Well, there could be some (critical or less critical) HW problem too, but at also the SW seems to be unable to handle it.
I compiled a 3.2.3 kernel and installed the 290.10. The same story as before:
startx, then slow start, can't get beyond the initial blank screen and a mouse cursor, the CPU loaded so that the machine is unresponsive. Somehow still managed to stop the X with Ctrl-C and this is what I saw in the log:
Code:
[ 2450.319] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (2, 6, 0x8000, 0x0000c6dc, 0x0000c94c)
[ 2459.678] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 6, 0x8000, 0x0000f1e0, 0x0000f1e0)
[ 2462.679] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 6, 0x8000, 0x0000f3bc, 0x0000f3bc)
[ 2465.681] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 6, 0x8000, 0x0000f4c4, 0x0000f4c4)
[ 2468.683] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 6, 0x8000, 0x0000f5cc, 0x0000f5cc)
[ 2471.685] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 7, 0x8000, 0x0000f624, 0x0000f624)
[ 2474.686] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 7, 0x8000, 0x0000fb64, 0x0000fb64)
[ 2477.687] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (0, 7, 0x8000, 0x0000045c, 0x0000045c)
[ 2480.688] (WW) NVIDIA(0): WAIT (2, 7, 0x8000, 0x00000518, 0x00000984)
[ 2484.103] [mi] EQ overflowing. The server is probably stuck in an infinite loop.
[ 2484.103]
Backtrace:
[ 2484.116] 0: /usr/bin/X11/X (xorg_backtrace+0x37) [0x80a7ec7]
[ 2484.116] 1: /usr/bin/X11/X (mieqEnqueue+0x1d1) [0x80a21b1]
[ 2484.116] 2: /usr/bin/X11/X (xf86PostMotionEventM+0xb0) [0x80c8fc0]
[ 2484.116] 3: /usr/bin/X11/X (xf86PostMotionEventP+0x6f) [0x80c910f]
[ 2484.116] 4: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/evdev_drv.so (0xb44f3000+0x2cfe) [0xb44f5cfe]
[ 2484.116] 5: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/input/evdev_drv.so (0xb44f3000+0x3e1d) [0xb44f6e1d]
[ 2484.116] 6: /usr/bin/X11/X (0x8048000+0x6dee1) [0x80b5ee1]
[ 2484.116] 7: /usr/bin/X11/X (0x8048000+0x1281c2) [0x81701c2]
[ 2484.116] 8: (vdso) (__kernel_sigreturn+0x0) [0xb779d400]
[ 2484.116] 9: /usr/lib/xorg/modules/drivers/nvidia_drv.so (0xb4ae2000+0x5f646) [0xb4b41646]
See also the Xorg log in the attached bug report.
Could someone from Nvidia look at this ?