Failure of reboot after update

Tue Oct 11 22:52:10 UTC 2016

> On Oct 11, 2016, at 2:26 PM, Jim Croft <gatorforge07 at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> The thumb drive was not a bootable drive. It had a Kubuntu 16.04 download, but an installation download, not a bootable one, so the fact that it would not boot from there may not mean anything (am I right?)
> 
> Anyway, I will not bother you any more until I get someone who is tech-savvy to check out the computer. It is older than you wrote, I copied the wrong ID for the machine. It is a Satellite A305-S6872, model PSAG8U-02E018, and is several years old.

If only several years old, that should not be a problem.  I would guess my Toshiba laptop is at least 7 years old and works just fine with 16.10

> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Jim Croft
> 
> -----Original Message----- From: Xen
> Sent: Tuesday, October 11, 2016 13:19
> To: kubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> Subject: Re: Failure of reboot after update
> 
> Jim Croft schreef op 11-10-2016 18:23:
>> Thank you for your prompt reply.
>> I am not able to follow the instructions because now I cannot get the
>> computer to boot at all. I will probably have to take it to a shop,
>> and I can’t afford that for a couple of weeks. I do have another
>> computer running Windows 10, so am not desperate. The Kubuntu machine
>> is a toy until I get it working well, and gain enough experience to
>> really use it for practical purposes.
> 
> Jim, normally speaking your hard-drive installation can have no
> influence over whether some USB stick boots or not.
> 
> Windows normally can have trouble with booting from e.g. DVD when the
> master boot record of the harddrive is not correct, a very annoying
> situation. But any Linux boot-stick that will boot without regard of an
> existing system should boot flawlessly no matter what some Kubuntu
> update may have done.
> 
> It is almost impossible that Kubuntu could cause your system to hang at
> the Toshiba screen because normally whatever goes wrong you should
> *always* get a grub prompt.
> 
> It cannot even normally be your harddisk, that could ever cause your
> stick to fail booting. Should not be possible.
> 
> So those are the thing that can't be true. So the first thing you would
> ever need to do at this point is to get your stick to boot (forget about
> the system in the meantime) or to run some (Kubuntu) live DVD. You must
> if you can still run Linux and Windows installation DVDs from some
> external DVD drive, for example. If those things work, then you can go
> on to the text step. Particularly if you can boot into Linux (Kubuntu) I
> am sure there are people that could help youThe thumb drive was not a bootable drive. It had a Kubuntu 16.04 download, but an installation download, not a bootable one, so the fact that it would not boot from there may not mean anything (am I right?)
> 
> Anyway, I will not bother you any more until I get someone who is tech-savvy to check out the computer. It is older than you wrote, I copied the wrong ID for the machine. It is a Satellite A305-S6872, model PSAG8U-02E018, and is several years old.
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Jim Croft
> 
> -----Original Message----- From: Xen
> Sent: Tuesday, October 11, 2016 13:19
> To: kubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> Subject: Re: Failure of reboot after update
> 
> Jim Croft schreef op 11-10-2016 18:23:
>> Thank you for your prompt reply.
>> I am not able to follow the instructions because now I cannot get the
>> computer to boot at all. I will probably have to take it to a shop,
>> and I can’t afford that for a couple of weeks. I do have another
>> computer running Windows 10, so am not desperate. The Kubuntu machine
>> is a toy until I get it working well, and gain enough experience to
>> really use it for practical purposes.
> 
> Jim, normally speaking your hard-drive installation can have no
> influence over whether some USB stick boots or not.
> 
> Windows normally can have trouble with booting from e.g. DVD when the
> master boot record of the harddrive is not correct, a very annoying
> situation. But any Linux boot-stick that will boot without regard of an
> existing system should boot flawlessly no matter what some Kubuntu
> update may have done.
> 
> It is almost impossible that Kubuntu could cause your system to hang at
