Grub freezes after upgrade to 12.10

[Windoze Refugee]

Hi Folks,

Having drawn a coplete blank with trying to resolve my freezing mouse probs ( see here http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2185584) I though id see if I could solve the issues with an upgrade. I set update manager running but was offered only 12.10 and not 13.10. I assumed this was because I was running 12.04 and that I'd need to upgrade to 12.10 first, and then again to 13.10 - (is this right?).

Anyway having done the upggrade I tried to boot but it hung on the grub menu page. the ten second coutdown didnt move and i couldnt access any of the choices.
I ran Boot Repair (more than once in fact)
the results are here http://paste.ubuntu.com/6411939/
and here http://paste.ubuntu.com/6412009/
and here http://paste.ubuntu.com/6413100/

It instructed me to repair the boot sector with test disk, but testdisk kept returning a bizarre "No Hard Drive" error.
Gotta say Im completely baffled.
Anyone got any ideas?

Cheers
WR

[Windoze Refugee]

No one, huh? OK.
How about this. Is there a way to roll back the upgrade to my previous 12.04? At least that worked, albeit with a semi-frozen mouse

[Windoze Refugee]

For the love of god, is there ANYONE out there who can help?? This is driving me nuts! I've wasted days trying to fix problems with ubuntu

[Windoze Refugee]

OK so Ive managed to get testdisk to run, but when it gets to the results part, ALL the partitions are highlit green. wtf?? Boot repair instructed me to fix the boot sector, but i really dont know how and dont want to mess up my partitions. Is there ANYONE out there who will help? Please??

[oldfred]

Please only bump once per 24 hours. We all are volunteers and are not always available.

Your NTFS partition has grub installed to the PBR or partition boot sector. You have to have Windows boot code in all NTFS partitions (even if just a data partition).

For sdb1:
Fix for most, a few have other issues, better than windows fix in many cases as it also fixes other parameters:
This has instructions on using testdisk to repair the install of grub to the boot sector for windows from Ubuntu or Linux LiveCD.
http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/bootinfoscript/index.php?title=Boot_Problems:Boot_Sector
You want to get to this screen:
http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Step_By_Step#NTFS_Boot_sector_recovery
OR similarly instructions:
[HowTo] Repair the bootsector of a Windows partition - YannBuntu
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BootSectorFix
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1926510

The Linux NTFS driver will not mount NTFS partitions that are hibernated or need chkdsk to prevent further damage. It does not look like sda1 was mounted so it may need chkdsk which you can only run from Windows or Windows XP install disk or other Windows repairCDs.

[Windoze Refugee]

Many thanks for your reply Fred. When you say Windows Boot Code does that mean the MBR? FYI I have Win XP pro installed (although never use it) and its a 32bit machine.
Cheers WR

[oldfred]

PBR is partition boot (record)sector and is part of every partition. MBR is master boot record or first sector on hard drive.

This explains BIOS/MBR boot process, shows Vista, but any BIOS version of Windows works this way. Long description but pictures worth reviewing.
Multibooters, Pictures here worth 1000+ words
http://www.multibooters.co.uk/multiboot.html
More tech info - BIOS boot process & some UEFI
http://homepage.ntlworld.com./jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/windows-nt-6-boot-process.html

[Windoze Refugee]

Sorry Fred, Im still finding this pretty baffling and IM worried about deleting a partiiotn.

I've run test disk and got the following result:

Disk /dev/sdb - 500 GB / 465 GiB - CHS 60802 255 63
Current partition structure:
Partition Start End Size in sectors

> 1 * Linux Swap 0 1 1 16707 254 63 268413957
1 * Linux Swap 0 1 1 16707 254 63 268413957

Bad sector count.
2 P HPFS - NTFS 16708 0 1 34793 254 63 290551590 [New Volume]
3 E extended 34794 0 1 60800 254 63 417802455
5 L Linux 43463 1 1 60091 254 63 267144822
X extended 60092 0 1 60800 254 63 11390085
6 L Linux Swap 60092 1 1 60800 254 63 11390022
X extended 34794 0 2 43103 254 63 133500149
7 L Linux 34794 2 1 43103 254 63 133500024
X extended 43104 0 1 43462 254 63 5767335

Could you possibly please tell me step by step how to fix things?
Cheers
WR

[oldfred]

Follow the directions in the links in post #5 above, I do not suggest any changes or recovery of partitions, but of the partition boot sector which is different.

