Unity not starting after upgrade on dell, did dconf reset and serid

[steampunk]

I did the usual unity work arounds but unity & x doesn't allow me to select session manager. When starting unit manually it says dbus refused connection. This is the third dell box the latest security updated screwed up.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
Package: unity 7.4.0+16.04.20160715-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-31.50-generic 4.4.13
Uname: Linux 4.4.0-31-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.1
Architecture: amd64
CompizPlugins: No value set for `/apps/compiz-1/general/screen0/options/active_plugins'
Date: Sat Jul 23 09:29:03 2016
DistUpgraded: Fresh install
DistroCodename: xenial
DistroVariant: ubuntu
DkmsStatus: virtualbox, 5.0.24, 4.4.0-31-generic, x86_64: installed
GraphicsCard:
 Matrox Electronics Systems Ltd. MGA G200eW WPCM450 [102b:0532] (rev 0a) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
   Subsystem: Dell PowerEdge R710 MGA G200eW WPCM450 [1028:0235]
MachineType: Dell Inc. PowerEdge R710
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_ZA:en
 TERM=linux
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_ZA.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.4.0-31-generic root=UUID=186eeabf-ebd5-4148-ab9e-51a9e66c0a88 ro quiet splash nopat
Renderer: Software
SourcePackage: unity
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
dmi.bios.date: 07/23/2013
dmi.bios.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.bios.version: 6.4.0
dmi.board.name: 0PV9DG
dmi.board.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.board.version: A00
dmi.chassis.type: 23
dmi.chassis.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnDellInc.:bvr6.4.0:bd07/23/2013:svnDellInc.:pnPowerEdgeR710:pvr:rvnDellInc.:rn0PV9DG:rvrA00:cvnDellInc.:ct23:cvr:
dmi.product.name: PowerEdge R710
dmi.sys.vendor: Dell Inc.
version.compiz: compiz 1:0.9.12.2+16.04.20160714-0ubuntu1
version.ia32-libs: ia32-libs N/A
version.libdrm2: libdrm2 2.4.67-1ubuntu0.16.04.1
version.libgl1-mesa-dri: libgl1-mesa-dri 11.2.0-1ubuntu2
version.libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental: libgl1-mesa-dri-experimental N/A
version.libgl1-mesa-glx: libgl1-mesa-glx 11.2.0-1ubuntu2
version.xserver-xorg-core: xserver-xorg-core 2:1.18.3-1ubuntu2.2
version.xserver-xorg-input-evdev: xserver-xorg-input-evdev 1:2.10.1-1ubuntu2
version.xserver-xorg-video-ati: xserver-xorg-video-ati 1:7.7.0-1
version.xserver-xorg-video-intel: xserver-xorg-video-intel 2:2.99.917+git20160325-1ubuntu1
version.xserver-xorg-video-nouveau: xserver-xorg-video-nouveau 1:1.0.12-1build2
xserver.bootTime: Sat Jul 23 09:21:54 2016
xserver.configfile: default
xserver.devices:
 input Power Button KEYBOARD, id 6
 input Generic USB KEYBOARD, id 7
 input Generic USB KEYBOARD, id 8
 input Avocent USB Composite Device-0 KEYBOARD, id 9
 input Avocent USB Composite Device-0 TOUCHSCREEN, id 10
xserver.logfile: /var/log/Xorg.0.log
xserver.version: 2:1.18.3-1ubuntu2.2

[steampunk (gerhard-gerrizen)]

Reinstalled and did a upgrade same thing happens

[steampunk (gerhard-gerrizen)]

Path for fix is apt-get install gnome -> select lightdm -> then enable unity via ccsm , by itself dconf , setsid and ccsm do nothing without installing gnome

[Andrea Azzarone (azzar1)]

Are you on a virtual machine?

[Matthew Thyer (matt-thyer)]

I too am having the Unity not starting problem.
It was working this morning but then I applied the latest updates and now it's broken.
I'm using Ubuntu Desktop 16.04 on VirtualBox 5.1.2 on Windows 10 Pro 64 bit.
I've tried:
- downgrading VirtualBox to version 5.0.26
- changing the VMs chipset to ICH9 (was PIIX3)
- changing the VM to having 1 vCPU (was 4)
- booting the 4.4.0-28 kernel instead of the default 4.4.0-31
- enabling PAE/NX
- changing networking to not use virtio-net
- changing paravirtualisation acceleration from Default (KVM) to none

None of the above has made any difference (so I've undone all those changes).
My VM is a default setup VirtualBox Ubuntu VM with 4 GB RAM, 4 vCPUs, USB 3.0 enabled, virtio-net.

Recent Ubuntu updates seem to be the culprit. I noticed that since a couple of days ago, every fifth boot will result in an NMI watchdog timeout with CPU stuck for 23s.

Is this a DBUS issue?

[Matthew Thyer (matt-thyer)]

I've just tried making a new user account and logging in with that and Unity starts ok.
So this seems to be some kind of user profile corruption.

[Matthew Thyer (matt-thyer)]

These series of commands do not resolve the issue:

dconf reset -f /org/compiz/
setsid unity
unity --reset-icons

How did I run them?
I just attempted to login graphically on VTY7 as usual (where I get Unity not starting) and then I swicthed to VTY2, logged in, export DISPLAY=:0 and ran those commands... then control-C and rebooted.

[Matthew Thyer (matt-thyer)]

I'm sick of this and have now fixed the problem by:
$ rm -rf .gnome .gconf .config .dbus

I actually tried just the first two first (rm -rf .gnome .gconf) but that didn't fix it so it was one of the last two.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for unity (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]