Cinnamon crashes on startup, can't restart

[asfi235]

Not sure what happened. Despite best intentions, I haven't been using my Mint 17.1 laptop all that much, so haven't had much opportunity for learning the basics.

Recently, I powered it up and I got the "Cinnamon has crashed" message. Using fallback mode isn't terribly useful, I get blank windows and such.

As suggested in another thread, I had a look at the system info with inxi -Fxzc0 but I am challenged once again -- how can I paste the output here? Plugging in a USB thumb drive just opens up another can of worms as it seems it doesn't mount.

Probably the most important parts of the inxi output are:

Machine's an Acer Aspire 7552 v1.12
Quad core AMD Phenom II X920
Graphics: AMD/ATI Madison [Mobility Radeon HD 5650/5750 / 6530M/6550M]

Root partition is 20 GB of which 5.2G is in use.


Thanks for any assistance.....

[orschiro]

Recently, I powered it up and I got the "Cinnamon has crashed" message. Using fallback mode isn't terribly useful, I get blank windows and such.

Probably a problem with your AMD/ATI graphics driver. Have you already tried a different one?

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/AMD

Side note: Maybe the MATE desktop is a better choice?

[AZgl1800]

As suggested in another thread, I had a look at the system info with inxi -Fxzc0 but I am challenged once again -- how can I paste the output here?

Actually that is pretty easy to do.
Maximize the Terminal screen.

At the very last line, which should be where the Command Cursor stops waiting for a new command;

Place the mouse cursor at the entry point, and then move the cursor up and keep it going up until you get to the top, Left Hand side.

That will highlight all of the text that was generated.
Now, Right Click / Copy

Paste that into a Text Editor for temporary storage until you get to where you are ready to Post the results.

[JoeFootball]

I haven't been using my Mint 17.1 laptop all that much, so haven't had much opportunity for learning the basics.

Acer Aspire 7552 v1.12
Quad core AMD Phenom II X920

Thanks for any assistance.....

Perhaps this is an opportunity an OS upgrade, and to a desktop environment more fitting for that hardware.

For something of that era, I would try LM 18.3 Xfce instead of LM 17.1 Cinnamon.

Joe

[orschiro]

I would try LM 18.3 Xfce instead of LM 17.1 Cinnamon.

Indeed. Or 18.3 MATE.

[asfi235]

As suggested in another thread, I had a look at the system info with inxi -Fxzc0 but I am challenged once again -- how can I paste the output here?

Actually that is pretty easy to do.
Maximize the Terminal screen.

At the very last line, which should be where the Command Cursor stops waiting for a new command;

Place the mouse cursor at the entry point, and then move the cursor up and keep it going up until you get to the top, Left Hand side.

That will highlight all of the text that was generated.
Now, Right Click / Copy

Paste that into a Text Editor for temporary storage until you get to where you are ready to Post the results.

Or just pipe the output to a file. Yeah, that's the trivially easy part.

The tricky part is getting the file from the non-functioning Linux laptop to a different (functioning) machine that's running a web browser, when USB drives won't mount.

[asfi235]

Okay.....biting the bullet and installing 18.3 MATE.

Except that well into the process I get a dialog box with "bootloader installation failed"

None of the available options work. Whether I try to select a different install location, install without a bootloader, or cancel the installation, or even just close the window......nothing happens.

It seems my only option is to shut down and restart (and hope for better luck the second time), but will avoid doing so until I hear back from wiser minds.

ETA: moved this stage of troubleshooting to a new thread: viewtopic.php?f=90&t=262206