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Strange problem booting an old Dell laptop running Linux
edy:
I have an old Dell laptop on which I installed Ubuntu. The battery is basically dead so we have it plugged in all the time otherwise it won't boot, like a desktop. When we don't need to use it, we close the lid and it goes to sleep. When we open the lid it wakes back up, no problem, works a charm.
Now the WEIRD STUFF happens when the machine gets unplugged by accident, and we have to reboot it. If I try to simply plug it back in and turn it on, it seems to get past the BIOS and then gets to a point where the boot freezes and I see strange bunch of lines and noise on the screen (I will post a photo when I get back home). The pattern is usually the same every time, it is repeatable.
Now here's the rub... If I press F2 on boot and get into the BIOS settings and do absolutely NOTHING but just choose the option to exit (no changes at all), it will proceed to boot normally. I will try to repeat this and make a video and post it.
I discovered this accidentally as I didn't know why this was happening. So I went into the BIOS a few times thinking something was up with the settings (since laptop dead I though maybe CMOS battery was also dead). But the computer retains the settings... clock, all the BIOS configuration is retained. So it can't be that.
It is as if something happens when I enter the BIOS menus that fixes the issue, that doesn't normally happen on a regular boot. I'm not even sure if this has anything to do with the OS and it happen with other distros or even Windows. I will also check if it happens if I do a proper shutdown versus and accidental unplug. Odd? Once I post the video maybe it will make more sense.
Jeroen3:
Try to replace the bios backup battery anyway.
edy:
Ok I have done some more testing... rebooting, shut down fully and then restarting, unplugging, etc. Turns out it is not me going into the BIOS that is "fixing" anything, I ended up having the problem even doing that. I just didn't notice because it seemed to work. But what is happening is this:
1. Computer unplugged or shut down or restarted normally
2. Gets past BIOS screen, hard drive spins a while but no GRUB menu and then screen fills with garbage (see attached photos - not always the same pattern)
3. I then hold down power button (or unplug/replug) until it reboots
4. Second time around GRUB menu appears and then it does a "recovering journal" and "clean" stuff
5. Boots successfully
If I now reboot the machine or unplug any which way, it will go through the exact same cycle AGAIN... requiring 2 boots to get up and running again. The first boot will always end up with no GRUB menu and garbage on screen. The forced restart will then show the GRUB menu and proceed to boot normally and end up doing the "recovering journal" / "clean" message which seems to indicate Ubuntu was loading the first time and froze.
I mistakenly thought it was me fixing it by going into the BIOS after the first unsuccessful boot that somehow fixed it and allowed it to boot the second time... but it had nothing to do with me. It will boot the second time even if I am not involved. This is consistent as I've now tested it numerous times. Always takes 2 to boot. :-DD
It's almost like something is happening in boot cycle one that doesn't let it boot but allows it to boot on cycle two, but once it successfully boots it reverts to a state that will not allow it to boot again (until it goes through the failed first boot cycle). :-//
I'm not too worried but out of curiosity it would be nice to understand what is happening. Probably an Ubuntu thing. Perhaps there is a boot log which may point to the failure. Some driver detect for video going funny and Ubuntu resetting it back to a more default generic, but then once it boots successfully it tries to revert back to the faulty driver automatically once it is up and running some process? I don't know, just guessing here. Very flip-floppy behavior. :-DD
They should call it Two-buntu!!!! :-DD :-DD :-DD
mfro:
--- Quote from: Jeroen3 on August 16, 2019, 02:25:03 pm ---Try to replace the bios backup battery anyway.
--- End quote ---
Would second that.
Also I would strongly assume that your problem hasn't anything to do with neither Linux nor Grub as it appears to happen long before the machine even smells it might have to boot one of them ;)
edy:
--- Quote from: mfro on August 16, 2019, 03:46:33 pm ---
--- Quote from: Jeroen3 on August 16, 2019, 02:25:03 pm ---Try to replace the bios backup battery anyway.
--- End quote ---
Would second that.
Also I would strongly assume that your problem hasn't anything to do with neither Linux nor Grub as it appears to happen long before the machine even smells it might have to boot one of them ;)
--- End quote ---
I'm not sure about that, because it goes past Dell's logo in both instances and hangs up *AFTER* the hard drive is spinning and seemingly doing something (by Ubuntu) for maybe 20 seconds. Then it freezes and shows something that looks like those photos I showed in my previous post. Then if I reset it again it will do again normal Dell logo and then display GRUB usually within 5 seconds and proceed to boot normally. It always fails on the "ODD" boot and works on the "EVEN" boot.
If the BIOS battery was bad, it wouldn't even retain settings at all, and it would never boot normally. This system always flip-flops between alternating BAD boot, then immediate next boot works. Then reboot is BAD, then boot again it works. Alternating indefinitely. Somehow if Ubuntu boots normally it messes itself up for the next boot, but something must happen in the BAD boot to fix itself so a subsequent boot works again normally.
By the way I'm trying "journalctl -b" and different logs "journalctl --list-boots" to show different logs (e.g. "journalctl -b-1", "journalctl -b-2", etc..) and I can't seem to track anything in there that would help. Strange behaviour, just thought someone may recognize this... we almost never reboot the machine anyways, just close the lid to put it into sleep, then wake it up... usually no problems. Only time we face this problem is if someone accidentally trips the cord or unplugs the wrong one (which is rare), then we have to go through this 2-cycle process to get it to boot. Annoying but not the end of the world, just a quirk.
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