XPS 13 / Ubuntu 15.04 Freezes with Caps Lock Blnking

My XPS-13 does the same thing. I've had it for about 24 hours now and it's done this about 3 times. Complete system hang, with caps lock light blinking. Totally unresponsive - can't use ctrl-alt-Fn to go to a different terminal, nothing. The only thing to do is hold down the power button for several seconds to force a shutdown, then reboot it.

Dunno why it's doing this, but it is frustrating. I run Linux to get away from this kind of system crashes.

My system is  Ubuntu 14.04 with kernel 3.19. Even on this kernel the keyboard still occasionally repeats keys. The trackpad & keyboard are better than 3.13, but far from perfect.

After using this laptop extensively for the past 24 hours I suspect these hangs are related to the touchpad. These hangs happen only when I'm using the touchpad - they have not happened while I'm connected to my big monitor & external keyboard & mouse.

Is there an update on this issue or a known work around? I saw someone mention changing to hibernate on lid close instead of sleep, but was unable to figure out how to do that. Tweak tool didn't have the option, or I couldn't find it. Currently running 15.04 on a XPS13 2015 with A03 BIOS.

Same problem here (XPS 13 DE, BIOS A.03). I wanted to upgrade from 14.04 to 15.04 via 14.10 and during dist-upgrade I got a message that the system couldn't install the newer Kernel version and a little bit later in the process I received the message that my system now might be in a corrupted state and that a rollback of dist-upgrade is now conducted. After that I rebooted only to get a blinking Caps-Lock key and a dark screen. After some reboots the Grub menu was shown and I could select (under 'Advanced options for Ubuntu') the hitherto 3.13.0.53 Kernel which initially came with 14.04. With this selection I was at least able to boot into Ubuntu again.

My original plan was to freshly install 15.04 via a USB pendrive (15.04 64bit ISO downloaded and installed on pendrive via startup disk creator) but shortly after booting from this pendrive I received and "Installation failed" window with the message: "The installation encountered an unrecoverable error. A desktop session will now be run so that you may investigate the problem."

However, the desktop session never showed up but instead I received a blank screen. So how do I install 15.04? I'm not getting it all. Installed Ubuntu any many machines in recent time and I never encountered these problems.

I'm feeling so disappointed right now ... :(

Mine has had no problems with suspend & wake. Correction: I am seeing it with suspend.

This complete system hang happens intermittently, mainly under 2 conditions:

1. Changing / selecting wireless. Sometimes when I change from one wireless to another by selecting it on the notification bar, the entire system hangs.

2. Suspending or waking from suspend. The hang can happen in either case.

In both cases, it happens intermittently - not every time, but frequently - about 25% of the time.

Itt's a hard hang - Ctrl-Alt-F1 etc. does not bring up terminals. The only option is to force shut down with the power key.

My system is Ubuntu 14.04 with kernel 3.19.0-18

Bionicman303 - Follow online instructions on how to create a bootable Ubuntu/Kubunutu/Xubuntu 15.04 USB live disk.  Boot to it and select install option and follow the process.

BTW - Where is Dell on these issues?  Why doesn't Dell respond and resolve an issue that seems to be common to all  XPS 13 DEs sold.

The silence is disheartening!!!

I am seeing most of my problems associated with logging out of X and not so much wireless or trackpad.  Hangs are 100% recreated by doing a sudo reboot and can be often created by logging out of X.

Having this issue as well. It seems to happen when the laptop is asleep too. I had put it to sleep and put it in my bag, but sometime over the next hour it woke up in my bag. When I took it out it was blazing hot and had a blank screen and blinking caps lock key. 

I'm on 15.04 and kernel 3.19.0-15 after much customizing and no real problems ... except for this issue (Caps lock blinking -- kernel panic).

It occurs occasionally when waking from sleep (perhaps 10%), and more frequently when changing to a different WiFi SSID.

I usually install TLP power management on Ubuntu laptops by default.  Removing TLP made the kernel panic issue A LOT better -- I was getting it 2 or 3 times a day while it was installed. Even after removing TLP, I still have the occasional freeze with blinking caps, screen on, laptop running hot with fan.

There is a way to reboot from a kernel panic on Linux without shutting down, and it works sometimes (but not always) on my XPS 13:

Alt-PrtScr-R-E-I-S-U-B

Hold all of these keys in order, and press them slowly, and the computer should do a soft reboot.

More info here.

Hopefully Dell will address this issue soon!

JR

I have the same Issue with Ubuntu 14.04 an Kernel 3.19

I got the Problem most time when I put the xps to sleep.

CAPS LOCK blinking is an indicator that the Linux kernel has entered "panicked" mode.  I have read elsewhere that there seems to be a problem with the latest Intel chipset drivers that have been causing kernel panics on other people's systems as well.  I can't be sure that this is the same root cause, but it makes sense.

Also, has anyone run into a kernel panic after upgrading to the A04 BIOS that was just released?

I have not experienced a kernel panic since my BIOS upgrade, but I didn't run into them that often before either...

I have had the same issue too, in 15.04, kernel 3.19, bios A3. 

It has happened coming back from sleep and switching wifi networks.

Would be nice to hear from dell to see that they are at least aware of the issue..

<< Since A04, I still get key repeats just like on A03. Not a lot, but often enough to be annoying. >>

Interesting, I don't get key repeats at all on A04..and if I recall correctly, your set up and mine are pretty close.

<< Since A04, bluetooth still doesn't work after waking from suspend. I've tried turning it off and back on (from the GUI and from RFkill) doesn't fix it. Once suspended, Bluetooth doesn't work again until rebooted. >>

I haven't been using bluetooth at all, so I don't know what the relative working state is.  I will have to keep an eye out for this in the future.

<< Since A04, I still get very occasional/infrequent trackpad jumping, just like on A03. Less frequent than keyboard dups, not really bad at all. >>

I had this after upgrading the BIOS as well.  If you download and apply the .deb backports that dell released for the 3.13 kernel (stickied at the top of this forum), it resolved the trackpad issues for me again.

<< Since A04, the CPU is occasionally stuck in slow (500 MHz) mode after waking from sleep, but not every time. Easy to fix - plug in power for a moment. >>

I haven't run into this myself yet, but I have heard that if you plug into power, it locks the CPU into max clock rate rather than restoring Intel Speed Step functionality.  Is this the case for you?

<< Also, has anyone run into a kernel panic after upgrading to the A04 BIOS that was just released? >>

YES

After updating to BIOS A04 I have gotten the kernel panic when selecting a different wifi connection.

Since A04, I have not gotten it (kernel panic) on suspend or wake.

Since A04, I still get key repeats just like on A03. Not a lot, but often enough to be annoying.

Since A04, bluetooth still doesn't work after waking from suspend. I've tried turning it off and back on (from the GUI and from RFkill) doesn't fix it. Once suspended, Bluetooth doesn't work again until rebooted.

Since A04, I still get very occasional/infrequent trackpad jumping, just like on A03. Less frequent than keyboard dups, not really bad at all.

Since A04, the CPU is occasionally stuck in slow (500 MHz) mode after waking from sleep, but not every time. Easy to fix - plug in power for a moment.

Still having kernel panics here. I am starting to think its related to some X applications. If I close everything, and put the XPS to sleep, it does not panic. It can be asleep for hours and wake up perfectly. If I suspend the XPS with applications running, it very often kernel panics (blinking CAPS) immediately after I close the lid.I initially thought it was Chrome, but its panicing with other applications open as well (FireFox, Evolution)