Common F11 bugs

This page documents common bugs in Fedora 11 and, if available, fixes or workarounds for these problems. If you find your problem in this page, do not file a bug for it, unless otherwise instructed. Where appropriate, a reference to the current bug(s) in Bugzilla is included.

Release Summary, Announcement and Notes

Read the Fedora 11 Preview release notes for specific information about changes in Fedora 11 Preview, known issues, and other general information.

My bug is not listed

Not every bug is listed in this page, but Bugzilla should be a comprehensive database of known bugs. This page is a sampling of the bugs most commonly discussed on our mailing lists and forums.

To see if your bug has already been reported, you can search Bugzilla. If it has not yet been reported, we encourage you to do so to help improve Fedora for yourself and others. A guide to Bugs and feature requests has been prepared to assist you.

If you believe an already-reported bug report should be added to this page because it is commonly enountered, you can:

• Add it yourself, if you have wiki access. Remember to try and follow the style and guidelines explained in the comments in the page source.
• Add the CommonBugs keyword to the bug report, and contact the Fedora QA team with the Bugzilla report number explaining why you believe that particular report qualifies as a common issue. You can contact Fedora QA through any of the methods listed here.

Issues when upgrading from previous releases

As usual, the supported methods for upgrading from previous Fedora releases are to do an 'upgrade install' from the regular installation media, or to use preupgrade (see How_to_use_PreUpgrade). Upgrading by using yum directly is not supported, but may in practice work. For known issues when upgrading via yum, see the page on this upgrade method.

Upgrade fails while editing existing bootloader entry

link to this item - Bugzilla: #501057

While upgrading your system using anaconda, the Fedora installer, you are given the option to update your bootloader configuration, create a new bootloader configuration or skip any bootloader configuration changes. When choosing to create a new bootloader configuration, the installer may fail while attempting to edit the default bootloader target created by the installer. To work around this issue, edit the default bootloader configuration after the upgrade completes and your system reboots. If changes are needed prior to a system reboot, you may manually edit the configuration by pressing <ctrl><alt>F2 and edit the bootloader configuration file by typing:

 vi /mnt/sysimage/etc/grub.conf

Can't find .i686 kernel

The kernel.i686 RPM is no longer produced. All .i386 and .i486 packages have been rebuilt as .i586 (Pentium class). These designations represent the minimum supported architecture version; Fedora 11 is optimized for Pentium 4-compatible and later processors. Fedora has never officially supported pre-Pentium architectures, and dropping any remaining backwards compatibility with these chips further improves performance and allows for code simplification.

The following kernels are available instead:

• kernel.i586, for those requiring compatibility with a Pentium-class architecture or who do not have a PAE and NX capable processor.
• kernel-PAE.i686, which requires a PAE and NX capable processor with Pentium PRO-class or later architecture.

After analyzing the differences between the i585 and i686 architectures, dropping the non-PAE i686 kernel is not expected to have a negative performance impact for those required to use the kernel.i586 package. The kernel-PAE.i686 RPM has additional capabilities, such as support for ExecShield security and the ability to address up to 64GB of RAM (the standard kernel can address only 4GB). Note that the architecture designations in RPM names represent the minimum supported architecture version; Fedora 11 is optimized for Pentium 4-compatible and later processors.

Anaconda (the recommended install method) will automatically choose the best kernel for your hardware.

If you are using the "yum upgrade" method (not recommended), you may receive the kernel.i586 package even if your processor would support the kernel-PAE.i686 package. To determine this, run the command:

grep 'flags.* pae' /proc/cpuinfo | grep -wq nx && echo 'kernel-PAE'

If you see "kernel-PAE" in the output, then your CPU is capable of using this package, and you can manually "yum install kernel-PAE".

