Will looking at some log file(s) help determine why my laptop suddenly has occasional lock-ups?
It doesn't happen often, but sometimes, when I come back to the PC that has gone to sleep (black screen), it will not come back to the log-in screen when I move the mouse or press any key.
In the case that it hasn't gone to sleep, occasionally it will flash a black screen 3 or 4 times (in about a second or two) while I'm working. (This also doesn't happen often.)
Zorin version 16.3
Has anyone got a suggestion where I might start? I was wondering if upgrading to v17 might help.
Thanks, all
I would definitely recommend upgrading to Zorin OS 17.3 at this point, since the previous version is about to reach end of life, meaning that no more updates of any kind are going to be available. As a side effect to this, if something is wrong with your current installation this might also solve the problem altogether.
Although for the sake of discussion if you want to troubleshoot this first, you can check if your memory is in good shape by running a memory test:
Memory tests good, thanks for that.
I will be upgrading to 17.x once I clone the drive.
In the meantime, I still can't help but wonder if (one or more) logs may show a hint as to what's up.
There may be some useful information, yeah. Try running journalctl -xe in the terminal, preferably after this happens otherwise you're gonna have some hard time finding the most relevant logs (it's not like there's a big message that says "this is it" or anything).
It looks like "journalctl -xe" only produces a log of events since last boot. I did search for and find more on the journalctl command:
To limit the logs shown to the current boot, use the -b switch.
$ journalctl -b
You can view messages from an earlier boot by passing in its offset from the current boot. For example, the previous boot has an offset of -1, the boot before that is -2, and so on.` Here, we are retrieving messages from the last boot:
$ journalctl -b -1
To list the boots of the system, use the following command.
$ journalctl --list-boots
Yes, I see the upgrade app. Awesome. Thanks for that.
I run it and it says that I need to 1st buy 17.x, and that previous buyers get a discount.
I hit skip since it doesn't recognize my 16.x credentials here, and it takes me to a screen that tells me I need to pay full price.
Correct, although this might still show information relevant to this error as the system recovers from an unexpected shutdown. You can also read the logs directly from the file where they're stored with:
sudo tail -n 100 /var/log/syslog
This would show the last 100 entries, so it'd be better to run this shortly after the freeze happens. Feel free to increase the number as needed or remove the -n 100 option altogether to see the full file.
But as mentioned, a license for Zorin OS Pro is only valid for the current release you bought it for i.e. Zorin OS 16. You will receive upgrades for that version normally, however.