[Windoze Refugee]

http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/bootinfoscript/index.php?title=Boot_Problems:Boot_Sector[/URL]


OK so I followed the sourceforge instructions and got the following:


Disk /dev/sdb - 500 GB / 465 GiB - CHS 60802 255 63
Partition Start End Size in sectors
2 P HPFS - NTFS 16708 0 1 34793 254 63 290551590 [New Volume]

filesystem size 290551590 290551577
sectors_per_cluster 8 8
mft_lcn 786432 786432
mftmirr_lcn 21045004 21045004
clusters_per_mft_record -10 -10
clusters_per_index_record 1 1
Extrapolated boot sector and current boot sector are different.

The options are
[ Dump ] >[ List ] [ Write ] [ Quit ]

What should I do?

Cheers
WR

[oldfred]

It should be this screen?
http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk_Step_By_Step#NTFS_Boot_sector_recovery

And you want to restore backup. Backup BS.

Only if backup is damaged, then you have to run Rebuild BS as you cannot run chkdsk on the Windows partition with grub installed into the PBR. Windows will not even recongize the partition.

[Windoze Refugee]

OK. So I bit the bullet and chose "write".
It wrote a new boot sector to the windows partition and I rebooted. Still nothing :(
No sign of a grub screen or anything .
Any other ideas?

[Windoze Refugee]

I got the confirm screen as described
"Status: OK
Sectors are identical" etc
So do I now need to run chkdsk from a windows cd to restore?

[Windoze Refugee]

So I reloaded the live CD and restarted testdisk through chroot, and go the following: (mostly in green)

Disk /dev/sdb - 500 GB / 465 GiB - CHS 60802 255 63
Partition Start End Size in sectors
>* HPFS - NTFS 0 1 1 16707 254 63 268413957
P HPFS - NTFS 16708 0 1 34793 254 63 290551590 [New Volume]
L Linux 34794 2 1 43103 254 63 133500024
L Linux Swap 43104 1 1 43462 254 63 5767272
L Linux 43463 1 1 60091 254 63 267144822
L Linux Swap 60092 1 1 60800 254 63 11390022

Not sure if Im reading it wrong, but shouldn't the linux partition have the * (ie be the primary bootable?

[oldfred]

No.
Windows (and a few BIOS assume Windows) have to have a boot flag on the primary partition that Windows boots from. In Windows it is set active partition.
Grub does not use boot flag. You should leave boot flag on NTFS partition with Windows boot files.

Run chkdsk on Windows and then rerun Boot-Repair, if necessary.
You already show grub in sdb, are you booting from sdb?
Or was the most current install of grub into one of the partitions. Then the grub in the MBR may not be current and give errors.

[Windoze Refugee]

Hi Fred.
Thanks again for your help.

Still no joy tho :(
I've run chkdsk on both drives (found errors and fixed 'em) and then run Boot Repair again.
But it just keeps freezing on the grub menu screen
I got Boot Repair to post info summary files before and after it ran, and these are here http://paste.ubuntu.com/6418481/ and here http://paste.ubuntu.com/6418494/

[oldfred]

You still have grub in the PBR of sdb1. You did not write the backup partition table from testdisk or the backup is also damaged and you have to run the Rebuild BS command.

Chkdsk will not run on sdb1 until you get grub out of it and have a NTFS signture in the PBR.

If you ran chkdsk on other NTFS and had errors you need to rerun until you get no errors. Chkdsk does not fix everything on one pass and may need several passes to fix everything.

Where did the device mapper come from. Did you have/do you have RAID? Or was drive just part of a RAID set before and need the meta-data removed. That also confuses things if not RAID but has meta-data.

Only run this on drives with the meta-data.
Presence1960 on remove old raid setting from HD
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1325650
sudo dmraid -E -r /dev/sda
sudo dmraid -E -r /dev/sdb
Also check BIOS for raid settings

[Windoze Refugee]

Hi Fred.
Many thanks for all your help.
Seems to be fixed now, thankfully. It looks as though it was mostly about the RAID error. Once I disabled RAID in the BIOS it all seemed to start working again.

