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I upgraded my ASUS AMD desktop from Ubuntu 12.10 to 16.04. Although I am able to sign in the cursor and the screen will freeze while switching back/forth between applications, then after a few seconds the screen will break as seen in the image:

enter image description here

The PC had 4GB RAM and 8GB swap. What causes the freeze - amongst other, opening Thunderbird, then firefox, then chrome in random sequences. Sometimes the freeze occurs after opening system administration/preference utilities.

It happens with both the default Ubuntu desktop as well as Gnome Metacity and unity. I have tried zapping the ~/.config folder of all preferences and letting it rebuild but the problem comes back.

I read some posts talking about various problems with Nvidia graphics cards or drivers, but other than figuring out that the PC has a Nvidia card, I don't know enough about cards or drivers to sort out whether this is the problem.

VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation C61 [GeForce 6150SE nForce 430] (rev a2) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])

If it is the VGA will a non-Nvidia card solve the problem? If yes, and it needs drivers, how do you do that in Linux?

ThunderBird
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Bob M
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    How did you "upgrade"? Was it a "fresh" install? – Steve R. Jul 12 '16 at 00:32
  • I also have an (old) AMD desktop that has periodic display problems. It seems that the nouveau driver does not work that well. Try one of the nvidia drivers under system settings, software and updates, additional drivers. Also see this post: http://askubuntu.com/questions/206283/how-can-i-uninstall-a-nvidia-driver-completely – Steve R. Jul 12 '16 at 00:38
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    I did an upgrade using a 16.04 disk created from downloading the .iso file. – Bob M Jul 12 '16 at 01:12
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    I found Additional Drivers under Applications --> System Tools --> Preferences --> Additional Drivers. It shows 3 working available including 2 Nvidia legacy drivers (version 304.131 one tested and one proprietary) and a "Using X.Org X server - Nouveau display driver ...) which is selected. If I select one of these Nvidia drivers and it fails is it likely to be catastrophic so that I can't revert or safe? – Bob M Jul 12 '16 at 01:20
  • I do not believe that it would be catastrophic. Use a "tested" Nvidia driver. Should it unexpectedly fail, it can be fixed through the command line. See the prior comment above for the link as it shows how to remove the Nvidia drivers through the command line and re-install the nouveau driver. – Steve R. Jul 12 '16 at 02:01
  • I made the change to the 'tested' driver last night. This morning I signed in successfully (no problems thank you) and have been marching along accessing various applications normally and setting up my desktop and windows preferences. Thus far the screen has not broken. Thank you for the tip. – Bob M Jul 12 '16 at 15:08

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I have an older AMD desktop. It seems that the (default) nouveau driver that is installed by Ubuntu does not work that well with an (old) AMD processor. Whether this problem is limited to my computer and this question or applies generically to other AMD computers, I do not know.

To fix this problem select one of the Nvidia (tested) drivers. This can be done by selecting: Applications --> System Tools --> Preferences --> Additional Drivers.

Steve R.
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