USB ports unrespnsive after dist-upgrade

Question

I was running apt-get dist-upgrade when my pi froze up. Afterwards, I booted it up and the keyboard and mouse went unresponsive. How do I fix this?

edit: By freeze I mean it locked up. I do not know why it froze. I did not overclock it and it did not overheat. The mouse and keyboard are plugged into a hub. The upgrades did not finish. It became totally unresponsive. Nothing happens when I plug and unplug them.

Answer 1

If your system is corrupted, because of an incomplete upgrade, one definitive but effective solution might be:

• mount your SD card on a computer and back-up your files and settings (if the filesystem is corrupted, you may recover using fsck);
• check the integrity of your medium;
• clone a fresh new OS and reinstall your applications.

This will avoid further unexpected, and difficult to solve, problems. After setting your system in a fashion that suits your needs, do not forget to clone it again. Then next failure, you will spare a lot of time and easily recover from it.

Answer 2

I was going to comment but I can't yet (not enough rep...).

IMO you need to diagnose the problem before you can fix it. I don't think that you have included anywhere near enough info for anyone to give you a proper answer...

Things to ponder:

• When you say 'freeze', what do you mean? Locked up? Kernel panic? Rebooted itself? Became unresponsive to kb/mouse but was still doing stuff?
• Why did your Pi freeze?
• Have you been overclocking?
• Did you board overheat?
• Did the upgrades finish completely before your pi froze?
• How old is your Pi?
• Did the Pi freeze as a result of something that was being upgraded?
• Or was the freeze separate and it caused an upgrade (perhaps to USB drivers?) to be interupted?
• Did your Pi really freeze? (I.e. become totally unresponsive
• Are your mouse & kb plugged into a hub (which has a dodgey cord)?
• What happens when you plug and unplug your mouse & kb?
• Can you SSH in? (If so then there is lots of diagnostics you could try from commandline inc checking logs, checking loaded kernel modules, checking in your apt cache for previous kernel and firmware packages and reinstalling them, etc)