Desktop Freezes After ~30 Seconds

[Guest]

Alright, I scoured the forums via the search function for a similar topic and I haven't seen anything that's quite similar enough to my issue to be of use. Newbie forums for newbies.

I'm using Kubuntu Jaunty 9.04 x32 and dual-booting with Vista Ultimate x32 on a Dell XPS M1530. I've got an NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT, 4 GB of RAM, and an Intel Core 2 Duo CPU processor with 2 GHz.

I got the system monitor widget up a few days ago since it's nice to see what's going on. Anyways, when I boot up, Kubuntu runs just fine. System process is chugging along at about 50%, normal.

Then it jumps to 95% for a bit. And freezes. The mouse can move a bit, but the desktop itself will be splotchy, with random blocks of white and dead window everywhere. Repeated attempts to move the cursor will eventually freeze it as well, leaving a cold shutdown the only option.

I've tried turning off effects and closing what programs I can before the freeze, but I'm new to Linux so I'm sure there are some solution attempts I haven't tried.

Some other information that might be fun to know is that my Vista won't boot, either. It'll load the desktop, sometimes load the icon images, then freeze. Sometimes it'll give me the BSOD, sometimes it'll reboot itself, sometimes it'll just shut off. Sometimes it'll just die and I'll have to do a cold shutdown. Trying to run startup recovery failed. Vista's safe mode and safe mode with networking are the only ways I can actually use my laptop at this point. I've tried disabling items in msconfig in the bootup but it doesn't seem to do anything but give me slightly more time before my desktop freezes.

I've tried running AdAware through safemode; it just freezes at some point and I have to shut down. My default virus protection is McAfee (sadly).

I've run disk checks for both Vista and Kubuntu, as well as memory tests, and they've all come back clean.

Also, I recently installed Amarok beta 2.1 on Kubuntu and gives me a lib error of some sort, but it's hard for me to retrieve because of the system freeze. I'm not sure if that's relevant or not.

And: the slot loader on my laptop is broken/jammed so I can't use CD's, though I do have a USB with netboot on it.

Thanks, anyone with any idea of what's going on. Any information is greatly appreciated.

[pseudyo]

Re: Desktop Freezes After ~30 Seconds

A lot of talk over at:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=7181437

[vinnywright]

Re: Desktop Freezes After ~30 Seconds

if you can get a konsole. shell , terminal , one of these up befor the crash and run ..top..
you should see the runaway prosess and posabley be abel to kill it.

at least see what it is to report hear

VINNY

[Guest]

Re: Desktop Freezes After ~30 Seconds

..top.. ?

[dibl]

Re: Desktop Freezes After ~30 Seconds

Most of these "freeze" reports are a video driver issue. You have a nice nVidia chip that is well supported. You might try installing EnvyNG in a Konsole window with:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install envyng -qt

and then run it in text mode, by first exiting the X server with Alt-F1, then:

sudo /etc/init.d/kdm stop

then

sudo envyng -t

First choose to "Remove" or "Uninstall" the driver, to remove the prior version, then choose #1 "Install" the proprietary driver -- it should pick the latest stable version and install it.

BEFORE you start the X server again, run

sudo nvidia-xconfig

to write a new xorg.conf file

Then do

startx

and you should get a nice screen with no more freezes.