However I now have two new issues.
1. is that I now have an intermittently freezing mouse (I had to plug in a USB mouse as the PS2 didnt work at all)
2. Most odd of all, is that something seems to be hogging all my processor power, slowing everything right down to a snails pace.

Any ideas?

Cheers
WR

[oldfred]

BIOS should be AHCI if you have that and if not Large or LBA not IDE. Windows 7 may need drivers for AHCI. XP just about does not work with AHCI.

What does top show? It should show which process is using the processor. In termimal top & q to quit out of top back to terminal.

[Windoze Refugee]

Ive really no idea how to read this, but this is the results of "top"
The CPU use seems to be going in peaks that roughly corespond with my mouse cursor freezing


1273 root 20 0 385m 189m 13m S 13.2 6.3 28:24.80 Xorg
2519 jonathan 20 0 623m 146m 25m S 6.3 4.9 13:12.23 compiz
7763 jonathan 20 0 446m 173m 24m S 4.0 5.8 22:06.36 plugin-containe
8998 jonathan 20 0 157m 15m 11m S 4.0 0.5 0:05.70 gnome-terminal
2734 jonathan 20 0 186m 17m 12m S 3.6 0.6 14:51.91 psensor
2854 jonathan 20 0 43720 11m 8256 S 1.0 0.4 0:26.69 gtk-window-deco
3352 jonathan 20 0 885m 286m 42m S 1.0 9.5 35:36.84 firefox
2866 jonathan 20 0 195m 53m 10m S 0.7 1.8 5:34.27 unity-panel-ser
846 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.3 0.0 0:02.06 flush-8:16
1322 gnunet 27 7 5036 1472 1136 S 0.3 0.0 0:55.92 gnunet-service-
1353 gnunet 39 19 5528 1940 1572 S 0.3 0.1 0:33.29 gnunet-service-
2300 jonathan 20 0 6512 3304 748 S 0.3 0.1 0:31.50 dbus-daemon
2722 jonathan 20 0 51336 10m 7364 S 0.3 0.3 0:11.15 bamfdaemon
2868 jonathan 20 0 75292 17m 3532 S 0.3 0.6 4:17.72 hud-service
7642 root 20 0 8852 4500 2316 S 0.3 0.1 0:13.81 cupsd
8481 jonathan 20 0 220m 75m 17m S 0.3 2.5 0:33.05 evince
8982 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.3 0.0 0:00.40 kworker/0:1
9055 jonathan 20 0 5372 1400 1016 R 0.3 0.0 0:05.10 top
1 root 20 0 3608 1880 1252 S 0.0 0.1 0:00.81 init
2 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kthreadd
3 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:05.61 ksoftirqd/0
5 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.50 kworker/u:0
6 root rt 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 migration/0
7 root rt 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.90 watchdog/0
8 root 0 -20 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 cpuset
9 root 0 -20 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 khelper
10 root 20 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 kdevtmpfs
11 root 0 -20 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.00 netns

[oldfred]

Please use code tags so it is readable.

Also all the one's with zeros do not matter.



1123 root 20 0 157m 51m 20m S 1 1.3 10:45.12 Xorg
10149 fred 20 0 557m 16m 11m S 1 0.4 0:00.57 gnome-terminal
9244 fred 20 0 1185m 351m 49m S 0 8.9 10:45.57 firefox
10211 fred 20 0 17340 1344 956 R 0 0.0 0:00.12 top
1 root 20 0 24592 2556 1336 S 0 0.1 0:00.59 init

How much RAM and what video?
Full Ubuntu with Unity needs a better system and 64 bit works better also. But even my 1.5GB RAM laptop from 6 years ago runs Unity but I change to fallback with screen like old gnome2 as that uses less resources. And it occassionally turns gray for a few seconds, so I know it is using swap and I started too many larger apps at once.

