I'm running Mandrake 9.1, and I'm having problems with using the Ctrl+Alt+Backspace keystroke to kill X; it totally shuts off my computer. I'm using this keystroke because in previous distros it killed X, but apparently Mandrake 9.1 handles this keystroke differently? I'm looking for a way to kill X without using another machine to SSH in and kill X.

You may be wondering how often X dies. It normally freezes up when using my mounted iPod to transfer files.


Thanks in advance!

I've had the same problem, both with Mandrake 8.1 and 9.0. I think what is happening is that it's going into suspend mode.

No idea how to fix it unfortunately...

It might be good to see if you can track down why the iPod is causing it to hang. I wish I could help you there, too... just yesterday I had problems with lockups (total and absolute) when syncing with my Sharp Zaurus... some kind of network or USB problem, I presume.

Something you could try, though, is control-alt-F1 (F2, F3, etc.), which should switch you to a login console. Log in, see if you can find out what process is hanging up, and kill it. Then control-alt-F7 (sometimes F8, for some reason) gets you back to X, where things hopefully will have straightened themselves out.

I don't know about that, it seems to shut right off. I'll investigate it later when I get home. I know that Mandrake has that new support for power management, so maybe you are correct. Either way, I need to figure out how to fix this problem.

As for the iPod, I have no clue why it kills everything. My mouse moves and the cursor changes, but I can't click anything. I will have to try Alt-F2 next time to see if I can bring up a console and kill stuff.

Thanks for you reply, and if you hear of any fixes for this please let me know.

yes..I had this problem too..with MDK 9.0

It was the setting in the BIOS (called hotkey or something similar), that catch this keystroke (ctrl+alt+backspace) and immediatelly turns the PC off (on the system low-level). Check if it isn't enabled.
So, maybe this could help you...

Best regards

Lempour

SOLVED
after a long time I didn't know what more could I tune on my linux box, then I decided to compile acpi support and modules (just to switch off by pressing the power button ). And then the strange problem went away . It seems that the acpi driver somehow catches the magic keystroke and decides itself what to do and not asking BIOS )