there was a bit of sarcasm there...
I was guessing that it was likely video related...as most things linux have tended to be...
Didn't appear in panic...but would not respond...clock frozen at 2:42 am...right about the time it should have locked screen...
3 finger salute was ineffective (natch)...so it was a hard start...5 seconds on the power.
While I was on it...it appeared to be working fine...though screen refresh seemed much slower than in 10.04..which is why I'm leaning on it having put in sub-optimal vid drivers.
Other possibility is it doesn't like the cycle down of the drives on the usb caddy...so tonight I pull that off and see.