ubuntu dies (or freezes) too often on command line input

[yyzengrim]

It has been happening to me since I started to use this laptop from the company for a linux test bed. Several times a day, when I do something from the command line,
for example running an application connecting to another host on the internet, etc,
it comes to a freeze and does not come out of it. I can not do anything else than a forced reboot from the power button, because the keyboard and the mouse do not respond.
This work laptop is a lenovo W500, running on ubuntu jaunty, release 9.04.

I have not encountered this problem before with my personal laptop though.
My person laptop is a lenovo X61s, running on ubuntu karmic, release 9.10


Should I reinstall the work laptop with some other version of ubuntu?
Could it be some hardware problem ? What tools should I use to diagnose
the real cause and how should I fix it.

THank you very much indeed for your help!

[ptkobe]

Maybe it is what you run on the command line, not the command line itself?

My bets goes to net configuration. Maybe the external host is refusing you.

I've experience freezes with laptops when the net don't work. So they work fine at home but not at work, or vice-versa.

As an example, probably not related, last was my laptop with a VM freezing (deep freeze) because the infrastructure where I was didn't allow multiple IP's on the same plug. The administrator allowed that for me, and no more problems.

Hope it may help
Luis

[Kloschüssel]

maybe x hangs up because of something.

try to hit CTRL+ALT+F[1..10] which should bring up another tty than the one on which X runs (usually 6 or 7 I believe).

once you get the other tty and log in you should be able to trace the problem (i.e. observe abnormal cpu usage with the command `ps aux` or see what sockets etc are open by `lsof -i`or `netstat -lptu`).

useful may also be system log, dmesg and all other log files located at /var/log.

let us know how you get on.