Xfce (on Xubuntu) seems to have developed a problem on two different computers of mine where if it is left alone for a short period of time it freezes.
To elaborate a bit, any background processes will continue to run and I can see them running (for example; if I am doing something in the terminal I can still watch it running until it completes), however I am unable to click on anything or interact with the computer using my keyboard.
Interestingly enough I can still move the cursor and the cursor will change depending on what it is hovering over, I just can't click on anything.
I can also Ctrl Alt F1,2,3,4,5,6 to get to other shells, which do accept my keyboard inputs. However, the main shell running my desktop environment remains frozen.
The two computers are quite different (one is an AMD FX powered desktop, the other is a 2010 Macbook Air), and are running different versions of Xubuntu with different versions of Xfce (the PC is running Xubuntu 21.04 with Xfce 4.16, whereas the Mac is running Xubuntu 20.10 with Xfce 4.14). However, I have noticed a few similarities between the computers that might help in deciphering what the issue is.
Both of the computers:
- Are running Xubuntu (the PC was running Ubuntu Studio Xfce prior to this where it did not experience the same problem).
- Have Nvidia graphics cards with the drivers from the official graphics PPA: https://launchpad.net/~graphics-drivers/+archive/ubuntu/ppa sudo add-apt-repository ppa:graphics-drivers/ppa
The PC has a GTX 970, the Mac has a GeForce 320M. Something else I have just noticed is that when I run screenfetch neither computer displays my GPU. Ubuntu Studio (which was installed on the PC before I installed Xubuntu) had no issue with showing the GPU. Might this be related to the issue?
- Both are older computers (2010 and 2015) but have Xubuntu installed on M.2 drives (the PC's is an NVMe drive whereas the Mac's is SATA).
Any ideas on what might be causing this? Or how I can fix this?
Thank you in advance to anyone who helps :)
This appears to be caused by faulty Nvidia drivers. Interestingly enough, fixing both computers were mostly similar, with the last step being different.
PC: First I disabled the ubuntu graphics PPA (via unticking it in Software & Updates), then I ran 'sudo apt update' to be on the safe side. I then switched the driver from 460 to 450 (both are the proprietary drivers) in Software & Updates. Rebooted the computer and it was fixed (it also changed my wallpaper back to the Xubuntu default for some reason).
Mac: Same exact steps as the PC, but for whatever reason the Mac didn't like the 450 driver either. So I switched it out for the nouveau open source driver instead, which worked like a charm. (It also changed my wallpaper to the Xubuntu default).
One interesting side note is that both computers were also struggling to run games where they really shouldn't, so these driver issues were causing more than just freezing.
Anyway, I hope this helps anyone who might need it!