Linzt
October 14th, 2015, 08:07 PM
About two hours ago I had a Lenovo X220 w/Evo 850 SSD containing a CentOS 7 installation on it (yes, a server distro on a laptop - I know, but I'm familiar with RHEL). Several weeks back I'd completed this from scratch through netboot install.
Anyway, I got rid of the installation today due to the machine just freezing up arbitrarily which after several weeks of use my patience with it has worn thin. I did not locate the source of the lock-up problems, but usually found that when copying large files from USB to the SSD or surfing Chrome with >12 tabs open would be sufficient to trigger the problem.
The kernel in use where this problem was present were:
3.10.0-229.7.2.el <-- Would crash on boot part way through
3.10.0-229.el7
Today I tried installing Xubunt from LiveUSB. I thought the problem above was specific to the installation, so was surprised when I found that either the installation GUI would report I/O problems and crash, or just lock up at the 30% way through the "copying files" stage.
To get round the issue I removed the SSD from the X220 into another x86_64 bit laptop (but which has AMD GPU chipset as opposed to Intel in the X220) and installed Xubuntu without trouble so doubt the problem is faulty/dying SSD, but rather the X220 may have some issue electronically (?). In any case, my question after all this is
* How do I prepare for moving the SSD back into the X220?
I am currently finding that the X220 does not boot. BIOS passes POST, but there is no GRUB menu so I cannot edit the parameters. The screen simply stays black with an intermittent underscore cursor top-left (as I gather it is stuck in a boot-loop).
After putting the SSD back in the other laptop I'm not able to locate the file which configures the GRUB menu so cannot mess with the parameters and regenerate the GRUB config.
So I guess I'm talking hardware here.
* How do I reconfigure the hardware config for moving back into the X220?
Previously when using CentOS I loaded the kernel module i915 for graphics. Maybe this could be an issue, however there are no proprietary drivers installed on the Xubuntu installation so I would guess the kernel detects the necessary driver and dynamically loads at boot. Could be red-herring then.
Anyway, all suggestions appreciated.
Anyway, I got rid of the installation today due to the machine just freezing up arbitrarily which after several weeks of use my patience with it has worn thin. I did not locate the source of the lock-up problems, but usually found that when copying large files from USB to the SSD or surfing Chrome with >12 tabs open would be sufficient to trigger the problem.
The kernel in use where this problem was present were:
3.10.0-229.7.2.el <-- Would crash on boot part way through
3.10.0-229.el7
Today I tried installing Xubunt from LiveUSB. I thought the problem above was specific to the installation, so was surprised when I found that either the installation GUI would report I/O problems and crash, or just lock up at the 30% way through the "copying files" stage.
To get round the issue I removed the SSD from the X220 into another x86_64 bit laptop (but which has AMD GPU chipset as opposed to Intel in the X220) and installed Xubuntu without trouble so doubt the problem is faulty/dying SSD, but rather the X220 may have some issue electronically (?). In any case, my question after all this is
* How do I prepare for moving the SSD back into the X220?
I am currently finding that the X220 does not boot. BIOS passes POST, but there is no GRUB menu so I cannot edit the parameters. The screen simply stays black with an intermittent underscore cursor top-left (as I gather it is stuck in a boot-loop).
After putting the SSD back in the other laptop I'm not able to locate the file which configures the GRUB menu so cannot mess with the parameters and regenerate the GRUB config.
So I guess I'm talking hardware here.
* How do I reconfigure the hardware config for moving back into the X220?
Previously when using CentOS I loaded the kernel module i915 for graphics. Maybe this could be an issue, however there are no proprietary drivers installed on the Xubuntu installation so I would guess the kernel detects the necessary driver and dynamically loads at boot. Could be red-herring then.
Anyway, all suggestions appreciated.