ubuntu (or debian) flavours FREEZE EVERY TIME!

Please provide information about the hardware.
Desktop pc (age):
Laptop (age):
BIOS age:
RAM how much:
Graphics card:

When different software fails on the same hardware it might point to a hardware issue.
If possible
- clean the hardware or leave the task to a professional
- verify plugs and cables, unplug usb externals
- exchange RAM (maybe test from a friend)
- exchange graphics card
- verify power supply unit
- update BIOS if it's rather old

Was Ubuntu (or any other) tested without installation?
Which architecture 32 or 64 bit?
If the cpu doesn't support pae, install a previous version and upgrade to 12.04.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1919647

FWIW sys requirements.
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DemystifyingUnityGraphicsHardwareRequirements

Thank you very much Sam, and sorry for my delayed answer. I have still been having the problem, trying out things.

What I forgot to add earlier was that I had a loose contact point on my input power cable, and the power often turned off in the last month before I replaced it (yesterday). the failure of the cable was there for a longer while, but I didnt replace it earlier because it seemed to do to twist the loose point a bit to fix it. But the turn-offs went too often in the last month, specially in the last week. so I got a new one yesterday. When I check memory or the hard disk (via Self Test in disk utility) they prove ok, except that the hard disk test returns that "the disk has a few bad sectors", the reason being "reallocated sector count" (but this has been so over a couple of months), I dont know if this has to do with the present problem.

I'd like to give a few more details: The computer definitely does NOT crash with Tango Studio. This resembles older Ubuntu Studio 10.10 (or Ubuntu Maverick) in look & function, which, like I said above, was the best experience I had with any OS to date. I guess it must be based on it.
After changing the power adapter yesterday, I used the same ubuntu 11.10 live CD, and, unlike before when it crashed within the first five minutes, it remained stable over the course of my whole activity of more than an hour. Also now, I am using Bodhi Linux, which, too, used to crash not too long after boot, but is keeping up so far as I write here.

Here are the details about the computer:

sorry for the interruption, Sam, PC froze again and I tried BIOS update then.

Here are the details of the system and PC:

Laptop, age: Toshiba Satellite A300, almost 4 years old since purchase.

BIOS: the output of "sudo dmidecode less" is as follows:

# dmidecode 2.11
SMBIOS 2.4 present.
35 structures occupying 1491 bytes.
Table at 0x000E8150.

Handle 0x0000, DMI type 0, 24 bytes
BIOS Information
 Vendor: INSYDE
 Version: 2.20
 Release Date: 12/07/2009
 ROM Size: 1024 kB
 Characteristics:
  PCI is supported
  BIOS is upgradeable
  BIOS shadowing is allowed
  Boot from CD is supported
  Selectable boot is supported
  BIOS ROM is socketed
  EDD is supported
  Japanese floppy for NEC 9800 1.2 MB is supported (int 13h)
  Japanese floppy for Toshiba 1.2 MB is supported (int 13h)
  5.25"/360 kB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
  5.25"/1.2 MB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
  3.5"/720 kB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
  3.5"/2.88 MB floppy services are supported (int 13h)
  8042 keyboard services are supported (int 9h)
  CGA/mono video services are supported (int 10h)
  ACPI is supported
  USB legacy is supported
  Targeted content distribution is supported

RAM: output of "free -m" is

             total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3036 528 2507 0 14 365
-/+ buffers/cache: 148 2887
Swap: 6092 0 6092

graphic card: "$ lspci -v less" returned a long list, but I hope I picked the needed info:

01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] nee ATI RV620 [Mobility Radeon HD 3400 Series] (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
 Subsystem: Toshiba America Info Systems Device ff1e
 Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 45
 Memory at c0000000 (32-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
 I/O ports at 5000 [size=256]
 Memory at d6300000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=64K]
 Expansion ROM at d6320000 [disabled] [size=128K]
 Capabilities: <access denied>
 Kernel driver in use: radeon

like I wrote, I tried BIOS update by resetting to factory settings. However, downloading BIOS update from manufacturer website and following steps as given there, it was displayed that the ROM version is the same as that of the BIOS update. That is, BIOS was already the newest one. I however installed a couple of driver updates listed in the manufacturer website, like those for sound, chipset..and during this Windows session PC turned itself off and on twice, and this happened 5 times only in the last 3 days, thrice today alone. this is a totally new thing, unlike freeze that has been occuring over the last months with varying frequency (at almost every boot of any OS in the last one week or so, except for Tango Studio).

So I reinstalled Artistx and booted Knoppix from live USB. both kept their usual freeze points during the login sessions so far. Knoppix live USB was also reinstalled, and this time cursor occasionally seemed to have slowed down, at times freezing windows for half a minute before doing anything. Specially right now Knoppix keeps freezing within 2-3 minutes of booting to Desktop.

I just had a memtest run for the second time in a week, and it gave again no errors. First pass was completed, and I stopped it at 80% completion of second pass. (I think one pass must be enough, right?)

to clean the hardware, would it do to open the bottom lids of RAM etc. and clean them? I guess there must be a cleaning spray for these parts? I never did this, all cleaning I ever did was blowing mightily into the fan from time to time to relieve it from dust as I once read would help. After having changed the power adapter, it seems to me that the duration of single "freeze-free" runs has increased (getting from half to over one hour since cable change- though no idea if relevant), however the frequency of freezes has not diminished.

