Hey, so I finally managed to track down some error messages in the logs.

I have attached the following:

/var/log/daemon.log
/var/log/Xorg.0.log
/var/log/gdm/:0-greeter.log
/var/log/gdm/:0.log.1

here is a brief summary of the errors:

=============================================================
daemon.log
=============================================================
Jan 27 10:15:35 valkyrie gdm-simple-greeter[6532]: GLib-GObject-CRITICAL: g_param_spec_flags: assertion `G_TYPE_IS_FLAGS (flags_type)' failed
Jan 27 10:15:35 valkyrie gdm-simple-greeter[6532]: GLib-GObject-CRITICAL: g_object_class_install_property: assertion `G_IS_PARAM_SPEC (pspec)' failed
Jan 27 10:15:35 valkyrie gdm-simple-greeter[6532]: WARNING: Unable to read from file /etc/arch-release

=============================================================
Xorg.0.log
=============================================================
(WW) Open ACPI failed (/var/run/acpid.socket) (No such file or directory)
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0): ACPI: failed to connect to the ACPI event daemon; the daemon
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     may not be running or the "AcpidSocketPath" X
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     configuration option may not be set correctly.  When the
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     ACPI event daemon is available, the NVIDIA X driver will
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     try to use it to receive ACPI event notifications.  For
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     details, please see the "ConnectToAcpid" and
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     "AcpidSocketPath" X configuration options in Appendix B: X
(II) Jan 27 10:15:34 NVIDIA(0):     Config Options in the README.

=============================================================
:0-greeter.log
=============================================================
(polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1:6530): GLib-GObject-WARNING **: cannot register existing type `_PolkitError'

(polkit-gnome-authentication-agent-1:6530): GLib-CRITICAL **: g_once_init_leave: assertion `initialization_value != 0' failed
gdm-simple-greeter[6532]: GLib-GObject-CRITICAL: g_param_spec_flags: assertion `G_TYPE_IS_FLAGS (flags_type)' failed
gdm-simple-greeter[6532]: GLib-GObject-CRITICAL: g_object_class_install_property: assertion `G_IS_PARAM_SPEC (pspec)' failed
gdm-simple-greeter[6532]: WARNING: Unable to read from file /etc/arch-release
Window manager warning: Buggy client sent a _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW message with a timestamp of 0 for 0x1200022 (Login Wind)

=============================================================
:0.log.1
=============================================================
[mi] EQ overflowing. The server is probably stuck in an infinite loop.

Backtrace:
0: /usr/bin/Xorg (xorg_backtrace+0x28) [0x4b04e8]
1: /usr/bin/Xorg (mieqEnqueue+0x1f4) [0x4a9874]
2: /usr/bin/Xorg (xf86PostButtonEventP+0xcf) [0x48751f]
3: /usr/bin/Xorg (xf86PostButtonEvent+0xb9) [0x487649]
4: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/synaptics_drv.so (0x7f44f0b11000+0x375d) [0x7f44f0b1475d]
5: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/synaptics_drv.so (0x7f44f0b11000+0x5998) [0x7f44f0b16998]
6: /usr/bin/Xorg (0x400000+0x72027) [0x472027]
7: /usr/bin/Xorg (0x400000+0x11de63) [0x51de63]
8: /lib/libpthread.so.0 (0x7f452541c000+0xee80) [0x7f452542ae80]
9: /lib/libpthread.so.0 (0x7f452541c000+0xffff80bada1e4177) [0xffffffffff600177]