Ubuntu 13.10 x64 cannot shut down properly, pressing esc stuck at purple screen

Question

Don't think this is a replicated question. Ubuntu 13.10 x64 cannot shut down properly, pressing esc stuck at purple screen:

Broadcast message from root@ubuntu-laptop
(unknown) at 19:51 ...

The system is going to power off NOW!
Shutting down SmartLink Modem driver normally
Unloading modem driver from kernel ... none found.
speech-dispatcher disabled: edit /etc/default/speech-dispatcher
 * asking all remaining processes to terminate ... [OK]
 * killing all remaining processes ... [fail]
modem-manager[662]: <info> Caught signal 15, shutting down [OK]

 * deactivating swap...
mount: / is busy
 * will now halt

And it hangs there and doesn't shut down. Please help and please tell me if more info needed!

Answer 1

It looks like you have some kind of process writing to your disk (/). Try to figure out which processes are running with the command command:

top

Then lookup the PID of that process. Then kill that process with

kill PID

if that dont work

sudo kill PID

Example:

 top
 11555 yourname     20   0 1105m 159m  18m S   2,0  2,0   0:30.38 chrome            
 11871 yourname     20   0  409m  36m  23m S   1,3  0,5   0:54.75 plugin-containe   
 6787  yourname     20   0 1412m  20m 8348 S   1,0  0,3   0:26.00 nautilus          

quit command:

 q 
 kill 6787

or

 sudo kill 6787

And Nautilus gets killed.

Answer 2

This seems to be a resolution (although it's not as intended):

shutdown -h now