[Windoze Refugee]

code:

3352 jonathan 20 0 919m 300m 41m S 6.9 10.0 42:23.49 firefox
7763 jonathan 20 0 439m 170m 26m S 5.0 5.7 27:19.11 plugin-containe
1273 root 20 0 303m 135m 14m S 4.3 4.5 33:46.62 Xorg
9504 jonathan 20 0 157m 15m 11m S 3.0 0.5 0:00.97 gnome-terminal
2734 jonathan 20 0 186m 17m 12m S 2.3 0.6 17:39.03 psensor
2519 jonathan 20 0 625m 147m 25m S 2.0 4.9 15:20.49 compiz
9559 jonathan 20 0 5372 1400 1016 R 0.7 0.0 0:00.10 top
1357 gnunet 27 7 4496 968 796 S 0.3 0.0 0:25.56 gnunet-service-
1 root 20 0 3608 1880 1252 S 0.0 0.1 0:00.82 init

4GB RAM

Card is : Geforce 8200 DDR2 512mb
Driver : GeForce 6200/AGP/SSE2 r



Also, another new weirdness Ive just discovered, there appear to be no sound devices! I cant control any of the audio input or outputs. Pulse shows no devices present, although I have the onboard sound plus a separate soundblaster sound card

[oldfred]

I have 4GB in my Desktop with 9600GT nVidia. And it works fine. But do not know about separte audio cards. You may have to research that.

So is your nVidia 8200 or 6200? I think those need different nVidia drivers. Are you still using the open source or have you install the correct nVidia driver?

[Windoze Refugee]

I've not installed any drivers. Not sure how to tbh. Might it be the fix for the audio too? Would the system detect the hardware?

[oldfred]

I have used both command line and system to install nVidia drivers. The new verions show several nVidia drivers but I cannot tell verison numbers. Look in system settings, older versions like 12.04 have a separate icon for additional drivers, new versions have a tab in Software updates at the bottom. It should show several nVidia drivers as options.

#To see video:
sudo lshw -c display
sudo lshw | grep -A 11 display
lspci | grep VGA
#Resolution:
xwininfo -root

You can confirm which version you should install, but I always prefer to install from repository, not from nVidia.
nVidia versions:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/unix.html
Legacy drivers.
http://www.nvidia.com/object/IO_32667.html


# You may need headers - meta package for current version, only some versions did not have the headers:
apt-get update
sudo apt-get install linux-headers-generic


# only reason to purge is there are several versions, if you know you have different nVidia use that:
#To see available versions:
dpkg -l | grep -i nvidia*
apt-cache search nvidia-sett*
# Houseclean out all old versions to avoid issues
sudo apt-get remove --purge < nvidiadriverpackagename>
# [ using the correct names] for each driver, before running:
sudo apt-get purge nvidia*
sudo mv /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.backup

# Install version you prefer
# I used nvidia-current-updates & nvidia-settings-updates, example below is just nvidia-current
sudo apt-get install nvidia-current
sudo apt-get install nvidia-settings
sudo dpkg-reconfigure nvidia-current
sudo nvidia-xconfig
sudo reboot
May want nvidia-current, nvidia-current-updates or nvidia-current-experimental-XXX for most recent testing version.
apt-cache search nvidia-sett*

Re: How To Install Nvidia Drivers [v8.1.2.12 by Bogan]. post 1126
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1743535&page=113
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/Nvidia
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2081649

[Windoze Refugee]

Hey Fred. Thanks again for your help. The following are the results of running the codes you provided. It seems I was mistaken and the card is a 6200. Before I go ahead, would you mind taking a quick look and advising whicc driver to keep (and which to purge) ?

jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ sudo lshw -c display
[sudo] password for jonathan:
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: NV44A [GeForce 6200]
vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
physical id: 0
bus info: pci@0000:01:00.0
version: a1
width: 32 bits
clock: 66MHz
capabilities: pm agp agp-3.0 vga_controller bus_master vga_palette cap_list rom
configuration: driver=nvidia latency=248 maxlatency=1 mingnt=5
resources: irq:16 memory:fd000000-fdffffff memory:c0000000-cfffffff memory:fc000000-fcffffff memory:fe1e0000-fe1fffff
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ sudo lshw | grep -A 11 display
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: NV44A [GeForce 6200]
vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
physical id: 0
bus info: pci@0000:01:00.0
version: a1
width: 32 bits
clock: 66MHz
capabilities: pm agp agp-3.0 vga_controller bus_master vga_palette cap_list rom
configuration: driver=nvidia latency=248 maxlatency=1 mingnt=5
resources: irq:16 memory:fd000000-fdffffff memory:c0000000-cfffffff memory:fc000000-fcffffff memory:fe1e0000-fe1fffff
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ lspci | grep VGA
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation NV44A [GeForce 6200] (rev a1)
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ #Resolution:
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ #Resolution:xwininfo -root
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ xwininfo -root

xwininfo: Window id: 0x244 (the root window) (has no name)

