I have a very similar problem on my Laptop running Xubuntu too. So no VMWare. Just normal Xubuntu running directly on the laptop.
After updating to kernel 4.2.0.30, my laptop would still start to the login screen. Everything seemed to be working fine on the login screen. Even remote access via ssh was still possible. But almost everything you can try to do on the login screen freezes the system. Trying to login. -> Freezes as soon as the login screen has disappeared. Trying to reboot. -> Freezes Trying to switch to tty1 -> Freezes Trying to reboot by typing "reboot" on an ssh-shell -> Logs me out from the shell and freezes the system. At first I had suspected the graphics drivers as I have the oibaf-ppa with current mesa-drivers installed. But selecting kernel 4.2.0.27 from grub solved the problem for me. -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Kernel Packages, which is subscribed to linux in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1548587 Title: Ubuntu 15.10 VMWare guest won't show UI after upgrading to 4.2.0-30 Status in linux package in Ubuntu: In Progress Status in linux source package in Wily: In Progress Bug description: I installed a fresh copy of Ubuntu 15.10 64-bit as a guest VM in VMWare Workstation 12.1.0. After installation, I am able to log into the system. I then ran the updater application to install the latest updates. After installing the updates and restarting, the system no longer shows any UI after booting. I am now faced with a black screen and a dash that does not blink. The system also does not respond to any inputs. I was able to get back into my system by holding shift to show the GRUB menu and boot using the 4.2.16 kernel. To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/1548587/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~kernel-packages Post to : kernel-packages@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~kernel-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp