My story of Linux, but the desktop tends to crash

Support & Help Requests
#1

I use Linux for the toughness of the file system. I have lost data on a Windows system before, but never on Linux.

I used Mandrake/Mandriva most of the time, although I did try some others like RH, Suse, PCLOS. After a short stint with Mageia I made the switch to Ubuntu, because it seemed to have the most development, and 3rd party support—it is now the ‘default’ Linux distro. Mageia is usable with KDE, but my advice is, turn off the regular updates—go from final release to final release. I am just not a big fan of KDE.

Having grown used to the old Gnome desktop I discovered Mate not too long ago. I have been using it as my main desktop since 16.04 on a Thinkpad W510 with the compiz windowing system. I am living with it, but I am not happy exactly. Here are some persistent issues:

  • the Software Updater window has stopped displaying; I see it in the taskbar but when I click on it the window fails to show up, and the taskbar button disappears (I do updates from the CLI from time to time)
  • the Eye of Mate image viewer crashes frequently, seems unable to deal with files larger than 2Mb; its hard to believe how crappy it is
  • Caja crashes quite regularly, and sometimes (1 or 2 times a week) freezes the desktop completely; I have to force a shutdown from the power button; it also cannot display directories with a large number of files, it grays out - unbelievable! it takes some doing to make Linux feel crappier than Windows (I am using PCManFM to do all the heavy lifting now - if I knew how to make it the default directory viewer I would)
  • Cron does not run my jobs, although the crontab is loaded correctly; nothing wrong with the crontab because it worked fine before

On the plus side, my 2 necessary Windows apps are working in Wine, Chrome is working fine, Samba server is working fine, Gimp is working fine most of the time. Sometimes Gimp fails to draw the main window contents; I have to shut it down and start it again - it takes 3 or 4 restarts on occasion. One time it failed until after reboot. (I launch it from the context menu of particular image files in the file manager.)

So, that’s my story. I like the toughness of the file system—I have more than 5 Tb of data stored, and growing. The desktop experience is well below the Windows 7 level. Explorer no longer forces hard reboots. Desktop issues can be fixed with the 3 finger salute, and by killing the process. Mate forces hard reboots quite regularly.

Why do you use Linux? And why did you choose Ubuntu MATE?
Why do you use Linux? And why did you choose Ubuntu MATE?
#2

After my last hard reboot, caused by a Caja desktop freeze, it turns out my desktop sticky notes are lost. Its a panel applet. Luckily I had copied the data over to another desktop so I can get them back.

#3

I’ve been having some problem with compiz causing lock ups in 16.04 lately. You should try Marco as your window manager for a while to see if that alleviates the problem. Also, you should enable Ctrl+Alt+Backspace to get out of a freeze, which is more preferred than powering down.

https://ubuntu-mate.community/t/enable-ctrl-alt-backspace/12971?u=steven

As @BrokenCanoe has already pointed out, this should be in the support section of the forum. However, I hope this helps you stabilize your system. Ubuntu Mate 16.04 is not perfect, but is still a good daily driver IMO.

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#4

Thank you for your reply, Steven. I always try Ctrl+Alt+Backspace first before going to the power button. I only go to the power button after mouse and keyboard inputs have been frozen. I also give it about 30 seconds or more to recover—sometimes grayed out windows do recover in 10-15 seconds.

It did occur to me that compiz could be a factor. I will enable the 3 finger salute, and switch out of compiz if I have to. The compiz desktop looks a shade better, but not enough to compromise stability I suppose.

Thanks again!

#5

Thanks for the suggestion, BrokenCanoe. Yes, the idea generally is to be constructive in feedback—I know it ended up sounding like a rant. I have had persistent boot issues (only boots through recovery mode, and only after repeated tries) on another Thinkpad, so my frustrations have mounted up a bit. I do not wish to sound ungrateful for all the efforts the developers put into Linux. Who could argue with a price tag of $0?

I have used Linux for quite a long time, and the very fact that I have high expectations should be seen as a compliment. Whether its being more stable than Windows is a high expectation is debatable I suppose.

I did mention that I use Linux for the toughness of the file system. I wish to be able to say I also use it for a more stable, reliable desktop experience than Windows. I used to have that once, with Gnome 2.x and a distro that is now defunct.

#6

If you have specific bugs or issues you need to raise, would you be kind enough to raise them in the Support & Help Requests section of the forum (https://ubuntu-mate.community/c/support) so people can work to help you where possible. Your posts seem to have pointed out more problems than reasons as to why you use / chose Linux / UM :slight_smile:

#7

I prefer compiz completely, but it has been locking up occasionally as of lately, although never to the point that Ctrl+Alt+Backspace failed to resolve the problem on my end. With Marco I suffer no lockups.

#8

Marco here, perfect stability - No issues whatsoever.

#9

Update : I upgraded my other Thinkpad which had the boot issue to 17.04 and now it boots. There is a kink. It does not boot up after a ‘Restart’ command. If I shut it down and power it up then it boots properly. This laptop’s screen was broken so it has been removed completely, and the external VGA monitor has been set as the default display in the BIOS. Somehow this trips up Linux/Grub some of the time, but not all of the time.

