I'm running an Intel Pentium D 945 machine with an nVidia GeForce 6200 video card.

I've just fresh-installed Ubuntu Edgy 6.10 (amd64) alongside my Ubuntu 6.06.1 LTS (i386) install. I purposely did a fresh install instead of an upgrade because I wanted to take advantage of the 64-bit features of my CPU and run a 64-bit OS. Unfourtinately, after the new install, I've made the following observations:

1. There is a long pause (60 seconds or so) at a black screen while X/gdm starts. The system is completely unresponsive during this time (I cannot even change to a virtual terminal). After I installed the nVidia drivers, the large nVidia splash screen that shows up hangs for about 60 seconds before the login screen appears.

2. Once logged into GNOME, I can move my mouse cursor but cannot click anything. Eventually, I found that switching to a different desktop using the [Ctrl] + [Alt] + [Left]/[Right] keyboard shortcut allowed me to click on things. After so many clicks, I can again no longer click anything and must switch workspaces again. The mouse just generally behaves oddly.

3. The keyboard randomly multiplies keystrokes. For example, if I wanted to show the contents /usr/bin in a terminal, my keystrokes might look like:

What I actually typed was "ls -la /usr/bin". The keys are not sticking (this is the same keyboard that works fine in 6.06.1) and there are no particular keys which have the problem; all are fair game if I type long enough.

4. When trying to log out with "System -> Quit", the system becomes unresponsive as the screen tries to dim. It takes about 5 seconds for the screen to dim one shade and, during that time, it is entirely unresponsive. Clicking "Shut Down", there is about a 5 second delay before anything actually happens.

5. I get a kernel panic when I try to shut down.

Obviously, all of this makes the system quite unresponsive and unusable (especially the crazy keyboard and mouse action). I have all the same drivers loaded in Edgy as I do in Dapper. Am I running the wrong kernel or something? Or does the Pentium D just not do 64-bit OSes very well?

Thanks for any help!

This is just a stab in the dark.

Try running:
It strikes me that your Xserver is not configured properly, hence the keyboard and mouse problems, and the slow startup.

Also, I haven't actually tried it, but try "nvidia-settings" or "nvidia-xconfig", and see if they help.

I know it isn't your GFX card, because I have a Nvidia 6200 as well.

If all else fails, there may be a problem with the Nvidia drivers. Try the i386 version of Edgy (you shouldn't notice much drop in performance).

--Ian

Thanks for the response.

I see what you're going for by reconfiguring xorg; but I am actually using the exact same xorg.conf file from my Dapper install (after careful checking that it would work). I still get the same behavior, so it's not in the way that X is configured. It's a mostly "vanilla" xorg.conf file anyway--I only modified the "stock" Dapper xorg.conf file for TwinView.

Incidently, I'm not the only person having this problem, or is Edgy the only distro showing the problem. This post shows that people using Fedora Core 6 are having the exact same issue on similar hardware. The general sense I have at the moment is that this is related to 64-bit, dual-core hardware. I actually have had no problems on this machine running Dapper or Fedora Core 5--but both of those installs were 32-bit. And I'm running both Edgy and Fedora Core 6 on my 64-bit laptop--but that's single core.

I don't really want to give up on running a 64-bit distro because I bought a 64-bit processor with the intention of using the entire CPU--not just the 32-bit part.

Unless you're doing some video editing or 3D modeling, 64bit applications are pretty much the same as their 32bit counterparts. Remember that 64bit instructions only add the possibility to address more memory and work with larger registers. In some cases, like Firefox+Flash player, you'll have to run 32bit versions because there's no 64bit ports yet.
My advice is, if you can a) resolve your issue within a reasonable time frame b) just want to learn what's wrong c) really -need- 64bit computing, then go ahead. Else, stick with a 32bit regular install and be productive until you find a definitive fix.