Take the 2-minute tour ×

Basically it will not boot without holding down the power key. It has taken as long as 10 minutes.

share|improve this question
add comment

1 Answer

up vote 1 down vote accepted

I found the fix in this and this, based on the idea that the Intel atom CPU is used by both computers.

Basically, the /etc/default/grub is edited to add two kernel options to the Linux Default command line.

  • Note: These instructions are long, but it's really simple and should not take very long.

Open a terminal (dash, type in terminal, … )

  • Note: If you prefer a GUI editor like Gnome Text Editor, see the note at the bottom.

Type in the terminal sudo nano -B /etc/default/grub and your password if asked…

user@YourComputer:~$ sudo nano -B /etc/default/grub

and the nano editor will open, thus (for mine)...

# /boot/grub/grub.cfg.
#   info -f grub -n 'Simple configuration'


# Uncomment to enable BadRAM filtering, modify to suit your needs

# Uncomment to disable graphical terminal (grub-pc only)

# The resolution used on graphical terminal


# Uncomment to disable generation of recovery mode menu entries

# Uncomment to get a beep at grub start
GRUB_INIT_TUNE="480 440 1"

#boot previous booted system by default

Using the arrow keys. move the cursor down to the line

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash" and then to the last ", i.e. (…sh")

Then type in a space and nomodeset nohz=off so it now looks like this.

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash nomodeset nohz=off"

Then type in Ctrl-O, the Enter key to save, and then Ctrl-X to exit nano.

Important last step

Now you have to run update-grub to update the system generated grub.cfg file in the /boot/grub directory.

Type into your computer sudo update-grub and your password if asked…

me@myS12:~$ sudo update-grub
Generating grub.cfg ...
Found memtest86+ image: /boot/memtest86+.bin
Found Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition on /dev/sda1

Now the boot should be much shorter.

Notes on nano

nano is especally easy to use in the terminal. Move around with the arrow keys. Type in you addtions, delete the unwanted.

The " -B" (or " --backup") option backs up the previous version of it to the current filename suffixed with a ~. Very handy in case of the dreaded Fat pfinger effect.

When you are though, Crtl-O will allow you to save your edits by hitting Enter. Closing nano without saving, Ctrl-X These and other options are shown at the bottom of the terminal screen with the ^ indicating Ctrl


Notes about nano, sudoeditor, and other editors.

Some in the Ubuntu community suggest sudoedit instead of nano. I recommend nano (which is the default sudoedit editor in later distributions of Ubuntu) instead of sudoedit because the default can be overridden in non-obvious ways (unless you are an administrator). sudoedit is safer in that it automatically saves a backup copy of the edited file, but the "-B" command line option in nano does the same thing. nano is safer than other editors like vi or emacs because it doesn't have scary shell escapes.

If you prefer not to use the nano editor and prefer the Gnome Text Editor, instead of sudo nano -B use gksu gedit. I generally do this for large files, and /etc/default/grub could easily be considered a large file. Thus type in gksu gedit /etc/default/grub instead of sudo nano -B /etc/default/grub. Note that the Gnome text editor does not automatically make a backup!

share|improve this answer
add comment

Your Answer