Installation issues

Booting Fedora 11 live media created from a Fedora 9 system fails to boot

link to this item - Bugzilla: #498155

Fedora 11 live media created from a Fedora 9 system may fail during boot with a message, Unable to find root filesystem. An updated livecd-tools package has been submitted to the Fedora 9 updates-testing repository for testing. Fedora 9 users experiencing this problem while creating Fedora 11 live media are encouraged to upgrade.

Installation fails with DeviceError: cannot commit to disk sda after 5 attempts

link to this item - Bugzilla: #491754

Several users have reported a failure during installation of Fedora 11. While partitioning your disk(s), the anaconda installer will fail and present an error message indicating DeviceError: cannot commit to disk sda after 5 attempts. Subsequent attempts to install the system using the same steps appear to be successful. Root cause for this failure is still under investigation.

Installation fails with PartitionException: Can't have overlapping partitions

link to this item - Bugzilla: #499544

Several users have reported installation failures while attempting to re-use or resize existing disk partitions during an install. The most common reproducer occurs while resizing existing partitions under the Create custom layout partitioning option. If you encounter this failure and the use of existing partitions is required, it is recommended that you resize your partitions prior to performing the installation. This page will be updated when more information is available.

Installation fails while editing previously encrypted partition - IndexError: list index out of range

link to this item - Bugzilla: #502310

Several users have reported installation failures while attempting to edit previously encrypted disk partitions during an install. When the installer discovers encrypted volumes, it will prompt the user for a passphrase needed to unlock the encrypted partitions. If the user does not enter a passphrase, and later attempts to edit a previously encrypted partition under the Create custom layout partitioning option, the installer will fail with a message, IndexError: list index out of range. To work around this issue, users are advised to enter a passphrase when prompted for any previously encrypted disk partitions. If the passphrase is not known, you are advised to let the installer partition your disks using the Use entire drive option, or edit any previously encrypted disk partitions by hand prior to installation.

Hardware-related issues

Miscellaneous problems with Intel graphics adapters

link to this item

Many users are already aware from coverage in the press that significant changes have recently been made to the driver for Intel graphics adapters (and the supporting code in Mesa/DRI and the kernel), and that these have caused some functionality regressions. If you are suffering from problems with an Intel graphics adapter such as failure of X to start at all, hangs or freezes or crashes in the graphical environment, display corruption, failure of 3D accelerated applications to work properly or similar problems, and your issue is not specifically covered elsewhere on this page, the following general advice may be of use.

Several such issues may be worked around by disabling kernel mode setting. To do this, add nomodeset as a kernel parameter. If this solves your problem, please check whether a bug has already been reported for it, and if not, file a new bug report on the xorg-x11-drv-intel component, explaining your symptoms, and providing all the usual information required for X.org bug reports. In future kernel mode setting will be the only available method, and so we wish to ensure all problems caused by kernel mode setting are fixed.

If this does not resolve your issue, one other potential workaround is to change to a different acceleration method. To do this, add a line:

Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"

or:

Option "AccelMethod" "XAA"

to the Device section of /etc/X11/xorg.conf. If that file does not exist, you can run system-config-display as root to create it. Again, if doing this works around the problem you are experiencing, please check whether a bug report on the problem has already been filed, and if not, please file a new bug report on the xorg-x11-drv-intel component, explaining your symptoms, and providing all the usual information required for X.org bug reports. These legacy acceleration methods will be removed in future, so any bugs in the new acceleration method (UXA) need to be fixed.

Text becomes corrupted on systems with Intel graphics adapters

link to this item - Bugzilla: #495323

Several users with many different Intel graphics adapters have reported text displayed in applications becomes heavily corrupted after the system has been running for a while. Disabling kernel modesetting, using the nomodeset parameter, works around this issue. The cause of this problem is under investigation and we hope to provide an official update to resolve it shortly after the release of Fedora 11.

A test build that should resolve this problem is available from Koji: kernel-2.6.29.4-167.fc11. If you are affected by this issue, please test this update and report your results to the bug report.

