[Mageia-dev] Strange system stalls - neep a tip

Mon May 21 20:10:23 CEST 2012

On Mon, 2012-05-21 at 19:50 +0200, David Sjölin wrote:
+> On Mon, May 21, 2012 at 7:33 PM, AL13N <alien at rmail.be> wrote:
+> > perhaps check the logs (/var/log/messages) for information regarding those
+> > downtimes.
+> >
+> > see if the ping also delays
+> >
+> > perhaps try to monitor something via ssh or in tty, to see if it's only
+> > the graphic card.
+> >
+> > also, check ntpd settings, do they make big jumps?
+> >
+> > etc...
+> >
+> >
+> > in short: logging is always the key.
+> >
+> >> Hello All -
+> >>
+> >> I am experiencing a strange problem with a specific machine running
+> >> Cauldron.  I am beginning to believe it is NOT a Mageia problem because
+> >> when I boot into Ubuntu 12.04 the problem exists as well.  I think it
+> >> may be hardware related but I can not find what is causing this issue.
+> >>
+> >> The machine is an Acer Aspire x3900 with a quad core ‎AMD Phenom(tm) II
+> >> X4 925 Processor - 6GB memory.  GeForce GT215 (GeForce 320) card. I am
+> >> running the x86_64 version of Cauldron.
+> >>
+> >> The problem occurs under both KDE and Gnome
+> >>
+> >> Basically, the system seems to freeze up (mouse moves) but nothing else
+> >> - gkrellem freezes and no errors occur - it just seems to hang - but
+> >> magically wake up again after some time (many seconds at a time)
+> >>
+> >> I have checked various logs and can not find any problems - so I am
+> >> stumped how to find the source of the problem.  I leave the machine
+> >> running 24x7, but don't think it is a thermal issue.
+> >>
+> >> When the system runs under Windows 7 (64bit) it appears to run fine.
+> >>
+> >> Any hints what I could check?
+> >>
+> 
+> Hello!
+> 
+> If you want to log cpuusage to see if some process has extra high cpu
+> usage during this freeze you could do something like:
+> 
+> while true; do date >> testfilen.txt ; top -b -n1 >> testfilen.txt ;
+> sleep 1; done
+> 
+> Then you will get top-output every second (sleep 1) or whatever time
+> you specify for sleep. I think there is a way to do this with top
+> only, without the delay but not sure which flags to use then (possibly
+> top -d 1 -b)
+> 
+> The file testfilen.txt will of course grow quite large after a while,
+> so you can't keep this running 24/7 maybe, but maybe you could clear
+> out the file regularly until you get the error situation again and
+> then based on the date output you should be able to find cpu usage
+> around the time of the problem.
+> 
+> Regards,
+> 
+> David
+
+Thanks for the quick responses.  I checked the cpu usage, but there
+doesn't appear to be a spike - and the load average in htop is real low:
+
+load average: 0.46, 0.67, 0.56
+
+so if the X server or something else was maxing out the cpu, I'd see
+that. 
+
+Also, if I use a console in KDE (like yakuake) - the stalls happen in
+there as well.  At first I though this was Firefox related (like flash
+problem or something) because it was most noticeable when I surfed -
+firefox freezes off and on and it is really frustrating.
+
+This machine was working fine for at least a year - and I was suspecting
+something with the latest kernels and the AMD processor - but have no
+evidence.
+
+The search continues . . .
+
+Thanks again,
+R.Fox
+
+
+
+