Freeze ups are occuring with both 8.04 and 8.10

Please could you try a different and tiny distro of linux, from a different major fork. I'm thinking of Wolvix Hunter but only run it as a LiveCd, don't install anything to your machine.
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=wolvix
Try out the Wolvix Control Panel to see if you can get sound working but please make sure you turn the volume down if you start the test. My neighbours keep complaining about the noise ;) Please let us know if this does work as it helps us to know if there's a potential hardware conflict with linux generally or just a problem in Ubuntu, in which case we should be able to fix it easily.

I'm not sure if you found this page. It's got a few obvious checks that are easily overlooked, such as check the wire is plugged in etc!
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/SoundTroubleshooting
I often find its the obvious stuff that i miss

Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

Tom

Thanks for your help. I had missed the SoundTroubleshooting page but I've now worked thru the first section with the following result:

List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****

card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 0: CMI9880 [CMI9880]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 1: CMI9880 Digital [CMI9880 Digital]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

card 0: Intel [HDA Intel], device 6: Si3054 Modem [Si3054 Modem]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0

suzi@suzi-laptop:~$ sudo aptitude install linux-ubuntu-modules-`uname -r` linux-generic
[sudo] password for suzi:
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information
Initializing package states... Done
Writing extended state information... Done
Couldn't find any package whose name or description matched "linux-ubuntu-modules-2.6.27-11-generic"
Couldn't find any package whose name or description matched "linux-ubuntu-modules-2.6.27-11-generic"
The following packages will be REMOVED:
libgalago3{u} mono-gmcs{u}
0 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 2 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B of archives. After unpacking 1413kB will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n/?] y
Writing extended state information... Done
(Reading database ... 129457 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing libgalago3 ...
Removing mono-gmcs ...
Processing triggers for libc6 ...
ldconfig deferred processing now taking place
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information
Initializing package states... Done
Writing extended state information... Done
suzi@suzi-laptop:~$

00:1b.0 Audio device: Intel Corporation 82801FB/FBM/FR/FW/FRW (ICH6 Family) High Definition Audio Controller (rev 04)
        Subsystem: LG Electronics, Inc. Device 000e
        Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 16
        Memory at b8000000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16K]
        Capabilities: <access denied>
        Kernel driver in use: HDA Intel
        Kernel modules: snd-hda-intel

According to http://www.alsa-project.org/main/index.php/Matrix:Vendor-Intel it appears to be supported. I didn't go any further as there are other indications that other problems exist and I didn't want to make matters worse.

I then tried Wolvix Hunter 1.1.0 as you suggested. It started to boot OK but when the installation progress indicator bar showed about the 80% finished, the PC froze. I tried again and it froze at the same point.

I have now loaded the ATI/AMD proprietary FGLRX graphic driver and while it now seems marginally less inclined to freeze, this morning it repeated froze while just selecting text on the terminal screen.

Regards, Ted

Hmmm, don't worry too much about Wolvix not working, i was just interested in troubleshooting a few things. It's Ubuntu that we want on this machine. I'm wondering if this is all caused by a cd-drive hardware problem and if so a fresh install might be able to fix all these problems in one go - not from a cd tho! Please make sure data is all backed up, this will mostly all be in the
/home/suzi/Documents
/home/suzi/Videos
/home/suzi/Music
/home/suzi/Pictures
folders. Probably easier to copy the entire /home/suzi folder to cd/dvd or via usb stick onto another machine.

Probably the best way to reinstall would be to try a Usb stick as it seems to be the most frequently used method.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation#Installation%20without%20a%20CD

https://help.ubuntu.com/8.04/installation-guide/i386/installation-howto.html

Alternatively ...
Although it is usually better to install onto the machine you are going to be using as hardware detection should result in a properly configured system it sounds as though you can plug a laptop drive into another machine and install Ubuntu onto that and then carry the laptop drive into your daughters machine?

Please let us know which way you want to try so we can try to help.
Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

Tom

Thanks for your continuing help. I decided to try your first suggested option but being a rank amateur, I found the installation notes (because they try to cover many different situations) to be somewhat confusing.

I'm trying to set up the USB stick on my own PC running 8.04. On my desktop I have an iso copy of 8.10. I also have a copy of 8.10 on CD correctly converted from iso and ready for installation. My USB drive is 1Gb, FAT16 format and is located at /dev/sdf1.

The package "usb-creator" doesn't seem to be available to me (presumably because I'm still running 8.04) and of the suggested alternative options "Make your USB stick bootable with SYSLINUX" followed by "Copy the Ubuntu CD to your USB stick" looked like the most reliable and foolproof option. Sadly it hasn't proved to be.

I installed the syslinux tools and made the USB drive bootable as directed. The file "ldlinux.sys" appeared on the flash drive. I then attempted to drag the files from the cdrom file browser to the USB file browser. About 600Mb copied OK but then the process stalled.

Now I have a partial copy of 8.10 installation files on the USB drive that I want to delete - so I can have a second and fresh attempt. Unfortunately I can't see a simple way to delete them. I presume operating as root via a terminal is required but I don't know enough about it to proceed with confidence.

Help would be much appreciated.

Regards, Ted

I'm not sure that 1Gb is going to be enough. It's worth posting a new question about getting a usb stick bootable because there are a lot of unknowns here for me. I'm also on 8.04 and can't find usb-creator in the 'System - Administration' sub-menu either. Sorry, i should have checked. My Usb stick is only 128Mb so i know i haven't a chance at trying out this Usb install in order to guide you but someone at the front-desk will probably already have experience with this.
https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+addquestion
I would use the stick to transfer the '/home/suzi' folder to a Windows machine (or a linux one it doesn't matter), just copy it into "My Documents" it'll be fine there.

To open the 'nautilus' file-browser as Root just go up to the top taskbar and click on
Applications - Accessories - Terminal
and into the terminal/command window/console type

sudo nautilus

it will ask for your normal user password, not your SuperUser/Root one and it wont shopw any stars as you type in the password, just to keep it even safer. Please close the file-browser console as soon as you have finished deleting stuff from the Usb stick. It's easy to forget and keep working with it which makes things much more difficult later.

Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

I'm trying to deal with another question which needs someone to install to Usb stick also and thought you might want to see what's going on there too

https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/66366

Note that copying the files to Usb might need you to use a nautilus as Root again. If you have already closed the nautilus console then please open a terminal console and press the up-arrow on your keyboard. This should give you the last command you typed in. I'm not sure how far back the up-arrow limit is because i've always lost count or been distracted by something else!

Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

Tom

Thanks. Operating as root I wiped the USB drive successfully and then attempted to copy and paste from the 8.10 CD to the USB drive. It worked OK except for one file. I presume all the files on the CD are necessary for a clean install.

Regards, Ted

I think it depends on what that one file is. It's likely to be something irrelevant, with a bit of luck. Is the Usb stick still bootable? Can you make it boot-able after copying the cd files across? I think it's quite possible but i'm not sure how-to.

I thought you were going to make the Usb stick bootable using the LiveCd of 8.10
System - Administration - Usb creator (or something)
and then copy the iso image onto the root "/" of the Usb stick?

Note that i haven't yet managed to do this myself successfully even once yet so it's well worth posting this as a new question.
https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+addquestion

I think that once you have the iso on a bootable usb stick then it should work as a LiveUsb session (we still call it a Lived session often) on the laptop with a possibly dodgy cd-drive. If you are using the possibly dodgy cd-drive to make the Usb stick then it could still work well but it would be good to have some idea of which file was missing or which folder it was going into.

Sorry about all this. It'll be worth it when you've got it all working smoothly - it's just very frustrating at the moment.
Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

Tom
Thanks for your help.
Using my own computer (running 8.04), I used the technique detailed on www.pendrivelinux.com to both create a CD boot disc (as the bios didn't allow the possibility of booting from a USB drive) and to load 8.10 onto a USB pen drive. Their instructions worked satisfactorily.
Booting off the pen drive, 8.10 installed OK and appears to run OK except, as before, no onboard sound and the freezing problems remain.
It looks like there must be a hardware incompatibility problem (bug?) somewhere between this LG laptop and Ubuntu.
Regards, Ted

Ok, so can you boot into a 'LiveCd session' off the Usb stick? I would guess not and suggest re-posting the main problem remaining because posting just before americans are likely to just get back from work or school maximises the chance of getting a good answer at the front-desk.
https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+addquestion

You can always link to this question if peopl start going down the same paths we have already tried here
https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/66920

I think we have made progress? And i think we have got the data safely backed up? And you've managed to make a bootable usb stick that should boot up to a 'LiveCd' session on most people's computers but just not your daughters at the moment? You have tried a distro from the Slackware fork and that gave you the same results. usually someone about now would say "Try Fedora" (RedHat fork) but i feel we have got a long way and want to see Ubuntu working d#@t it, lol. The best bet is to try to keep the question quite short initially.

Good luck and regards from
Tom :)

PS thanks for the link, now maybe i'll be able to manage to get a bootable usb stick working ;)

Tom

I have now established that the freezing problem remains whether 8.10 is loaded via USB or CD drive.
In addition I started again from scratch and dual booted XP plus 8.10, both using the CD drive. XP installed without any problem, it doesn't freeze and it has on-board sound where expected. 8.10 installed OK but has no on-board sound has still is prone to freezing. As I can reliably make it freeze (when it should be emitting an alert sound), I think there is an excellent chance both issues are connected.
I will report this as a bug.
Thanks for your help.

Regards Ted

Hi :)

Have you been able to test the new Ubuntu 10.04 before it gets officially released?
http://www.ubuntulinux.org/testing/lucid/beta1
Trying it as a LiveCd or as an extra dual/multi-boot would be ideal. Developers and everyone are keen to try to iron out any problems before 10.04 gets officially released so you might find faster & more effective answers to your bug reports which would make 10.04 work better on your system for you

It might be a good plan to try the Ubuntu Netbook Remix rather than the normal desktop edition.

Thanks and regards from
Tom :)