8.10 Desktop version hangs right after accepting password

[Chris Mohler]

On Thu, Jan 15, 2009 at 6:44 PM, Jim Allison <jallison22 at comcast.net> wrote:
[...]
> I booted from the CD I made from the iso and installed using the entire
> disk. The installation appeared to go OK. I rebooted, removed the CD and
> was prompted for a login. I entered my userame and password sucessfully,
> and then the system hung with an empty tan desktop. There is a mouse
> icon that tracks when I move the mouse, but nothing else comes up.
[...]

I ran into a similar scenario - I'm not sure what the culprit was
(buggy video driver?), but running the updates cleared it up.

Unfortunately you will have to do the updates on the command line,
since the graphic login is not working...

At the graphic login screen:
1. Press CTRL-ALT-F1 (you should see a black screen with white text)
2. Log in (you will not see anything on the screen while entering your password)
3. Type 'sudo apt-get update' and press enter (enter your password
again when prompted)
4. Type 'sudo apt-get upgrade' and press enter (depending on your
connection speed, this could take a while)
5. When it's done, type 'sudo reboot' and press enter

You should now be in business with GUI login when it comes back up.

HTH,
Chris