Kernel 3.4.1: the Linux kernel you've been looking for

[SteveRiley]

Dunno how many of you have experienced problems, but there's been a raging issue for a while where machines will crash hard. They become completely nonresponsive: no TTYs, mouse movement, frozen second hand on an analog clock, and not even magic SysRq works.

Launchpad bug 993187 is tracking it, but alas, because so many people chimed in with other kinds of freeze-up issues, the bug was closed as "won't fix." That's somewhat irritating, but also understandable -- the bug report is rather useless in its current state.

I have been suffering with this issue on my T520 for about three weeks now. Reliably, once or twice a day, my computer would lock up hard. I have tried a variety of kernels and Xorg drivers, none of which appeared to fix the issue. Consistently and curiously, the lock up would occur during a mouse movement, and a few of the bug reports indicate the same.

This morning I tried yet another kernel: 3.4.1 from the mainline PPA. Although it's labeled for Quantal, it runs without incident on Precise. And I'm happy to report that I've gone the entire day without a single crash. I will continue to use this kernel for a while and monitor its behavior. If you're having issues with any of the 3.2 kernels (which most distros appear to have abandoned, according to one comment in the bug), you might try the 3.4.1, too.

[vinnywright]

do you happen to know the difference between the "linux-image" and the "linux-image-extra" ?

VINNY

[SteveRiley]

Many drivers, including graphics, have been moved into the -extra package. You will need both image files. Download the .debs and take a look inside; compare to the .deb of an older kernel and you'll see the differences.

[vinnywright]

K
which would you recommend installing ...................on my 12.04 partition.

VINNY

[vinnywright]

and isnt their supposed to be moduals .deb as well ?

VINNY

[vinnywright]

OK my bad the modules are in the image........du
as far as I see in the packages the "extra" is just that extra stuff and you still kneed the base image .............yes/no


VINNY

[freeseek]

I have also followed launchpad bug 993187 with great disappointment. This is such a serious issue to have made it in a stable release of kernel (if that is where the problem lies). I download kernel 3.4.1 from http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/ hoping that this will solve the issue. If I don't get hard lock-ups for more than 48 hours I will report back. For SteveRiley, do you also use module i915 with an Intel HD 3000 on your laptop?

[SteveRiley]

OK my bad the modules are in the image........du
as far as I see in the packages the "extra" is just that extra stuff and you still kneed the base image .............yes/no

Previously, the image file has always contained the full kernel and all modules. It appears that this is changing, with some modules being moved into a separate image-extra file. Thus, both files are now needed. I first noticed this with the 3.4.0-3 kernel that the Xorg-Edgers PPA supplies.

[SteveRiley]

For SteveRiley, do you also use module i915 with an Intel HD 3000 on your laptop?

Yup.

Indeed, this was how I stumbled across the separation of the kernel image into two files: I omited the image-extra file on first install and noticed that X was loading the VESA driver. There was no i915 module present. When I downloaded the image-extra file and poked around inside it with Ark, I noticed that's where a lot of drivers have been moved.

[vinnywright]

Yup.

Indeed, this was how I stumbled across the separation of the kernel image into two files: I omited the image-extra file on first install and noticed that X was loading the VESA driver. There was no i915 module present. When I downloaded the image-extra file and poked around inside it with Ark, I noticed that's where a lot of drivers have been moved.[/b]

LOL yup ....... I did the same thing ......and got the same results (VESA) .....BUT that kernel is giving me more trouble than the standard one in my 12.04 install
3.2.0-24-generic.

maby I didn't do it right........hears what I did.

first I did

sudo dpkg -i linux-headers-3.4.1-030401_3.4.1-030401.201206041411_all.deb

then

sudo dpkg -i linux-headers-3.4.1-030401-generic_3.4.1-030401.201206041411_amd64.deb

then

sudo dpkg -i linux-image-3.4.1-030401-generic_3.4.1-030401.201206041411_amd64.deb

and rebooted ........got a way out of wack display no wireless and the USB mouse did not work ............so wile still in this state I

sudo dpkg -i linux-image-extra-3.4.1-030401-generic_3.4.1-030401.201206041411_amd64.deb

and rebooted .......now at first all looked well , heck my temperature widget even had 2 more display regions for a total of 4
then I noticed the desktop cube wouldn't work , well it had set it's self for xrender so I switched it back to openGL and that fixed that, then I start up Clementine and it consistently crashes before it can finish 1 song. I close it and just start browsing around in dolphin and things just seem jittery , so reboot back to the old kernel and hear I am .

did I install in the wrong order or something?

VINNY

[SteveRiley]

I use a wildcard with dpkg so that the installer does everything in one swell foop. Not sure whether that matters, but this 3.4.1 isn't causing any problems like yours on either of my laptops. So maybe it's worth a shot re-doing it?

First remove the 3.4.1 kernel while booted into an earlier one:

sudo dpkg -P linux*3.4.1*

This will delete the 3.4.1 kernel, modules, ABI, and initrd. Double-check to ensure you don't have anything left over:

sudo rm -rfv /lib/modules/3.4.1*

Then reinstall all four .debs at once:

sudo dpkg -i linux*3.4.1*.deb

[vinnywright]

I use a wildcard with dpkg so that the installer does everything in one swell foop. Not sure whether that matters, but this 3.4.1 isn't causing any problems like yours on either of my laptops. So maybe it's worth a shot re-doing it?

First remove the 3.4.1 kernel while booted into an earlier one:

sudo dpkg -P linux*3.4.1*

This will delete the 3.4.1 kernel, modules, ABI, and initrd. Double-check to ensure you don't have anything left over:

sudo rm -rfv /lib/modules/3.4.1*

Then reinstall all four .debs at once:

sudo dpkg -i linux*3.4.1*.deb

worth a shot .........here we go

VINNY

[vinnywright]

done ....time to reboot and see what we will see

VINNY

[vinnywright]

so far so good .........

thanks SteveRiley 8)

VINNY

[sumski]

Dunno how many of you have experienced problems, but there's been a raging issue for a while where machines will crash hard. They become completely nonresponsive: no TTYs, mouse movement, frozen second hand on an analog clock, and not even magic SysRq works.

Launchpad bug 993187 is tracking it, but alas, because so many people chimed in with other kinds of freeze-up issues, the bug was closed as "won't fix." That's somewhat irritating, but also understandable -- the bug report is rather useless in its current state.

I have been suffering with this issue on my T520 for about three weeks now. Reliably, once or twice a day, my computer would lock up hard. I have tried a variety of kernels and Xorg drivers, none of which appeared to fix the issue. Consistently and curiously, the lock up would occur during a mouse movement, and a few of the bug reports indicate the same.

This morning I tried yet another kernel: 3.4.1 from the mainline PPA. Although it's labeled for Quantal, it runs without incident on Precise. And I'm happy to report that I've gone the entire day without a single crash. I will continue to use this kernel for a while and monitor its behavior. If you're having issues with any of the 3.2 kernels (which most distros appear to have abandoned, according to one comment in the bug), you might try the 3.4.1, too.

I gave it a quick look. Why is bug assigned to xserver-xorg-intel? I ran through few comments, and as far i see, there are users of all graphic cards, with both open and closed drivers?
I personally haven't experienced any kind of crash (using 3.2 kernel + fglrx), and i also installed Kubuntu Precise on my girlfriends laptop (Dell N5110 - integrated Intel), and there are no crashed for her either (although, i did installed Intel driver from x-updates ppa, but no crashes prior to that).
Regarding mainline ppa, don't know if i understood correctly, but it is built on latest LTS release, so there shouldn't be issues running the builds on Precise? Or am i missing something?