Graphical desktop failing to start or crashing with AGP NVIDIA graphics cards

link to this item - Bugzilla: #490358, Bugzilla: #487456, Bugzilla: #498579, Bugzilla: #499730

Problems have been reported with several NVIDIA AGP graphics cards, with the new nouveau graphics driver used in Fedora 11. AGP is a tricky case that the driver does not yet handle well for several cards. If you experience failure to start the graphical desktop (X server), or hanging or crashing of the graphical desktop, and you have an NVIDIA-based AGP graphics card, you may want to try the following workaround. Add the kernel parameter nouveau.noagp=1. For many reporters, this resolves the problem.

Some NVIDIA onboard graphics chipsets use AGP, as well as expansion cards that fit in an AGP slot. To check whether your onboard chipset is an AGP one, run this command:

grep -i agp /var/log/Xorg.0.log

if it returns anything, your chip is an AGP one. If not, it isn't.

If you experience a problem of this kind, and your graphics card is not the same model as in any of the existing reports listed above, please file a new bug report on the xorg-x11-drv-nouveau component, explaining your symptoms, and providing all the usual information required for X.org bug reports.

Grey lines appear in Firefox location bar and terminal windows with Intel i845 graphics adapters

link to this item - Bugzilla: #502096

In a default configuration, on systems with Intel i845 graphics adapters, you may notice graphical corruption of the Firefox location bar, GNOME terminal windows, and possibly other applications. The corruption manifests as one pixel tall, dotted light grey lines of varying widths in random locations, appearing and disappearing. Disabling kernel modesetting, using the nomodeset parameter, works around this issue.

Enabling desktop effects causes system hang with Intel i845 graphics adapters

link to this item - Bugzilla: #490005

On systems with Intel i845 graphics chipsets, attempting to enable accelerated desktop effects (Compiz) via the System / Preferences / Desktop Effects menu entry causes the system to hang (in fact, X is stuck, but if you have the appropriate network setup, you should be able to ssh into the affected machine to shut it down in an orderly fashion). There is no known workaround for this issue, therefore we advise not trying to enable desktop effects on this graphics chipset for now.

Corrupted display in some OpenGL applications on Intel i855 graphics adapters

link to this item - Bugzilla: #490366

In a default configuration, on systems with Intel i855 graphics adapters, some OpenGL-accelerated applications do not display properly. At least the glxgears test application and Google Earth are reported to be problematic, with Google Earth rendering only a small, empty black rectangle (and hence obviously being useless). Some users report that other applications, including teapot, Compiz (desktop effects), and extremetuxracer, work correctly. Disabling kernel modesetting with the nomodeset kernel parameter may work around this issue in some cases.

Frequent hangs on Intel i865 graphics adapters

link to this item - Bugzilla: #502077

In a default configuration, on systems with Intel i865 graphics adapters, frequent hanging of the system may be observed. Disabling kernel modesetting with the nomodeset kernel parameter should work around this issue. We are aiming to fix this issue for final release of Fedora 11.

A test build that should resolve this problem is available from Koji: kernel-2.6.29.4-167.fc11. If you are affected by this issue, please test this update and report your results to the bug report.

Screen stays black when returning from idle mode on Thinkpad X41T

link to this item - Bugzilla: #489907

On the Lenovo / IBM Thinkpad X41T model laptop, with default settings, the screen will fail to turn back on once it has gone into power-saving idle mode (either on a timeout, or on closing and re-opening the lid). Disabling kernel modesetting via the nomodeset kernel parameter works around this problem, but may cause other problems to occur instead. Another workaround is to create a file with the following contents:

#!/bin/bash
xrandr --output LVDS1 --off
xrandr --output LVDS1 --auto

Make it executable, and set a shortcut key combination to launch it. Running the script via the shortcut should restore the display. Fedora developers are currently working on a fix for this problem.