> the Toshiba screen because normally whatever goes wrong you should
> *always* get a grub prompt.
> 
> It cannot even normally be your harddisk, that could ever cause your
> stick to fail booting. Should not be possible.
> 
> So those are the thing that can't be true. So the first thing you would
> ever need to do at this point is to get your stick to boot (forget about
> the system in the meantime) or to run some (Kubuntu) live DVD. You must
> if you can still run Linux and Windows installation DVDs from some
> external DVD drive, for example. If those things work, then you can go
> on to the text step. Particularly if you can boot into Linux (Kubuntu) I
> am sure there are people that could help you troubleshoot from there on.
> 
> Most importantly you will be able to access your internal harddisk.
> 
> What Alan meant was accessing the drive to check on S.M.A.R.T. which is
> a measure of your drive's health. But if you can't even boot an usb
> stick (or DVD), that won't be necessary. Regardless you *could* take the
> hard drive out and hook it onto your Windows 10 computer, but can be
> difficult because of connectors. Or if you think it's fun you could at
> least take the hard drive out to see if it will boot without it (some
> usb stick or DVD). Generally for a laptop there is only one other thing
> you can check and that is the RAM (memory).
> 
> Typically what you say indicates that either the RAM has gone bad or
> your laptop has died.
> 
> Some laptops have very sudden RAM failures, I've been told. Your laptop
> was released in January, 2014. Perhaps you still have warranty? Having
> installed Linux on it should not void it (this is a hardware problem).
> 
> Regards.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> 
>> Thanks,
>> 
>> Jim Croft
>> 
>> FROM: Alan Dacey (grokit)
>> SENT: Tuesday, October 11, 2016 10:30
>> TO: Kubuntu user technical support
>> SUBJECT: Re: Failure of reboot after update
>> 
>> Going by where the boot process stopped the problem may be your hard
>> drive and not software. Could be your hardware too but let's rule out
>> your hard drive first.
>> 
>> Open a terminal any paste the output of the following in your
>> response:
>> 
>> sudo smartctl --all /dev/sda
>> 
>> If it complains about an ATA device behind a SAT layer then use the
>> following:
>> 
>> sudo smartctl -d sat --all /dev/sda
>> 
>> That will give an estimate of your disk's health. You then should run
>> a long test, this will take a while, like 45 minutes to an hour and a
>> half depending on the size of your disk. Smartctl will tell you how
>> long it will take so after that time run the command above again and
>> look for any changes.
>> 
>> Use the following command to run a long test:
>> 
>> sudo smartctl --test=long /dev/sda
>> 
>> It is possible but unlikely that you'll need to enable smart logging
>> on your disk. You'll know if you get no real output.
>> 
>> Use this command to start logging:
>> 
>> smartctl --smart=on --offlineauto=on --saveauto=on /dev/sda
>> 
>> If the command 'smartctl' is not found you'll need to install the
>> package first.
>> 
>> sudo apt-get install smartmontools
>> 
>> You can install a graphical front end with the package gsmartcontrol
>> but if smartctl complained about the layer stuff then you need to go
>> to Options-->Preferences and add "-d sat" (without quotes) in the
>> "Smartctl parameters" box and rescan.
>> 
>>> On Tuesday, October 11, 2016 6:02:13 AM Jim Croft wrote:
>>> 
>>> I am running Kubuntu 16.04 on a Toshiba Satellite E55t-A5320 series
>> computer.
>> 
>>> 
>> 
>>> The last two updates, when prompted to reboot, I clicked on the
>> prompt and the reboot failed. The computer froze on the initial
>> Toshiba banner page which is supposed to allow access via F2 to Setup
>> Utility or by F12 to Boot Manager. The first time this happened, I
>> tried to boot from a thumb drive. The computer gave a <Boot Failed>
>> message, but when I attempted a normal boot, it worked, and continued
>> to work, through several reboots, for several days. However, the next
>> time I updated, and clicked the reboot prompt, the reboot again
>> failed, and the previous work-around did not work. The computer will
>> not get beyond the Toshiba introductory banner described previously.
>> Any recommendations? I am not very familiar with Kubuntu, and am only
>> semi-literate on computers in general, so please put it in “baby
>> talk”!
>> 
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