After repo updates to Firefox v16, it crashes every time its started. The firefox icon just bounced a bit before the Mozilla Crash Reporter starts.

GIMP starts when selected from menu, but as soon as I try to open a file, it crashes. Does the same think if I do a "Open with" for the image file.

MyComputer does not display Device, Filesystem, Total space, Available space for all drives, including removable USB disks, CDs, DVDs making read or write impossible. USB printer also could not be detected - as a result, no printing possible.

KMail display new messages as read ignoring all settings assigned (different color, bold font, play sound, systray notification).

KMail not importing exported LDIF address book from SuSE11.4. Have to manually type in 100s of contact details (no fun)

Amarok crashed several times but still going. There may be problems with other software which I haven't had a chance to use yet.

The openSuSE12.2 was only installed 3 days ago, and it was the first time I used GIMP, so I cannot say whether it started crashing after all initial updates. But Firefox definitely worked straight after installation when it was version 14. Only stopped working after the updates from oss, non-oss, libdvdcss, packman codecs, nVidia driver installations.

I am beginning to regret plunging in to suSE12.2 head first. All previous distros were never plagued with as many problems I had with this version.

Would appreciate any help to resolve above problems. Thanks in advance

Right... That's quite a lot of problems, with not a lot to go on. To help work out what's going wrong with firefox/GIMP, run them from a terminal: hopefully you'll get some debug/error messages which will give us a hint.

This is the error log starting using konsole to run program:

daisyb@linux-dwdt:~> gimp
Illegal instruction
daisyb@linux-dwdt:~>
(file-jpeg:6782): LibGimp-WARNING **: file-jpeg: gimp_flush(): error: Broken pipe

(file-jpeg:6782): LibGimp-WARNING **: file-jpeg: gimp_flush(): error: Broken pipe

(script-fu:6771): LibGimpBase-WARNING **: script-fu: gimp_wire_read(): error

This is the Firefox error log:

Add-ons: langpack-cs@firefox.mozilla.org:16.0...x@opensuse.org:1.0.2,{972ce4c6-7e08-4474-a285-3208198ce6fd}:16.0.1
BuildID: 2012101000
CrashTime: 1351253333
EMCheckCompatibility: true
FramePoisonBase: 7ffffffff0dea000
FramePoisonSize: 4096
InstallTime: 1351089104
ProductID: {ec8030f7-c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384}
ProductName: Firefox
ReleaseChannel: release
SecondsSinceLastCrash: 4329
StartupTime: 1351253331
Theme: classic/1.0
Throttleable: 1
URL: about:blank
Vendor: Mozilla
Version: 16.0.1

This report also contains technical information about the state of the application when it crashed.

I do not know how to get error logs for the MyComputer not displaying disks info, I do have a printout of hardware info (about 6 pages long) though if required.

Thanks very much for taking time to read my post and offer of assistance.

Cheers

Hm. That sounds rather odd. I can't see any particular way you would fix that, other than:

• Reinstalling firefox/GIMP, see if that fixes the problem
• Checking the md5sum of the iso you downloaded against that of the openSUSE iso (to ensure that you've downloaded an uncorrupted file) and reinstall the OS
• Try a different distro

But maybe someone else on the forum will have a better idea.

I did a media check before installation and it was ok. I normally don't mind re-installing but this distro in particular started off with not displaying on a 24" screen. Then the installation of nVidia driver to configure X Screen was a major effort.

How do you do a check md5sum of distro?

I have been on openSuSE since version 9 and really do like it very much, until now!

Thanks for reply

Before reinstall, remove what is installed already(Firefox,Gimp), so that way you'll have a clean install. Try this first as Snark1994 suggested.
Now if there are too many problems, it is probably better to do a clean system install, do BACKUP your data first.
System upgrades not always end well because there are too many variables, sometimes is better to just do a clean install.

Regards

Run the command

replacing <iso_file> with the name of the iso you downloaded (you'll need to run it in Konsole in the directory that contains the file) and then compare the string of letters and numbers it gives you to the one which should be on the openSUSE download page.

Thanks Snark & ukiuki
I have no way of backing up my data because plugging in a usb external drive or burning to DVD is impossible since they are not being picked up at all. Printer & plugged in flash drives are all showing in hardware info, but i have no way to access them without device notifier.

You can see the depth of s*** i'm in. some of my files are too big to upload to my web host server. Without ability to print, I can't print out contents of address book so at least I can spend the next 2 months re-entering all contacts manually.

Going away from openSuSE, which distro do you think is similar AND more reliable?

thanks very much again. it was the bad news i was hoping i won't have to hear - reinstall

Like I said, hang on a couple of days just to see if anyone else has got a better idea...

You can try mounting USBs manually, by running

and see if they're detected at all. Do you have any other distros on your computer (dual booted, for example)? Failing that, you can boot from a LiveCD which does detect your USB drives, and copy your files that way.

