Oh No! Something Has Gone Wrong – How to Fix GNOME Desktop Error in Linux
If you’re a Linux user running Ubuntu, Fedora, or Debian, you may have come across a scary screen that says.
“Oh no! Something has gone wrong. A problem has occurred, and the system can’t recover. Please contact a system administrator.
This error usually appears when the GNOME desktop environment crashes and cannot load properly. Don’t worry — in most cases, this issue can be fixed with a few troubleshooting steps. In this guide, we’ll explain why this error happens and how you can solve it.
Why Does This Error Appear?
The “Oh no! Something has gone wrong” screen is triggered when the GNOME shell or display manager (GDM/LightDM) fails to start correctly. Common reasons include:
Step-by-Step Fixes
Press Ctrl + Alt + F3 together.
- This will switch you from the graphical screen to a text-based console.
If it works, you’ll see a login prompt like:
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS TNS tty3
TNS login:
Enter your username and password there.
If you can log in, that means your system is running, but the graphical interface might have crashed or failed to load.
Step 1 – Check system status
Run this command to see if everything looks fine or if there are errors:
sudo systemctl status
Step 2 – Check the graphical interface (display manager)
Run this command to see if your GUI is active:
sudo systemctl status gdm
or if you’re using another display manager, try:
sudo systemctl status lightdm
or
sudo systemctl status sddm
Step 3 – Check disk space
Sometimes issues occur if your drive is full. Run:
df -h
Look for the line with / and see if it’s near 100%.
Step 4 – Update and fix broken packages
Run the following commands one by one:
This will update your system and fix any broken dependencies.
sudo apt update
sudo apt upgrade -y
sudo apt --fix-broken install
Step 5 – Restart the graphical interface
Once you’ve checked the status and fixed packages, restart the display manager. For example, if you have gdm:
sudo systemctl restart gdm
For lightdm:
sudo systemctl restart lightdm
Then switch back to the graphical interface by pressing Ctrl + Alt + F2 or Ctrl + Alt + F1, depending on your setup.
Let’s carefully diagnose this.
Step 1 – See which services failed
Run this command to list only the failed services:
systemctl --failed
This will show you which services are not working.
Step 2 – Check the details of a failed service
Once you identify which service(s) failed, select one and review its details. For example, if it’s gdm.service, run:
sudo systemctl status gdm.service
Or replace gdm with the service name you see failed.
Step 3 – Check logs for more clues
You can check the logs with:
journalctl -xe
This shows recent errors and warnings.
Or, if you want to look specifically at the display manager (for example, gdm), run:
journalctl -u gdm.service
Again, replace gdm with the name of the service that failed.
Let’s follow a few more steps to understand what’s going on.
Step 1 – Check what display manager is running
Run this command to see if any display manager is active:
ps -e | grep -E "gdm|lightdm|sddm|xdm"
This will list any of the common display managers if they are running.
Step 2 – Check if the graphical target is active
systemctl get-default
This will tell us if the system is booting into the graphical mode or not. If it shows multi-user.target, it’s booting in text mode.
If you want to switch it to graphical mode, run:
sudo systemctl set-default graphical.target
sudo systemctl reboot
Let’s first see what it shows before rebooting.
Step 3 – If you want to try starting the GUI manually
startx
Now, let’s proceed to diagnose the graphics/display problem.
Step 1 – Check graphics-related errors
dmesg | grep -i "error\|fail\|gpu\|drm"
Step 2 – Try starting the GUI manually
startx
Step 3 – Check connected displays
xrandr
This will tell us if your monitor is being detected by the system.
Now let’s move step-by-step.
Step 1 – Try switching to Wayland or Xorg manually
GDM sometimes defaults to Wayland, which may not be working due to graphics driver issues.
Let’s force it to use Xorg.
1. Edit the GDM configuration file:
sudo nano /etc/gdm3/custom.conf
2. Look for the line:
#WaylandEnable=false
If it’s commented (with #), remove the # to uncomment it:
WaylandEnable=false
3. Save the file:
- Press Ctrl + O, Enter to save
- Press Ctrl + X to exit
4. Restart GDM:
sudo systemctl restart gdm
Step 2 – Check graphics drivers
Run this to check which GPU is installed:
lspci | grep -i "vga\|3d\|2d"
This will tell us if it’s Intel, NVIDIA, AMD, or something else
Step 3 – If necessary, install or reinstall drivers
Depending on your hardware, we can:
Install
xserver-xorg-video-intelfor Intel graphics.Install
nvidia-driver-###for NVIDIA cards.Install
xserver-xorg-video-amdgpufor AMD cards.
Try starting the GUI manually
Let’s attempt once more to start the GUI and see detailed error messages:
startx
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