Lubuntu Saucy fails to boot after installation

[Erick Brunzell]

I'm not at all sure what's wrong but I'm testing the Lubuntu i386 20130722 Alternate image and after the installation completes I simply can't boot into a working DE. The disc ejects as it should and the boot process appears to be trying to do something, but nothing ever happens.

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

BTW the hardware used was:

VIA C7 CPU @ 1500MHz
VIA CN700/P4M800 Pro/P4M800 CE/VN800 Graphics [S3 UniChrome Pro] (rev 01)
VIA VT8233/A/8235/8237 AC97 Audio Controller (rev 60)
Ethernet controller: VIA Technologies, Inc. VT6102 [Rhine-II] (rev 78)
1GB DDR2 RAM

and a 160GB SATA 1 drive.

[Ubuntu QA Website (ubuntuqa)]

This bug has been reported on the Ubuntu ISO testing tracker.

A list of all reports related to this bug can be found here:
http://iso.qa.ubuntu.com/qatracker/reports/bugs/1203852

[Jackson Doak (noskcaj)]

Can someone confirm of this happens in AMD64, netboot, PPC, or the desktop installer?

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

@ Jackson,

I doubt this is actually a d-i bug since Nio has reported the same thing I'm seeing while testing the live image. I'm not sure what the source of the problem is but I PM'ed Julien.

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

I marked this invalid because it's clearly not a debian-installer bug. I suspect it's either a kernel bug or a lightdm bug and we're continuing to investigate that.

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

Please track bug #1203984 for progress on this bug.

[sudodus (nio-wiklund)]

It's bug, real big fat one with tha Lubuntu alternate installer. Maybe it should be reported against another package, but until it is, I will add 'affects me too'

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

OK, I changed the status to confirmed, but we may be dealing with two different bugs here.

Could you please post your hardware profile here?

At the very least these outputs might be helpful:

lspci | grep VGA

cat /proc/cpuinfo

In my case I'm having trouble with a VIA C7 CPU @ 1500MHz and VIA CN700/P4M800 Pro/P4M800 CE/VN800 Graphics [S3 UniChrome Pro] (rev 01).

So far I know that it effects the i386 Alpha 2 candidates of both Lubuntu and Xubuntu, but I've fairly well ruled out a kernel problem by trying a current "pending" server image.

So, in my case, I think it's an X problem but I'm not finding anything helpful in the logs :^(

Also I'm encountering this same thing with the Xubuntu and Lubuntu live images, so what I was reporting was NOT a d-i bug.

I'm still picking my brain to try and figure this out.

[sudodus (nio-wiklund)]

My problems were with a Dell with Pentium 4 bought January 2004 according to the following specs.

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/dim4600/en/4600i/sm/specs.htm

I could install a system to a USB HDD that did not boot on the same Dell with Pentium 4 CPU, but ran on other computers, one with

i5: http://www.toshiba.se/laptops/satellite-pro/c850/satellite-pro-c850-19w/

and one with Pentium M: http://www.cnet.com/laptops/lenovo-thinkpad-t42-2373/4507-3121_7-31155666.html

After updating and re-trying, it could also be booted on the original Dell computer, and ran without problems.

[sudodus (nio-wiklund)]

guru@alt-saucy:~$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 15
model : 2
model name : Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.80GHz
stepping : 9
microcode : 0x17
cpu MHz : 2792.881
cache size : 512 KB
fdiv_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 2
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe pebs bts cid xtpr
bogomips : 5585.76
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 128
address sizes : 36 bits physical, 32 bits virtual
power management:

guru@alt-saucy:~$ lspci|grep -i vga
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV34 [GeForce FX 5200] (rev a1)
guru@alt-saucy:~$

guru@alt-saucy:~$ lsb_release -a
No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu Saucy Salamander (development branch)
Release: 13.10
Codename: saucy
guru@alt-saucy:~$

I can boot a live USB drive of the same version, flavour and date without any boot options, so the corresponding live system has no issues with the graphics. But the installed system made from the alternate iso did not run at reboot. Not even after power off and cold boot. However it runs now after visiting two other computers and a kernel upgrade (apt-get update && apt-get dist-upgrade).

from:
guru@alt-saucy:~$ uname -a
Linux alt-saucy 3.10.0-4-generic #13-Ubuntu SMP Thu Jul 18 19:25:05 UTC 2013 i686 i686 i686 GNU/Linux
to:
guru@alt-saucy:~$ uname -a
Linux alt-saucy 3.10.0-5-generic #14-Ubuntu SMP Mon Jul 22 15:25:20 UTC 2013 i686 i686 i686 GNU/Linux
guru@alt-saucy

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

I see you're effected with totally different hardware so I need to ask, is that hardware also incapable of running the live image?

I'm leaning strongly in favor of this being an Xorg bug in my case, but if you can use the live image OK, and just not the alt, then we're looking at two totally different things.

[Phill Whiteside (phillw)]

It was a kernel big, 3.10.0.-4 was not a good day for the kernel team. This is resolved in 3.10.0-5 which the alternate images now all have.

[sudodus (nio-wiklund)]

On 2013-07-25 13:11, Erick Brunzell wrote:
> I see you're effected with totally different hardware so I need to ask,
> is that hardware also incapable of running the live image?
>
> I'm leaning strongly in favor of this being an Xorg bug in my case, but
> if you can use the live image OK, and just not the alt, then we're
> looking at two totally different things.
>
Did you see my correspondence with Phill et.all today?

I added you to the mailing list. Maybe those mails were stopped by your
spam filter.

Anyway, finally I was able to run it in the Dell. But before that I ran
a persistent live session booted from a current Lubuntu Alpha 2 USB
drive. And I needed no boot options, I have no graphics issues with the
current kernel.

But maybe there are issues [only] with the older kernel, that comes with
the alternate iso. That is why I think a re-spin would help.

-o-

By the way, I was also able to boot the installed system in the USB HDD
in an old IBM Thinkcentre via a grub menu entry with chainloading.

Most things work, but like Raring, the colour map defaults to a simple
one, maybe only 256 colours, so the default wallpaper looks ugly. It is
obvious that the support of old hardware is vanishing. This is old Intel
graphics.

Best regards
Nio

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

There were two different problems in play here:

1) The alternate images still had an older broken kernel. So Phill's respin fixed that for Lubuntu alpha 2.

2) Recent Xorg changes don't like my VIA P4M800 graphics. I have some other tasks to tackle but I will follow up on that ASAP and open a new appropriate bug report if needed.

Can Phill mark this fix released?

[Erick Brunzell (lbsolost)]

I need to post a screenshot to pursue this P4M800 xorg bug so I can discuss it with the Lubuntu QA team. So please don't think that this is related to the d-i bug that the kernel upgrade fixed.

This d-i bug should be marked fix released!