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I have a Lenovo P50 laptop with the following specs:

CPU: i7
Ram: 32GB
Video: NVIDIA Quadro M1000M
SSD0: 1TB
SSD1: 512MB
SSD2: 512MB

I have tried the following Ubuntu versions:

14.04.6-desktop-amd64
18.04.5-''
20.04.1-''

I have closely followed the instructions found on the Lenovo site found here

My problem is the same on every installation. When I launch Firefox or Opera, they both freeze and or crash. Sometimes, I can get Firefox to work for a little while and Opera usually works for about 5-10 minutes before crashing. I am entirely new to Linux and I don't have the slightest clue on where to begin. I have a hunch that I'm having a problem with the NVIDIA but I don't really know. What am I doing wrong?

Edit: I am not using any add-ons and I have turned off hardware acceleration.

Edit: I updated the BIOS but still experience the issue.

Edit: ###### UBUNTU IS NOW FREEZING RANDOMLY TOO ######

NoOne
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  • Have you done any driver or hardware enablement actions on the machine, yet? If not, open a terminal and run this: `sudo apt install --install-recommends linux-generic-hwe-20.04`. This may resolve your graphics issues while also enabling some of your other devices to work better –  Feb 10 '21 at 23:02
  • Thanks, will do. I will re-install 20.04 and get back to you. – NoOne Feb 10 '21 at 23:03
  • Only supported releases of Ubuntu (*standard support*) are on-topic for this site. Ubuntu 14.04 LTS is EOL (*end-of-life*) thus off-topic, and Ubuntu 14.04 ESM is in extended support and only supported by Canonical via Ubuntu Advantage thus also off-topic here. Refer https://askubuntu.com/help/on-topic https://help.ubuntu.com/community/EOLUpgrades https://fridge.ubuntu.com/2019/05/02/ubuntu-14-04-trusty-tahr-reached-end-of-life-on-april-25-2019-esm-available/ *I realize the other releases are on-topic, but why not have tried 16.04 or something supported & thus on-topic for this site* – guiverc Feb 10 '21 at 23:56
  • `opera` is not default on any official installation, thus what `firefox` are you using? have you tried *snaps* if so which? what package version(s) did you try? given the `opera` also implies you're not just using default browsers. – guiverc Feb 10 '21 at 23:57
  • Thanks Matigo, when I run that command, the result is "linux-generic-hwe-20.04 is already the newest version..." – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 00:24
  • The firefox version is 79.0 and I only installed Opera because firefox wasn't working and to show that it doesn't seem to be an issue related to firefox. – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 00:26
  • Open System Monitor - Resources tab, and watch to see what might be tanking. – user3169 Feb 11 '21 at 05:24
  • Thanks, user3169. Unfortunately nothing notable in System Monitor when Firefox freezes. All 8 cpus are at 10% and memory is at around 8%. – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 05:44

1 Answers1

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Looks like RAM issue. Check it by memtest86

ExploitFate
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  • Thanks. I searched how to use memtest and I found that the process for brining up the grub menu are (1) reboot and (2) hold the shift key. It doesn't work. I can't get the grub menu to appear. – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 00:21
  • Ok, I managed to make a bootable USB for memtest and it ran with no errors. Do you have anything else I can try? – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 04:53
  • Did you run quick test or full? I think it's hardware issue. You can test browsers with disabled hardware acceleration https://www.itechtics.com/disable-hardware-acceleration-in-google-chrome-firefox-opera-and-vivaldi/ – ExploitFate Feb 11 '21 at 08:43
  • Yes, I have tried disabling hardware acceleration and made certain no add-ins are installed – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 14:16
  • As far as the Ram test, when memtest booted, it started on its own and was anything but quick. So I don't know if it was the "quick test" or not. I can't get memtest86 to show up in Grub so I downloaded the most current version 9. When it started, it's image wouldn't display properly, so I then used version 4. I'm not sure how UEFI works over legacy BIOS but my system is supposed to be capable. – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 14:24
  • I let memtest run for another 5 hours and not a single error. One thing to note, my SO-DIMM slots are not equal. There are four slots available and only three are used. Two have matching 8GB sticks and the other has a 16GB stick. I'm not sure on the speeds. However, if there was truly a problem with memory, why would Ubuntu keep going and Firefox freeze? – NoOne Feb 11 '21 at 22:08
  • Now the OS is also randomly freezing. I think you're right, there is a hardware problem but I'm not sure it's memory. – NoOne Feb 12 '21 at 01:21
  • It looks like it's some kind of CPU problem. When I turn off mutli-processing in BIOS, it works fine, but everything is obviously slower. Is there some way I can control the i7 core processor??? – NoOne Feb 12 '21 at 02:57
  • You can install gnome shell extentions like https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/841/freon/ to monitor temperatures and https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/945/cpu-power-manager/ to manage CPU perfomance – ExploitFate Feb 12 '21 at 15:06
  • Thanks, I will try that. When I disable Core Multi-Processing in BIOS, everything seems to work great. However, even with Intel (R) Hyper-Threading Technology enabled, I only have two cores. It's a four core processor and with hyper-threading, I could have eight, which would be optimal for me. – NoOne Feb 12 '21 at 15:34