You know the drill. This one's pretty short, anyway.
I installed Ubuntu on an old computer a few months ago. It has 256 MB memory, a 500 GB internal hard drive, and a 1.0 GHz P4 CPU. The problem is that I don't have what you could call a spare mouse. I have a broken wired Dell ball-mouse and a Kensington wireless laser mouse which every computer I've ever used it on has hated in different ways. Windows likes to drain the batteries even when the PC is off (don't ask me how!) while Linux seems hellbent on having the mouse double-left click constantly.
I decided to upgrade my Ubuntu package when it told me it had 42 new updates since I'd last powered up the machine. I figured, "Let's do this, and then let's go about getting this mouse fixed!"
Problem 1: Ubuntu installed its upgrade 99% of the way (that's even what it said), but then at the very last second, a good hour and a half of waiting later, it decided it couldn't do it.
Problem 2: It said it was going to try to salvage the old kernel.
Problem 3: It stopped halfway through.
Problem 4: It told me to report this to Ubuntu Central Command.
Problem 5: Attempts to do so (via Synaptic) resulted in an error message saying I needed to run the command sudo dpkg --[something, I forget] -a
Problem 6: Doing that resulted in an error but suggested I might be able to get around it by doing this.
Problem 7: "This" required me to unrar a .rar.
Problem 8: Installing "unrar" (from WinRar's Linux download) required me to run the sudo command again. Cyclical problem.
Problem 9: The OS thinks it's the new Ubuntu, as reflected by its new desktop, new security log-in screen, and lack of available updates when I go to the updates manager. But it thinks it's the old kernel insofar as some other things are concerned.
Problem 10: Going into this one thing my friend told me to look at, to try and find the kernels, reported back 0 kernels on this machine.
Problem 11: And yet powering off, and back on again 24 hours later, resulted in a successful start-up of a Linux session. Minus all the problems we've been having, mind you.
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Attempts to shut down work 50% of the time and fail 50% of the time. Specifically, the first few times I tried it (last night), it sent me into a BIOS-looking debugger which presented me with very few options, but among those were some fairly promising ones ("repair/revert," something like that, and "dpkg," and one other one) out of which none had any net effect.
Then this morning, after having done nothing new, and after confirming through the terminal that my Linux was still busted, I shut down without a hitch twice.
The difference? XD
Last night: I told Linux via its GUI "Shut Down" option to shut down. It said it was, and after spewing out a lot of familiar termination-of-processes code, it then decided to pull a U-Turn, show me the BIOS debugger, and (after I chose to exit) restart the machine.
This morning: I manually depressed the power key for 5 seconds. Much to my surprise, the machine did NOT power down! Instead, Linux popped up a message box in its GUI asking me, "Do you wish to Shut Down? Restart? or Hibernate?" And selecting Shut Down then (STILL IN THE GUI!) resulted in an unfamiliar shut down sequence by which Linux output only one line of termination-of-processes code and, before I could make out what it even was, *VOOOOooooooooooooooom* shut down the machine instantaneously.
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