Absolute upper-left X: 0
Absolute upper-left Y: 0
Relative upper-left X: 0
Relative upper-left Y: 0
Width: 1680
Height: 1050
Depth: 24
Visual: 0x21
Visual Class: TrueColor
Border width: 0
Class: InputOutput
Colormap: 0x20 (installed)
Bit Gravity State: ForgetGravity
Window Gravity State: NorthWestGravity
Backing Store State: NotUseful
Save Under State: no
Map State: IsViewable
Override Redirect State: no
Corners: +0+0 -0+0 -0-0 +0-0
-geometry 1680x1050+0+0


linux-headers-generic is already the newest version.
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
alien amora-cli compiz-plugins-extra hyphen-en-us libimlib2 librpmbuild3
librpmsign1 lsb-core m4 ncurses-term pax python-wnck rpm

jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ dpkg -l | grep -i nvidia*
rc nvidia-304 304.88-0ubuntu0.0.3 i386 NVIDIA binary Xorg driver, kernel module and VDPAU library
ii nvidia-common 1:0.2.71.1 i386 transitional package for ubuntu-drivers-common
ii nvidia-current 304.88-0ubuntu0.1 i386 NVIDIA binary Xorg driver, kernel module and VDPAU library
ii nvidia-settings 304.88-0ubuntu0.2 i386 Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
rc nvidia-settings-304 304.88-0ubuntu0.0.3 i386 Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver

jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ apt-cache search nvidia-sett*
nvidia-settings - Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
nvidia-settings-experimental-304 - Tool of configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
nvidia-settings-updates - Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
sensors-applet - Display readings from hardware sensors in your Gnome panel
nvidia-settings-experimental-310 - Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver

[oldfred]

I do not remember where the cutoff of new drivers working. Older versions of cards need an older nVidia driver.

If newer driver still supports your card then install that.
My 9600GT still works with the newest and I used the updates version which was not the most recent in the repository, but not the oldest either.
I used nvidia-current-updates & nvidia-settings-updates

[Windoze Refugee]

OK - so I tried to purge the 'extra' drivers but didnt have much luck.
Am I doing something wrong?

jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ sudo apt-get remove --purge nvidia-common 1:0.2.71.1
[sudo] password for jonathan:
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package 1
E: Couldn't find any package by regex '1:0.2.71.1'
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ sudo apt-get remove --purge nvidia-304 304.88-0ubuntu0.0.3
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package 304.88-0ubuntu0.0.3
E: Couldn't find any package by regex '304.88-0ubuntu0.0.3'
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$ sudo apt-get remove --purge nvidia-settings 304.88-0ubuntu0.2
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package 304.88-0ubuntu0.2
E: Couldn't find any package by regex '304.88-0ubuntu0.2'
jonathan@jonathan-desktop:~$

[oldfred]

The purge is only required if you installed different or multiple versions and they are getting confused. Often happens if you download a version from nVidia and then install from repository.

The list is available versions not installed versions. You should just have to pick a version and install it.

[Windoze Refugee]

Hi Fred. Excellent. The freezing mouse is no more! Many thanks.
And weirdly, now the sound devices have showed up back again too.

The only thing I need to fix now, is that I'm still having to use a USB mouse. I have a DVI switcher running a wireless keyboard and mouse for two machines, both with PS2 feeds to each PC. Problem is, the ubuntu machine doesnt seem to recognise the DVI source mouse, hence me using a USB mouse. Any ideas?

[oldfred]

I had a wireless mouse and keyboard for my desktop and it never seemed to work. So I use a USB wired mouse. But I have to have USB on in BIOS settings for mouse & keyboard or on grub menu keyboard does not work, but ps/2 port does.

But I have a newer Logitech wireless (USB) mouse on my laptop and that works without issue. Even half way booted I can realize I forgot to plug it in and then it works.