I will try and exchange ram and the graphic card with another pc. It is a 32-bit one, and the OS with which freezing problems occured were mostly on USB except one, therefore they were all tested without installation. regarding the support for pae, is there a way for me to know this for different OS that I mentioned before?

What I observed, whether this means anything or not, is that duration of login sessions until the freeze tend to be similar for consecutive bootings, but to vary in different such intervals of consecutive booting. for ex. if the PC froze generally after 5-10 min. this morning every time I rebooted, it may be doing so after 15-20 minutes when I turned on the PC again in the afternoon.

What comes to my mind is, could a full hardware scan be possible to diagnose whatever is wrong?

Many many thanks for your time for reading this long text,

warm greetings!

sorry, just noticed that RAM details were messed up while copy-pasting, pasting again:

                              total used free shared buffers cached
Mem: 3036 1034 2001 0 19 648
-/+ buffers/cache: 366 2669
Swap: 6092 0 6092

apparently misalignment comes from text editor posting the comment :) hope it doesnt affect clarity of details.

oh goodness.. did I write that one pass should be enough for memtest?!?..as I've been informed here;
http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/16666/diagnose-hardware-problems-with-an-ubuntu-live-cd/

it seems that I will leave it running before sleep..I feel wary about Cpuburn, though the author refers to it for cases of random restarts..would you recommend to use this tool?

Also I found out about Inquisitor and downloaded it; http://sourceforge.net/projects/inq/files/inquisitor/3.0/inq-live-3.0-x86.iso/download

could SystemRescueCd also be helpful in this context, though it seems to be oriented towards hard disk recovery/repair?

my apologies for the array of messages piled up above..

I would like to sum up the situation here:

currently I have had following problems with Linux Mint, Ubuntu from 11.10 on, Knoppix, Dream Studio, Artistx, Apodio and Bodhi Linux (but I had NONE of these with Tango Studio):

-PC freezes within 1-2 minutes to 1 hour of desktop session start.

-random shutdown-reboots. this happened 1 to 3 times a day since friday. this also happened during brief "factory settings" session in Windows Vista.

-Knoppix live USB boot hangs after disk partition containing Knoppix OS is detected.

I used the following diagnosis methods:

1.I did Memtest with 10 passes,leaving it running overnight. All passes were without errors.

2.I did the longest SMART test on Disk Utility. It showed the same error that existed for months now; reallocated sector count, explained as read/write verification error (4 bad sectors and the normalized/worst/threshold values remaining the same since the error started).
From I found out online on this error, this value staying constant and not increasing is deemed something not to worry about so far.

3. I installed a CPU temperature indicator on the desktop. The values remained between 44-51°C over the course of about 2 hours, where the critical value was shown as 114°C. does this rules out that CPU might have a general overheating problem?

(I also "halfway" opened the inside of my laptop today. "halfway" because I thought removing the screws at the bottom surface would reveal it, which it didn't; an online search after putting it back together showed me the true method of disassembling.
I anyway blew compressed air in it from the opening I could get, and tried to clean the fan I could see, but not ins and outs of the hardware. I reseated both RAMs, too.)

No matter the referred CPU value observed, would a full clean-up, that is obviously worthwhile for hardware health, still be worthwhile in terms of tackling above issues?

Thus having reassembled PC and booted Ubuntu 11.10, it froze in 2.minute.

4.I feel by now absolutely certain that with Tango Studio I have none of the problems that happen with all other OSes (Mint, Ubuntu from 11.10 on, Knoppix, Dream Studio, Artistx, Apodio..), which means:

no PC freezes,
no random shutdown-reboot attacks (btw, this happened during brief "factory settings" session in Windows Vista, too)
no breakdown whatsoever.

if there were a hardware problem whether with RAM, HDD, CPU, processor or motherboard, shouldn't this also have occured in Tango Studio, either?..but then..I dont get why since the other day Knoppix boot from USB hangs at the point the partition gets detected..

It has been over 4 hours I am working on Tango Studio and not a single disturbance happened, one also "feels" the stability while being active.

As Tango is based on 10.10 as far as I see and am informed, concerning my hardware, could there be something (a setting, installation..) that needs to be done to enable smooth running of other, newer systems? could "being newer" be the reason of problems referred?

else might you have any suggestions to try as a solution here?

Thank you very much,

Best summer days!

update: I applied ultimate boot cd and selected one of the "system" testing applications (cant remember the name, but it was the one with four big letters starting with N). As soon as it started, it returned the message "an active virus has probably been detected in memory! You should run some good antivirus program and check your system!"

Upon this, I decided to make a fresh install, and installed Bodhi Linux on my whole HDD, just for the purpose of erasing everything that was there.
The first result was encouraging: Knoppix USB booted again, instead of hanging after partition detection.
I am currently running the same Knoppix session, hope the freeze or shutdown issues have disappeared, too.

for me it is still a question mark what has been happening all the while, but if errors are now gone for good, I cant ask for more :)

I am closing this post. The problems all persist, or even are more, and I will have the PC examined by a technician.