My keyboard sometimes lags or completely misses keypresses, mainly during startup and for a few minutes afterward. I first noticed it while using Linux Mint with Cinnamon and suspected a software issue because reinstalling Mint with XFCE made the problem disappear temporarily. After about three days, the lag returned, although it currently seems limited mostly to startup. My previous Cinnamon installation also showed a USB driver error while shutting down, but I no longer have the exact message. What could be causing this, and how can I determine whether it is a USB, kernel, driver, or hardware problem?
1 Answer
Since a reinstall only fixed it temporarily, I’d compare the behavior with another keyboard and, if possible, a different USB port. Also check the system logs around startup with commands such as `journalctl -b` and `dmesg` for USB, HID, input, or kernel errors. Testing from a live Linux session or another kernel can help separate a desktop configuration problem from a driver or hardware issue. If the lag only happens during startup, a service or USB power-management setting may be delaying input rather than XFCE itself being the cause.
I’m using XFCE mainly because it’s lightweight. At the moment the keyboard works normally after startup, and the problem only appears briefly when the system first comes up, though it may become more frequent over time.