Though the lesson you've learnt is backup regularly, and especially before big upgrades/installations

RE: distros, I'm afraid I disliked SUSE when I used it. I don't know how much you know about Linux, but if you just want something that looks the same, you want another distro that uses KDE - Kubuntu certainly does, if you google you'll find many others that do by default. I use Arch and love it, but it may not be the most beginner-friendly option... Fedora's meant to be quite nice, but I've never tried it. The basic story is "try it and see what takes your fancy"

Do you have a separated partition for your home directory? How big is your hard drive? You might be able to rearrange you data and partitions with a live cd and Gparted if you don't have it that way. Now If you already have a separated partition for your home then when installing new system, just point that as home, and make sure to keep the data there, also make sure the installer don't format that partition.

About a distribution well before giving any suggestions, did you do a fresh install of Suse12.2 or did you upgrade it(did you install it on top of old version)?
If you have not a clean install try that first before going to other distribution.
I have never touched Suse so I can't really say much about it, always sticked with the major ones(RedHat, Fedora, Debian), Debian is rock solid with stable software versions, Debian is what run on my machines, it is very modular and is possible to build the system your way, or if you prefer the default install you can also choose different desktop flavors, Gnome, Xfce, Lxde, as default install, yet you can install any other you want.

Regards

Hi ukiuki
This is a list of my hard disk partition

Disk /dev/sda: 808.9 GB, 808887533056 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 98341 cylinders, total 1579858463 sectors
Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x6d6d6d6d

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 2048 20965375 10481664 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda2 * 20965376 1579857919 779446272 f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/sda5 20967424 62910463 20971520 83 Linux
/dev/sda6 62912512 1579831295 758459392 83 Linux

I have installed 12.2 initially from previous 11.4 version. It had problems and I have since reinstalled 3 times already because I could not get it to display anything at all because for some strange reason, after initial boot, the system was not able to recognize my 24" monitor. As a result, the screen was just filled with squares. I finally did an install with a "nomodeset" boot option in the beginning of installation and then used the safe mode to log in after initial boot post installation.

I did all the necessary installs like libdvdcss, packman, oss and non-oss updates. Firefox has not worked since initial updates. Finally managed to set display to 1920x1080 after struggling with nVidia XServer display config. Then I had problem getting KMail's address book to accept import and display contents (akonadi). I have got all those going ok now and turned to install the HP driver installation. Driver & plugin installed ok but printer cannot be found. Now all my hard drive info and any other plugged in usb drives, CD or DVD drives cannot be displayed. Therefore, no way of getting my backed up data on removable drive or CD/DVD over. MyComputer does not display any disk info all of a sudden. This was because no devices can be detected when plugged in.

If I can't print because usb printer cannot be detected altho its already plugged in and was detected and working with previous versions, device notifier not picking up plugged in usb flash drives, can't access audio or data from CD/DVDs, I have a totally useless system. I am prepared to start from scratch since i have all my data backed up before going from openSuSE11.4 to 12.2

The problems are too many to list, but the best way is to start really fresh. How can I clean my hard disk totally. Remove ALL traces of previous installations & bugs so that I am really starting on virgin disk space. Is there a way to fdisk the entire drive so that when I install, none of the previous linux bugs are left behind? I believe that even when I did a clean install without formatting the /home partition did not do the trick.

I have been a SuSE user since its version 9. I have never encountered any problems. That the reason why I am comfortable going with all the upgrades until now. For a user like myself,would Debian be within my capabilities?

Can you please advise me how to nuke my drive so I can really start afresh? I would prefer to start with no traces from all previous versions. Thank you both so much for the advice so far. Much appreciated.

Thanks. Am contemplating using DBan to nuke the drive and start from scratch. Downloading another iso of 12.2 now with Firefox's DownThemAll with built-in check sum.

This time around, I would like to select another distro based on users' experience. It is daunting after this bad experience and I thought it might be better to stay with the devil I know for the time being.

What distro are you on? You obviously know heaps more about Linux than I do.

Cheers

You shouldn't need to nuke the drive yourself - most installers will happily reformat the drive during a normal install (normally there's a "take up all the disk space" option).

Aha, I wouldn't be overly confident on that. It's just through practice, anyway. Like I said previously, I'm on Arch, but I don't think it's a particularly beginner-friendly distribution. I would go with something a bit more mainstream, like Ubuntu (or Kubuntu, etc.), Mint, Debian or maybe Fedora.

You may find this distro chooser useful as well.

Regards,

1 members found this post helpful.

Most live CD have Gparted a tool to create, delete, format, resize the partitions, it is easy to use. Normally the installer have the option to totally erase a partition.

There are hidden files in the your home folder, they are not visible, but in the terminal if you list the files/folders this way: ls -la you will be able to see them, the ones with a dot(.) in the begin. So you could manually delete the ones that are related to programs to avoid conflicts with newer version only leaving your specific data like photos, docs, music, etc.

Regards

Thanks very much. Your heads up re manually deleting all the hidden files with a dot was a welcome relief. I will do that, then a new installation of the iso i'm downloading now with Downthemall & Metalink which should automatically do a check sum.

I followed instructions by Knightron on this forum under 'Linux Newbie' http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ml#post4814218 for help with getting the installed nVidia driver to work.

Hopefully I will have a normal OS after this install.

PS: Snark1994, I did manage to mount the flash drive manually as you suggested. Thanks