Is it just me, or does Ubuntu crash a lot? Ubuntu crashes all the time for me. Sometimes when I have a few tabs open in Firefox, Gaim open, and XMMS open, it crashes. It's rather annoying. I thought Linux was supposed to be more stable than Windows? Also, when I restart sometimes, my sound doesn't work. It works before I restart, then I restart or crash and it doesn't work anymore. Why is this? Does anyone have similar problems, and can someone please help me out?

Thanks,
Sir Loin

i use vmware , mplayer ,more than 10 gnome terminals ,more than 15 firefox tabs with no problem //512 miga rams -2000 mhz cpu//
it might get a bit slow according to the heavy load but crashs ! no


never had a linux desktop crashed coz of heavy load !

did u do any newly hardware/software changes ?

never tasted Ubuntu flavor but it mustn't differ from other distros .

Well, it's not you, but it is also not Ubuntu. In fact, no modern OS will crash "a lot"--not even Windows.

There can be lots of reasons, including faulty memory, failing harddrive, bad power supply, etc.

have you run any hardware diagnostics?

When is the last time the computer was cleaned?

I frequently have 8-9 tabs, TVTime, X-Chat, GAIM and other things running,

No probs at all...

IGF

Sometimes it depends on how experimental your software is.

I run some beta and some svn builds and they can be quite temperamental

Ubuntu just sucks hard. It crashes for no reason at all, and when I boot it up, it "forgets" my sound card. That's ridiculous. I have a 1.21Ghz processor and 512 MB of RAM, I shouldn't crash just because I'm using Firefox.

If you don't like it, try something else. I haven't had problems with Dapper Drake (or earlier versions that I've used).

I've tried mostly all of the Debian-based distros. They were all slow and horrible except for Ubuntu, but it crashes. It must be a problem with Firefox, because when I use Opera, I don't crash at all. The best distro I've used was Gentoo, but I can't install it - I get an error: error code 63.

Well, given the reports on Ubuntu/Kubuntu/Xubuntu, are overwhelmingly positive, Id say the problem is you, not Ubuntu.

IGF

Considering I'm only USING Ubuntu when it crashes, I doubt it's me. If Ubuntu expects to become as popular as Windows and Mac, it shouldn't crash when you try to do simple, everyday tasks. Windows never crashes when I use Firefox. In the everyday home user's perspective, Ubuntu isn't for me. It's barely a reliable switch from Windows. Saying it's just me is a slap in my face. Do you think I purposely crash my system when I'm trying to watch a skateboarding dog on YouTube? No.

Now, does anyone have any solutions that, well, are actually helpful? I crash when I'm using Firefox. Period. No more, no less.

Thanks,
Sir Loin

Hey,

Not to point out the painfully obvious, but someone is pretty pissed. It's possible the original install disc was damaged. It's also possible the install that you did of Firefox is damaged. I'm not sure if you got it from disc, online or if it came with your Ubuntu install disc. Like pixellany said, it's possible you could be having some hardware failure, it's not unlikely. Try reinstalling with a different disc. Remember to BACK UP your work.

Regards,

Brandon

Now you've given more clues. First of all, you claim it crashes all the time, now it's only when you use Firefox and then when you're watching videos with multiple tabs opened.

This could be of several problems, firstly, Firefox is known to have memory leaks. With this in mind, how long is it taking before it crashes? And when you say crash, is it freezing or just totally crashing by taking you back to a login console prompt, etc? Is it just X that crashes, have you tried a ctrl-alt-backspace to kill X and restart it when this crash occurs?

I could narrow it down to possibly several hardware pieces, either with Firefox and it's memory leaks, it's bad memory or possibly a faulty or badly configured video card, since you say it crashes while watching a youTube video..

But it's not a slap in the face when people tell you that it's you and no Ubuntu, cause that's simply a fact. We don't know your habits when dealing with computers and we don't know what hardware you're using, but if Ubuntu crashed as often as you say for everyone, I doubt it would be the top downloaded distro currently..

And perhaps if you say you can't install Gentoo due to error, that should give you a clue that you're working with faulty hardware possibly.

Perhaps you need to go back to the drawing board, start performing some real troubleshooting and find the real cause of the problem, instead of just blaming Linux itself cause I doubt you're system is truly crashing, and if it is, it's not Ubuntu that is crashing it.

PS. Stay away from youTube as well, it'll make you stupid just like mySpace.com..

Try starting Firefox from a command line. Then when it crashes see if an error is thrown in the cli window. I have done that before and found it to be my hardware. Like pixellany said, it could be hardware. I blamed linux on it's ability to play dvd's about a year ago. Only to discover the acutal problem was the dvd drive.

You really need to learn what a slap in the face is...

Ok, Considering there are not an overwhelming number of reports on Firefox crashing, Youtube not working, etc. One can draw a logical conclusion that it IS JUST YOU. YOU have not configured something correctly or YOU have some sort of hardware issue...

I have zero problems out of Firefox.

So yes, I believe its probably YOU and something YOU didn't configure properly.

IGF

After reading through all of this (with some amusement I admit):

Since Opera seems to work fine I would believe that this has something to do with the Firefox installation and\or some plugins that are being used. If you are not using the default Firefox install and default plugins that Ubuntu supplies I would go back to those first.

If it is in fact Ubuntu it is a misconfiguration of something, most likely the video card. If it were me I would set up a dual boot and see if another distro acts the same way. Or better yet try a live cd-even ubuntu and see if it acts the same. If it doesn't email your self a copy of lsmod and see if the same modules, in particular video drivers, are loaded. You could also check and see if you are using the same versions of Firefox, plugins, etc.

If that isn't it then it is most likely a hardware problem as trickykid pointed out.

As for it being the user..frustration, anger and lashing out aren't going to solve it. Neither are responders who lash back and waste his time with non helpful answers.