Desktop 15.10 live image doesn't boot

[Stephen Fenwick]

The Ubuntu Desktop 15.10 live image fails to boot from USB on an Intel NUC5PPYH (N3700 CPU - details here http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/nuc/nuc-kit-nuc5ppyh.html)

During the normal boot process it hangs on the splash screen. Booting in console mode gives an error:
 - NMI watchdog: BUG: soft lockup - CPU#3 stuck for 23s! [systemd-udevd:1165]

A photo of the console boot screen showing this error is here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ax6j2dbedqpwbrb/IMG_20151104_213045.jpg?dl=0

I am happy to follow instructions to get more detailed logging, but am not currently clear how to do this at this point in the boot process.

Ubuntu Desktop 15.04 installs successfully.
This bug is still present in Ubuntu Desktop 16.04 nightly

The BIOS settings on this device include an option for "Operating System" with values "Windows 7", "Windows 8.x/10" and "Linux". Setting this to "Linux" enables Ubuntu to boot, and Windows 10 seems to run OK too. This provides a workaround for now but isn't completely satisfactory as Windows 10 is probably not supported on the device in this mode, and this may cause problems I haven't found yet.

I would expect that 15.10 runs with the BIOS in "Windows" mode the same as 15.04.

[Stephen Fenwick (spfenwick)]

I'm attaching the photo of the boot screen showing the error. This is the same image as the Dropbox link above

[Brad Figg (brad-figg)]

This bug is missing log files that will aid in diagnosing the problem. From a terminal window please run:

apport-collect 1512995

and then change the status of the bug to 'Confirmed'.

If, due to the nature of the issue you have encountered, you are unable to run this command, please add a comment stating that fact and change the bug status to 'Confirmed'.

This change has been made by an automated script, maintained by the Ubuntu Kernel Team.

[Joseph Salisbury (jsalisbury)]

If you are able to install an older release, it would be good to know if you can boot the Wily kernel on the older release. The Wily kernel can be downloaded from:

https://launchpad.net/~canonical-kernel-team/+archive/ubuntu/ppa/+build/8175543

[Stephen Fenwick (spfenwick)]

I am unable to run apport-collect as the system doesn't boot far enough. I'm therefore changing the status to 'Confirmed' as instructed.

I'll try running 15.04 with a Wily kernel tonight (NZ time) and report on the outcome.

[Stephen Fenwick (spfenwick)]

Results are:

Ubuntu Desktop 15.04:
 - Default kernel: boots successfully
 - Wiley kernel from above link boots to desktop but mouse and keyboard are unresponsive. I think this is an unrelated issue. I only installed the kernel image .deb file (using dpkg -i) so I'm not 100% sure if this is a valid test. Adding other packages may get the mouse and keyboard working but might also trigger the hang.

Ubuntu Desktop 15.10 (upgraded from 15.04):
 - Default kernel: hangs on startup
 - Kernel 3.19.0-31-generic (left over from the upgrade): boots successfully

[Stephen Fenwick (spfenwick)]

Update: On Ubuntu Desktop 15.04 with Wily kernel I installed linux-image-extra as well, and was able to get a working system.

So it looks like the problem is an interaction between the Wily kernel and something else that has changed in 15.10.

If there is a way to get useful logs from the hung boot process on the upgraded 15.10 I'm happy to give that a go - just let me know what to do.

[Gerbrand van Dieijen (gerbrand-d)]

I got a similar if not identical error: https://plus.google.com/photos/photo/109261057416378398888/6263113522736172050
CPU is Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-6700HQ CPU
Internal memory 32GB, and the laptop has a PCI-Express SSD. Booting into an already installed Ubuntu installation does succeed. Other than that my experience on kernel-debugging is a bit to limited to find more detailed information.

[Gerbrand van Dieijen (gerbrand-d)]

Some minor additional information: booting from pci-express ssd only fails when the boot-image is configured to allocate space for writing. So the problem seems more than likely related reading/writing and or heavy io with the pci-express ssd during boot time.