The Restart command creates the same issue as with 16.04—a gray screen, presumably the Grub splash, and then nothing. After a hard shutdown it offers up the full Grub menu, including recovery mode options.

If I choose recovery mode it stops at this error
ACPI: Video Device [VID1] (multi-head: yes rom: yes post: no)
sometimes, but sometimes it manages to go through.

If I choose Resume from recovery mode it stops at this error
Starting Load/Save Screen Backlight…ness of backlight:acpi_video0…
sometimes, but sometimes it goes through.

Anyway, having no Restart option is not a big deal. I can shut down and power up. A broken laptop screen is not a common situation obviously, so I am sharing the feedback as a matter of curiosity mainly. It may or may not be of interest.

Thanks for the replies, Steven and Bulletdust.

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#10

Perhaps this link might help - https://askubuntu.com/questions/712111/forcing-grub-menu-to-external-monitor-connected-to-laptop-via-hdmi-vga

#11

Thanks, mdooley. I suspect it is not Grub itself that is the problem, because it does display the plain splash and the menu options on the external monitor. It is after the boot script starts running that the errors are met. Why not ignore the error and keep going? I have no idea. I think any and all non critical errors should be ignored during boot, and then reported to the user afterward.

#12

By the way, I reported this issue to Ask Ubuntu and got no response. I did discover that some other users have experienced it.

#13

I agree that grub is not the problem but using it may be a part of the solution for you. In my own case, I added “video=SVIDEO-1:d” just after quiet splash and before vt_handoff to get my upstairs laptop to boot 17.04 and 17.10 beta much quicker. Your call of course…

#14

Thanks, I’ll keep it in mind if the problem reappears.

#15

Cron jobs don’t execute on 16.04 and 17.04. It is the same tab that has worked before. I googled it as best I could but there isn’t much.

#16

Having tried 17.04 on a secondary Thinkpad I decided it may be a shade more stable than 16.04, so I started an upgrade of my main system. Then while rebooting it hits a kernel panic, something to do with “fail to sync VFS” and “unable to mount root fs at block 0, 0” and such. Now I am running a backup of my home directory from 17.04 live CD, then I am going to try fsck. If that fails I will have to reformat the drive and start over. WTH

I have to at that point give serious thought to Windows 7 again. I am not getting the experience I remember from my past experience of Linux (Mandrake/Mandriva mainly). I am sacrificing the usability of Windows—using Wine to run 2 important apps—but I am not getting the reliability and stability of Linux. I have never known Linux not to boot at all. I have had problems before, but only when I have been tinkering with it, which I used to do in the early days when 3rd party drivers were scarce. I do zero tinkering these days.

Then while I am trying to upload a screenshot I am told my file is larger than 3mb when I know it is 2.2mb. I use GIMP to halve the size of the image, so it is now 1.4mb. Nope! Will not take my screenshot upload. :slight_smile: I can’t catch a break, can I?

#17
#18

Ok, I got a clean install of 17.04 and updated to 17.1.

  1. Cron is still not executing my tab.
  2. CLI sudo chown command not working.
    3 VMware not booting. (Critical!)
  3. Could not restore desktop customization by copying over the hidden files/folders from the old home directory.

I am limping along, experiencing just about the same pain in the a** I get from good, old Windows.

#19

After a couple of months of using 17.1 I find it is more stable than 16.04 LTS. There remain some persistent issues:

  1. Caja seems to get crappier with each new release; it is unbelievably slow, and routinely grays out for 10-15 seconds, and sometimes for so long I end up force killing it. If there is a network I/O operation happening Caja becomes completely unusable, and network I/O is a routine thing for me because I store all my data on a ‘server’ (not a real server, an older laptop retired to local file server duty).

  2. Eye of Mate is a little improved, it crashes less often, but still struggles to load larger sized files sometimes.

  3. Tux does not like to ‘remember’ things for me! I have to mount my samba shares manually from CLI after every boot. I tried for days to get them to load from fstab, but I’m just too dumb I guess. Tux either can not or will not ‘remember’ my samba password. It feels almost like the system is designed with the mission to send the user to the CLI as often as possible! I have a text file full of commands that I keep on the desktop so I can copy-paste them easily—at some point I am likely to tire of this absurdity.

  4. I have a USB audio device which is intended to play music only, while the internal sound card remains the default for all other apps. Sometimes I get the setup just perfect, and it works swimmingly. But after a reboot Tux ‘forgets’ my setup—I have to tinker with Pulseaudio from CLI again, and again, after every reboot.

  5. I have given up on cron working for me—how does one release a Linux distro with a broken cron? I don’t get it. I suppose nobody tested it! Anyway, I have to run my cloud backups from CLI every night. Some nights I forget to…

This is not an exhaustive list, but the routine things I can recall off the top of my head. I think the Linux desktop has hit a glass ceiling—the absence of a profit motive. The server side tools have business models, the desktop does not. The difference between “user” and “customer” is an impasse.