2

first of all, this is my first question on this site or anywhere for that mater, so excuse any mistakes or the lack of info I might provide, I'll try my best:).

I have recently installed a program on my windows 10 from some torrent, I was stupid enough not to have checked if the uploader was trustworthy, but tho program worked fine. I have a dualboot, windows 10 and Ubuntu 18.04 LTS, each OS installed on a separate HDD. After restarting the computer the Ubuntu won't start and just would get stuck on boot, displaying a bunch of lines picture.

after restarting once again into Windows, it would boot fine, however some windows fonts disappeared. here is an example of one of the effects of the program. i would post other images, but right now the problem is gone, even though it was still here when I turned on the PC. I am unable to see any fonts in settings and most of windows programs, and i tried everything. I did a clean install of windows twice, but the problem persisted. i then installed a winfilefolder.exe, which fixed the problem, but it hen reappeared after two days. I also updated graphic card drivers, which also fixed the issue, but not for long. no antivirus I downloaded was able to detect any threats (bit defender, ESET, malwarebytes), not even in the safe mode. windows works fine in safe mode.

this affects Ubuntu, as it gets stuck on boot most of the times, but when it does boot, it freezes after 15 minutes of use. I tried bootfix, which didn't work, I have two bootable DVDs one with ubuntu 17.10 and the other with 18.04 LTS. when I boot 17.10, it works fine, but the 18.04 only shows black screen if I opt for either installing ubuntu (which would enable me to reinstall) or just the live option. i can boot normally into ubuntu if I go into recovery mode and choose continue to boot option, but the performance is reduced, and some apps as well as some functions don't work (as some drivers don't load is my guess). If I take the HDD with Ubuntu to another PC and load it there it works just fine.

Each time I run ubuntu it gives me the following error:

radeon 0000:03:00.0: couldn't schedule ib

My last option is to create a bootable DVD of windows 10 and another for DBAN, wipe the disk, update Bios and install Windows 10 again.

so is it possible that the program somehow infected my Bios, or is it just limited to my windows 10 HDD, and I should just completely wipe it and reinstall windows 10?

15
  • What are the bunch of lines?
    – gekepdp
    May 12, 2020 at 7:18
  • "so is it possible that the program somehow infected my Bios, or is it just limited to my windows 10 HDD, and I should just completely wipe it and reinstall windows 10? " how are we supposed to answer this? Nothing here has any relation to Ubuntu. " If I take the HDD with Ubuntu to another PC and load it there it works just fine. " proving Ubuntu is not the issue. You are better off asking this on a windows forum.
    – Rinzwind
    May 12, 2020 at 7:37
  • 1
    @gekepdp I inserted a picture. May 12, 2020 at 8:00
  • 2
    For Windows 10: To check if the program you are installing can be trusted or won't effect your Windows OS. Install it in Windows Sandbox. What is Sandbox? Ans: >Windows Sandbox is a new feature available beginning with the Windows 10 May 2019 Update (version 1903) designed to run untrusted applications inside a lightweight isolated environment running independently from your main installation. Every time you launch the feature, it runs a new clean installation of Windows 10. when you close sandbox everything inside it disappears saved files and Installed Programs it's completely isolated
    – Ahwar
    May 12, 2020 at 8:04
  • 1
    You never mentioned windows defender which is actually very capable. Also, you can use Ubuntu to scan Windows for viruses. If the virus is somehow hiding from the antivirus on Windows while it's running, it shouldn't be able to hide from an external scan from Ubuntu.
    – mchid
    May 12, 2020 at 10:08

2 Answers 2

5

That screen you see is the kernel output and is completely normal. You can press ESC or one of the F keys to see this screen during boot so you can see errors if there are problems. However, I see no errors. Everything says "OK" so all is good.

All you have to do is press CTRL+ALT+F1 or CTRL+ALT+F2 to get back to your normal display screen.

If that fails, you should be able to log into a text only TTY screen with your username and password by pressing CTRL+ALT+F3 or any of the other CTRL+ALT+ F keys up to F8. From there, you can perform updates, check error logs, and run commands.

The last line does say something about livepatch, and this is just a guess, but if you recently updated your kernel and you manually or incorrectly installed your graphics driver, that may be the issue.

Run the following commands to correctly install (or possibly reinstall) any needed graphics drivers:

sudo apt update
sudo apt full-upgrade
sudo ubuntu-drivers autoinstall

Reboot to apply the changes.


Also, you can try restarting the display manager by running the following command:

sudo systemctl restart gdm

Additionally, you can also try using a different display manager as GDM is known to not boot sometimes. Run the following to install lightdm:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install lightdm

Use the arrow keys to select lightdm and then press TAB and then press ENTER.

Then, use the following commands to start lightdm:

sudo systemctl stop gdm
sudo systemctl start lightdm

If it doesn't automatically take you to the login screen, press CTRL+ALT+F7 to switch to your normal display managed screen.

Also, if you want to set your display manager back to GDM, run the following command:

sudo dpkg-reconfigure lightdm

Use the arrow keys to select GDM3 and then press TAB and then press ENTER.


Now, viruses from Windows typically can't affect Ubuntu although it could be possible and data corruption might be an issue. However, I would be more thinking that your GPU might be the problem if you are having graphics issues. A quick check revealed that FL doesn't really use that much GPU and some people say that viruses can cause hardware damage but all the security experts say that hardware damage is nearly impossible and rarely, if ever, happens. So it may just be a coincidence if you recently updated your kernel and didn't update your graphics drivers or it could be something else.

0

You ask a number of questions and have a number of issues. Yes, it is perfectly possible for Windows to change BIOS. There are legitimate programs, often from BIOS producers to update BIOS settings. So, of course, any other untoward program can do the same. I always keep a written record of my BIOS settings and a log of any changes I undertake. There are very recent reports(May 2020 and before) of some Windows updates causing some of the problems you are having - missing fonts etc. It sounds like your attempts to re-install Windows has also involved installing recent updates, so going round in circles with the same error. The Ubuntu issues you are having seem to be unrelated to your Windows issues. However, I suspect if your BIOS settings have changed Ubuntu is not expecting this as it will have set itself up based upon the BIOS settings at the time (I think) I would start 100% afresh. Check whether your BIOS is the latest version and if not flash it to the latest. I would then download the very latest Windows Media and install this onto a newly formatted hard disk. Once all is done and put right, I would repeat the process with a fresh download of Ubuntu 20.04 LTS and install again on a freshly reformatted hard disk. Good luck.

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .