[Bug 1167008] [NEW] Should warn users with non-PAE systems that Ubuntu has dropped support for their computers

[Sam Thursfield]

Public bug reported:

I upgraded my Thinkpad T40 system from Precise to Quantal yesterday.
It's quite a long-running Ubuntu install so I got various prompts from
dpkg about replacing config files etc., and one curious error that
linux-image-3.5.0-generic failed to install. After upgrading, 'apt-get'
was broken, suggesting I ran 'apt-get install -f' which proceeded to
fail to install linux-image-3.50-generic again. I noticed an error
message hidden amongst apt's output to the effect that the kernel cannot
be installed on my non-PAE hardware.

I would not have run the dist-upgrade in the first place, had I known
that in the long-term Quantal and future releases will not work on my
computer in any case (it still has the 3.2.0 kernel for now, but I don't
think that using an unsupported kernel is viable in the long term). It
would be great if update-manager could warn when it detects non-PAE
hardware to avoid others wasting an evening as I just have.

The only hint of dropping support in the release notes is the following
line:

    Transitioning of the i386 generic-pae flavor to become the generic
flavor offering

I had no idea what PAE was until today, so this isn't enough in itself.

Release: Precise Pangolin
Hardware: IBM Thinkpad T40

** Affects: update-manager (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New


** Tags: dist-upgrade

** Tags added: dist-upgrade

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1167008

Title:
  Should warn users with non-PAE systems that Ubuntu has dropped support
  for their computers

Status in “update-manager” package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  I upgraded my Thinkpad T40 system from Precise to Quantal yesterday.
  It's quite a long-running Ubuntu install so I got various prompts from
  dpkg about replacing config files etc., and one curious error that
  linux-image-3.5.0-generic failed to install. After upgrading, 'apt-
  get' was broken, suggesting I ran 'apt-get install -f' which proceeded
  to fail to install linux-image-3.50-generic again. I noticed an error
  message hidden amongst apt's output to the effect that the kernel
  cannot be installed on my non-PAE hardware.

  I would not have run the dist-upgrade in the first place, had I known
  that in the long-term Quantal and future releases will not work on my
  computer in any case (it still has the 3.2.0 kernel for now, but I
  don't think that using an unsupported kernel is viable in the long
  term). It would be great if update-manager could warn when it detects
  non-PAE hardware to avoid others wasting an evening as I just have.

  The only hint of dropping support in the release notes is the
  following line:

      Transitioning of the i386 generic-pae flavor to become the generic
  flavor offering

  I had no idea what PAE was until today, so this isn't enough in
  itself.

  Release: Precise Pangolin
  Hardware: IBM Thinkpad T40

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