According to German technology news website Heise, news is emerging on discussion and support forums of graphics problems when updating from Ubuntu 13.04 to the latest version – Ubuntu 13.10. Users are reporting graphics problems in the form of a black screen. The problem most affects systems with AMD graphics cards if the proprietary AMD driver (fglrx) is used. However, additional package sources can also cause problems.
Anyone wishing to update their current Ubuntu 13.04 installation to the latest 13.10 version, should first check whether they are using proprietary graphics drivers and uninstall them if necessary. This can be done in the System/Software & Updates settings under the “Additional Drivers” tab. Uncheck the Nvidia or AMD driver respectively there and pick the X.Org-X-Server driver instead and then reboot.
Some reports of problems also indicate that there can be problems with the update if individual components of the graphics stack don’t originate from the standard Ubuntu repositories. If you have included PPAs such as Xorg-edgers with the latest X.org code or Ubuntu Unity with the current developer version of the Unity desktop, you should remove these repositories with the ppa-purge tool, which can be installed from the software centre. A reboot before the upgrade is also recommended here to check that everything is working.