[Windoze Refugee]

Had no luck getting my ps2 switcher to play ball, but still using the USB mouse.
Right after I changed the drviers, it suddenly all started working really well - much faster, no freezes, and like i said, even the sound devices appeared back in controller.
Now the weird thing is that where it was all working great yesterday, now Im geting intermittent mouse freezes again.
And I have no clue what it could be this time.
Any ideas?

[oldfred]

I have had mouse issues with bad cable, or then new mouse was only solution.
Also sometimes my mouse pad gets too shiny and mouse seems to skip.
If software then you want to go to terminal and run top and see if some process is consuming all the cpu or RAM.

[Windoze Refugee]

I've checked all the cable and they seem OK .
And now, in addition to the returned mouse freezing, the soudn devies have all vanished again. Is it possible the old driver has reinstalled itself? How would I check what version is currently installed? Can I prevent auto updates?

[oldfred]

I think this says I am running nVidia and a list of drivers that work with my card.

fred@fred-Precise:~$ lspci -nnk | grep -iA3 vga
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation G94 [GeForce 9600 GT] [10de:0622] (rev a1)
Subsystem: ZOTAC International (MCO) Ltd. Device [19da:1043]
Kernel driver in use: nvidia
Kernel modules: nvidia_319_updates, nouveau, nvidiafb

cat /sys/module/nvidia/version
nvidia-settings --vv

Version & settings need to be the same version of nVidia or you will have issues.

Have you gone into nVidia settings from your menu. I use fallback so I have the old menu system and it is applications, system tools, administration, nvidia X server settings.

[Windoze Refugee]

Hi Fred,
So with the continuing mouse freeze and soething hogging all the processing power I ran Clam TK antivirus. It turned up 100 finds of malware including trojans. I selected 'quarantine" and it immediatley began running much better.
However today (ie after turning it off and rebooting this morning) I have no desktop icons and no navigation bar. I seem to have 'quarantined' something important but I dot know what or how to fix it. The desktop is there but there's nothing on it. Any idea what I can do to fix it?
Cheers WR

[oldfred]

Virus programs often find virus where none exist.
And in Linux anything in use that you uninstall is not released until you stop using it. You can even delete the kernel you use to boot and system runs until you reboot and then kernel is gone.

I do not knows details of what you installed or which of those may be what is missing.

If it is something with dependencies this may fix it or else you may have to in effect reinstall entire desktop. This is what I suggest after a chroot to repair system. Either every command needs sudo or you can use the sudo -i command to put you in administrative mode. Do not run other commands from that terminal as you will still be root and can of course do things you maybe should not. # are comments, do not copy or type the comments.

#Commands once in chroot:
#if not chroot use: sudo -i
#houseclean
apt-get autoclean # only removes files that cannot be downloaded anymore (obsolete)
apt-get clean
#refresh
apt-get update #resync package index
apt-get upgrade #newest versions of all packages, update must be run first
#would upgrade you to the latest kernel in the repositories
#dist-upgrade is also able to remove existing packages if required
apt-get dist-upgrade
# fix Broken packages -f
apt-get -f install
dpkg --configure -a


# reinstall desktop
apt-get remove ubuntu-desktop
apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

If you have changed any settings or customized it at all, be sure to back up before hand. The reinstall may reset some or all settings, so backups always good to have.

[Windoze Refugee]

Hi Fred. OK - I did as you said and got gnome running again, thanks.
However the intermittent mouse freeze is back worse than ever, and now I cant use any sound devices unless I first change the nvidia drivers! - i.e all devices in sound control are missing until the video driver is changed. It doesn't seem to much matter which driver is swapped to or from, just as long as a change is made, then the sound devices magically appear again. The intermittent mouse freeze, along with regular 'stalls' in all other packages, continue. I'm baffled. And sorely regretting 'upgrading' from 12.04 :(

[oldfred]

When mouse freezes can you use terminal and run top? And then does it show some process using 100% of system?

i have not looked at this file for years, and I thought they were obsoleting it. But it may have your sound settings also and resetting video may change sound settings as both may be configured by this file.
/etc/X11/xorg.conf
May be best to post new thread with sound in title, as those who may know more about that type of issue will not look at a thread on grub.
If I installed a new driver for sound in my XP, it would stop working. I then learned I had to unplug & replug in speakers as sound card sensed plug-in to activate speakers and they did not work until you did that.