So now I ran without Desktop Effects for ~24hrs and got a crash that didn't lock up the PC. Xorg.0.log didn't show anything interesting but kern.log had some good info which I'll attach. Next step I'll try the mainline kernel as suggested. Should I just download the *.deb files or could I add a line to sources.list - and if the latter what should it look like? (apt sometimes is a bit confusing to me).
** Attachment added: "kern.log" http://launchpadlibrarian.net/49260782/kern.log.txt -- [865g] X locks up solid with HD thrashing https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/585734 You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs