Arch Linux

helmut

Member

Registered: 2008-10-10

Posts: 65

Boot very unstable, looping reboot, garbled screen

I have the problem that the boot process on my laptop has become rather unstable without having made any change. I see the following symptoms:

- The grub starts normally and tries to boot the linux kernel (Linux lapi_acer 3.2.6-2-ARCH #1 SMP PREEMPT Thu Feb 16 10:10:02 CET 2012 x86_64 Intel(R) Pentium(R) Dual CPU T2370 @ 1.73GHz GenuineIntel GNU/Linux)

- At the first command of the boot the system either starts to reboot, freezes or I get a garbled screen.

- Hard resets usually reproduce the same symptoms (repeating the boot 10-20 times does not change anything)

- I usually let the system warm up some time (about 15-30 minutes).

- If the system is sufficiently warmed up I can get a stable boot. Once a stable boot has passed the system works perfectly.

Booting from a live Knoppix CD works without any problems.

I have the suspicion that there is something wrong in the boot phase with handling the temperature sensor data properly, because after warming up the behaviour changes. But I have no idea on how to diagnose the situation because it happens in a very early phase of the boot where I have no chance to enter any commands. Since the harddisc is not yet mounted I assume that no errorlog information is available either.

Does anybody have an idea on how to handle and diagnose the situation?

Last edited by helmut (2012-12-20 02:47:45)

helmut

Member

Registered: 2008-10-10

Posts: 65

Re: Boot very unstable, looping reboot, garbled screen

Isn't there anybody who can provide some idea on how to diagnose the situation?

Should I provide more information? If yes, what information?

Strike0

Member

From: Germany

Registered: 2011-09-05

Posts: 1,429

Re: Boot very unstable, looping reboot, garbled screen

By the error descriptions you give makes me think it is a hardware fault of some sort creeping in.

But the first thought is that your system is not up-to-date! Better do an update, or why do you stick to that kernel?

Other points:
Does booting from Knoppix work consistently also when the machine is cold?
Maybe it's a bios issue as well. Have you checked for updates and / or reset it to default?
How about the fallback kernel? Does that make a difference?
Maybe install memcheck to your bootloader and see what that brings once you have to hard reset.