I recently installed a new copy of Ubuntu 9.10 (Kernel 2.6.31-14) on to my Hp Pavilion dv6t, so I can setup a Linux development environment. The install went flawlessly and I proceeded with Ubuntu's udate manager's long list of updates (292 in all). I also setup a swap file and activated a Nvidia 185 driver for the Nvidia 260m GPU on the machine.

After all this was done I restarted the computer and booted into Ubuntu this time with a newer 2.6.31-19 Kernel which was installed from the update manager. During booth the computer hung at this point:

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013136] Performance Counters: Nehalem/Corei7 events, Intel PMU driver.

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013141] ... version: 3

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013142] ... bit width: 48

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013144] ... generic counters: 4

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013146] ... value mask: 0000ffffffffffff

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013147] ... max period: 000000007fffffff

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013149] ... fixed-purpose counters: 3

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.013151] ... counter mask: 000000070000000f

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.015539] ACPI: Core revision 20090521

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.052264] Setting APIC routing to flat

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.052639] ..TIMER: vector=0x30 apic1=0 pin1=2 apic2=-1 pin2=-1

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.152580] CPU0: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU Q 720 @ 1.60GHz stepping 05

Feb 24 14:23:12 braeburn-laptop kernel: [ 0.270845] Booting processor 1 APIC 0x1 ip 0x6000

I can post a full kern.log of this boot process if requested. Hopefully this is enough information to go on.

I should add that I'm still new to configuring and running a Linux OS although I know enough basic command line usage to do software development. This is my attempt to become more familiar with Linux and manage my own system.

I'd like to get some insight on the nature of this system hang, what the problem is and how to resolve it. At this point I can scrap the install if I broke something, but my intuition says this is an issue with the kernel recognizing the correct hardware configuration for my system, or perhaps this is an issue with the APIC drivers managing Nehalem's new power management capabilities?

Thanks for looking at this issue and providing feed back.