Graphical installation / desktop fails to start on Asus Eee Top

link to this item - Bugzilla: #491627

It has been reported that with a default configuration, Fedora 11 fails to initialize the graphical desktop (X server) properly on the Asus Eee Top system. You can work around this issue by downloading this file and installing it as /etc/X11/xorg.conf. With this file in place, the X server should start correctly at the native resolution of the system.

Graphical installation / desktop fails to start on Mac systems with Intel 945 graphics adapter 8086:27A2

link to this item - Bugzilla: #494390

Several users of various Apple Mac systems, including some generations of the Mac Mini and Macbook, which all use an Intel 945 graphics adapter with the PCI ID 8086:27A2, have reported that the graphical installation / desktop (X server) fail to start correctly. Some users report that disabling kernel modesetting, with the kernel parameter nomodeset, works around this issue.

Graphical installation / desktop fails to start on Toshiba Portége M100

link to this item - Bugzilla: #500544

It has been reported that starting the graphical environment (either during installation or on boot of an installed system) fails entirely with default configuration on the Toshiba Portége M100 system. To work around this issue, add the nomodeset kernel parameter, which disables kernel modesetting. With this parameter set, things should work fine.

PulseAudio-based volume control cannot adjust volume satisfactorily

link to this item - Bugzilla: #497966 (tracker)

Fedora 11 introduces a simplified, PulseAudio-based GNOME volume control applet and application: see the release notes for more details on this. This, and other PA-based volume controls like pavucontrol, rely on PulseAudio to set the volume level. In some cases where the underlying ALSA volumes do not default to sensible values, PulseAudio-based volume control applications cannot properly adjust the volume: for instance, you hear no sound even with the control set to max, or setting the control to its lowest level still results in audible sound. In these cases, you can use the legacy volume control application installed by default in Fedora 11 to control the underlying ALSA volumes directly. It can be found in the menus under System / Preferences, with the name Advanced Volume Control. If you find yourself in this situation, please file a new bug report on the pulseaudio component, according to these instructions, and set it to block the bug AlsaVolume.

Sound Blaster Live! cards (and other emu10k1-based cards) default to digital (S/PDIF) output

link to this item - Bugzilla: #496320

Due to an oversight in the logic for deciding what input/output profile is best, PulseAudio defaults to digital (S/PDIF) output for emu10k1-based sound cards in Fedora 11. This includes many Sound Blaster Live! sound cards, and several others. For many users this will result in the card apparently not working - you will hear nothing when playing back sound. This is because most users use analog rather than digital connections for their speakers or headphones. To switch to analog output, install the pavucontrol package, and run the program (you can run pavucontrol directly, or look in the system menus under Sound & Video for PulseAudio Volume Control). Go to the Configuration tab, and in the drop-down menu for the affected sound card, change to the 'Output Analog Stereo + Input Analog Mono' option. This should cause sound playback to work correctly. The PulseAudio developers are currently working on an update to fix this issue, which should be available shortly after Fedora 11 is released.

Some fingerprint readers do not work with non-zero bytes in cmd response error

link to this item - Bugzilla: #500460

Some fingerprint reader models (including at least the ones in some Thinkpad T43 laptop models) will fail to work at all in Fedora 11. If you run an application which attempts to use the fingerprint reader from a console, the following error messages are observed:

upekts:warning [__handle_incoming_msg] non-zero bytes in cmd response: fb ff

There is no known simple workaround for this issue, but the bug report contains a patch for libfprint which advanced users could use to re-compile libfprint and resolve the problem. An official update including the fix should be made available after Fedora 11 is released.

Software issues

Update notification doesn't disappear

link to this item - Bugzilla: #492005

After updating using PackageKit, the updates notice may reappear even when there are no package updates left to receive. The maintainer is aware of the issue and we expect to resolve it soon.

A test build that should resolve this problem is available from Koji: gnome-packagekit-2.27.2-0.1056.20090527git.fc11. If you are affected by this issue, please test this update and report your results to the bug report.

References

• Common kernel problems