved. Thanks to you both again!

[dibl]

Re: Kubuntu freezes at splash screen

Question: How often should I back up?
Answer: How much data do you want to lose?

LOL -- that's a classic!