Ubuntu – Ubuntu 16.04 shut down goes to log screen (always after suspend)

Forcing hibernate to power off the machine:

After looking around a long time for an answer to this that actually addressed the issue (not related ones), I found a tip here which got the job done for me:

Create a file in the pm config directory:

sudo vim /etc/pm/config.d/hibernate_mode

that sets the variable HIBERNATE_MODE like so:

HIBERNATE_MODE="shutdown"

After doing this, hibernate powered down the machine on completion like expected. An explanation for what setting HIBERNATE_MODE does is in the manual for pm-hibernate:

Default method to power down the system when hibernating. If not set, the system will use the kernel default as a default value. Check /sys/power/disk for valid values. The default value will be surrounded by [square brackets].

My default in that file was platform. Setting the variable above to shutdown overrides this, and gets what we want happening.

Related information and tips for getting hibernate to work correctly:

As for those "related issues" everyone seems to have with hibernating, quick debugging tips:

1. Check that the command sudo pm-hibernate actually does something. If not, none of these other tips will make any difference. If it doesn't work, ensure 1) the size of your swap partition is greater than that of your RAM and 2) secure boot is disabled in your BIOS.

2. Only once that command works, look at integrating hibernate into your system as you please. A couple of common ones:

   • Add hibernate to the Ubuntu menu: This seems to be the best answer to me. Official documentation also has a slightly different version.
     Note: once hibernate is added to the Ubuntu menu, you may also need to fix the alternative call to sudo systemctl hibernate. Apparently, (at least for Ubuntu 16.04) the Ubuntu menu option calls sudo systemctl hibernate instead of sudo pm-hibernate. systemctl hibernate was fixed for me by adding the following content to file /etc/systemd/sleep.conf:

     [Sleep]
     HibernateMode=shutdown

     If the file doesn't exists yet, you can create it. More info here.

   • Change the behaviour of the power button (by default it displays in interactive menu): To change it to directly hibernate, or shutdown you need to modify the associated gsettings entry. A lot of other answers go through the GUI way if that floats your boat. To see the available options use gsettings range org.gnome.settings-daemon.plugins.power button-power

What is the BIOS version you guys are running on your Lenovo machines? I think this may be related to a BIOS update in mid 2015. My G50-45 has the problem with this BIOS version, and it happens with kernels 3.18, 4.4, an 4.7 basically everything.

$ inxi -Fxz | grep Bios
Bios: LENOVO v: A2CN38WW(V2.06) date: 07/15/2015