[SOLVED] Can't get past login screen

[oldgeek]

I think an external hard disk supposedly fixed may have done something to my Linux setup. I am using a Neon dev-stable setup using Kubuntu 16.04. Up to now it has worked very well. Something seems to have knocked it out of whack--an external hard disk may be the culprit- When I boot the machine, I get Grub, and then Linux loads to the login screen. I dutifully type in my password, but the screen freezes and I can't do anything else. I tried using the recovery boot in Grub and I eventually get to the command line, but I don't know what to do from there as there's no graphic interface. I have been able to copy important files (photos mainly) to a backup hard drive using an Ubuntu Studio live version on a USB stick, but even there I had trouble, as some of the files can't be opened. Maybe this is part of the problem that zonked my OS: By the way, I also have Windows 10 on another partition, and that doesn't seem to be affected. And to think I was going to erase it for more disk space today! I'm currently using my netbook (Ubuntu Mate) to write this.

Any suggestions?

[Snowhog]

How much space is being used on the root partition (meaning, how much space is left)? From the command prompt type: du

[oldgeek]

After doing the command I got this number: 139494276. The partition size for Neon/Kubuntu is 229 GB. Thanks for your speedy response, by the way.

[Snowhog]

Space available on the root partition could be an issue here. The figure 139494276 (139,494,276) is 139.4 MBs 'available' out of the 229 GBs. How long has it been since you did system maintenance; removing no longer needed packages, downloaded .deb files, and older installed kernels?

[oldgeek]

Quite recently; I eliminated unused programs and Linux kernels. I've been doing some film editing (with OpenShot) recently, which uses a lot of memory, and it was while I was saving a 7 GB file to an external hard disk that I seemed to mess up the disk--it would no longer mount. And this was my backup disk. I lost about half of what was on it. I was checking it out just today to see what was lost, and when I unmounted it and replaced it with the new HD to copy more files, my OS went down and since then I haven't been able to get it past the graphical login screen--it freezes up as soon as I type my password and press enter. In Recovery mode, however, I at least get to the command line after typing in my user name and password. So maybe it is an electrical thing. I can boot off a USB drive with Ubuntu Studio, and can even access my hard disk while in live mode and copy files to the HD that was fixed, except for those which all of a sudden need root permission. So my first impression was that it was an electrical problem. I do not want to reinstall everything, as I might lose the files that were wiped off the backup disk and can't be accessed on the computer's HD.

[oldgeek]

One other thing. A program crashed the last time I was able to use Neon--I think it was Dolphin but I'm not sure.

[oldgeek]

I was able to solve the problem, whatever it was. Here's what I did: I went into recovery mode and saw that there were updates, so I downloaded and installed them, then rebooted. Voila! A working desktop--and the files I was unable to copy are now available. Time to back them up. My guess is that something in the last group of updates, perhaps connected with other factors, caused the crash. Now I don't seem to have lost anything. Thanks Snowhog for your attention.