Random freezes in KDE4

[eamner]

Hello. I already posted this in the Hardy forum but couldn't get a solution. Now I have Intrepid (and still having the same problem).
My system completely freezes randomly since I upgraded to the first KDE4. I never experienced this with KDE3. It's a complete hard-freeze (no mouse, no numlock leds...). Nothing works. It happens at any time. It may be right after startup, or 3 hours later... It may not happen in the whole night or it may happen 3 or 4 times..... I may be doing nothing, or running any application... It's just random.
Another important thing is that after a few minutes (5, 10...) it comes alive again. And while it is frozen, the cpu works like crazy. I leave the "system monitor" running, and the graphics are normal, but after the freeze, I can see how the cpu graphics go to the top and slowly come to normality again.
At first I thought it could be a problem with swap memory, but when I run "free", I see I have 1.2gb of swap (but "0" used). I'm not sure if this is normal. I have 2gb of ram and a P4 proccesor (and an Intel motherboard, and a Nvidia geforce 7300GT card with 177.8 nvidia driver).
Please help me, I've had this problem since the first KDE4, and still have it (now I'm with 4.1.2). I have kubuntu 8.10 with the latest kernel update.

[dibl]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Open a Konsole window and run

top

and put it in a corner of your screen where you can keep an eye on it. When your system "freezes", it is important to be able to see which process is using all the CPU resources.

[eamner]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

dibl:
Thanks for your answer. I'll check that tonight (I'm at work now). I just hope it does happen, because I never know when it's going to happen... I have tried to do that a couple times, but for some reason could never catch it when it happens...
I'll keep you posted.

[eamner]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Hello. It did happen last night.
I didn't see anything unnusual in "top". The upper proccess was "marble" (I had just installed this program and was testing it), and the other processes where Kwin, Xorg, firefox, and others that I don't remember (I didn't have chance to copy them because it only lasted around 4-5 minutes).
Is there some log that I could copy and paste here? or some other information that I could provide?
By the way, I also upgraded to KDE 4.1.4 last night (after the freeze), though I don't have much hope that it will solve the problem.

[dibl]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

I didn't see anything unnusual in "top".

That doesn't sound right! The process at the top of the list should have been using 100% of the CPU, or some combination of the top processes should have been using 100% of the CPU. If that was not the case, then the freeze is not caused by the operating system or software applications. Maybe there's something going on with the hardware. Do you have any other OS that you can run on that hardware? How about booting a Live CD (some other OS -- Mepis, sidux, E-live, whatever, there are many choices).

[HavocXphere]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

My first reaction would be a failed delayed write on the hard disk. Whats the harddrive light on your box doing during the freeze? But I suppose then it would also happen under kde3.

Try to time it next time. See if the time till its resurrects is consistent. If it is, then something is timing out.

[dibl]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

My first reaction would be a failed delayed write on the hard disk.

Indeed, a slowly failing hard drive could possibly cause such an apparent freeze of the system. The last FAQ on the link in my signature has a link to the procedure for testing a hard drive.

[eamner]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Well, there's something else I forgot to mention. I have a dual boot machine, and 2 Hard disks (1 for each system). In the SATA disk (80GB) I have XP and in the IDE disk (30 GB) I have kubuntu.
When I checked the processes in "top", the upper procceses' cpu load was around 4% for the first one, 3% for the second, and so on for the others. But I guess these numbers where about half a second before the freeze... and right after it came back, the numbers where normal again. But if I check the graphs in "system monitor" I can see how the cpu load works like crazy during the freeze (and I can hear the fan coolers speeding up), but right after it, the graphs come back to normality (and the fans slow down).
Perhaps the 100% cpu load occured DURING the freeze (with not enough time to update the information on screen), and maybe that's why I couldn't see it in "top".
This problem never occurs in XP. Only in kubuntu and ONLY after I installed KDE4. Never happened with KDE3. And I haven't changed any hardware since then.
One more thing: I have installed the nvidia 177.82 driver, but the problem also happened before installing the driver.

[dibl]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Hmmmmm. It is probably a phenomenon of the new X.org in 8.10. But, in that case, "top" should show "xorg" using 100% of the CPU during the "freeze". It also strikes me, now that you explained your 2-drive setup, that Win XP would not be running on the IDE disk, so it would never know if that drive were failing. I think the problem is a video thing, since it didn't happen with KDE 3.5, but we haven't really ruled out the hard drive, unfortunately.

One thing you could try, after backing up your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file, would be to configure a VESA display, and see if the system runs fault-free in that mode. I haven't done that since the new X.org came out, so I'm a little at a loss to explain how to do it. Possibly just booting Recovery Console, and choosing "Fix X" would do that, but the other possibility is a manual edit of the xorg.conf file. Sorry I can't be real specific -- perhaps Ubuntu Forum has a post on that topic.

My last thought is, Nvidia driver 180.22 has fixed a number of problems with KDE 4. That is another avenue that might fix this.

[eamner]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Hmmmmm. It is probably a phenomenon of the new X.org in 8.10. But, in that case, "top" should show "xorg" using 100% of the CPU during the "freeze". It also strikes me, now that you explained your 2-drive setup, that Win XP would not be running on the IDE disk, so it would never know if that drive were failing. I think the problem is a video thing, since it didn't happen with KDE 3.5, but we haven't really ruled out the hard drive, unfortunately.

One thing you could try, after backing up your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file, would be to configure a VESA display, and see if the system runs fault-free in that mode. I haven't done that since the new X.org came out, so I'm a little at a loss to explain how to do it. Possibly just booting Recovery Console, and choosing "Fix X" would do that, but the other possibility is a manual edit of the xorg.conf file. Sorry I can't be real specific -- perhaps Ubuntu Forum has a post on that topic.

My last thought is, Nvidia driver 180.22 has fixed a number of problems with KDE 4. That is another avenue that might fix this.

As for the new xorg in 8.10, I must tell you that this also happened when I had 8.04. In fact I installed KD4 with 8.04 (using the "remix" cd). Before that, I had kubuntu 6.06 (with kde3), which never gave me problems.
Talking about XP, I can't even see the ide HD from XP... but I can see the sata disk from kubuntu... anyway I'm not an expert about this... but in fact, my main disk is the ide, from which I load grub. Well, kubuntu configured this... I'm not an expert on linux installations as you can see. I just had my windows hard disk first, and later I installed the ide disk and there I installed kubuntu, which made all the configurations.
I have in fact, a couple times, modified the xorg.conf, specially after some upgrades, which have corrupted my video configuration, and I have fixed it by entering in Recovery mode and choosing "fix it". But if I do this, my video performance goes to hell -specially with opengl apps- and I've had to re-install the nvidia driver.
Anyway I've been thinking about installing the 180.22 driver. I think I'll try that.
And if that doesn't work, I'll have to wait until 4.2 comes out and see what happens (I'm not brave enough to try the beta).
And if that doesn't work... I guess I still have a Windows partition....

[eamner]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Updating: Installed the 180.22 drivers. Still same problem.

[dibl]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

My bet is a hardware issue -- not sure which hardware, though.

If it were the OS or some application, it would show up in "top". You say there's nothing showing a big CPU utilization there, so that leaves the hardware ....

:P

[eamner]

Re: Random freezes in KDE4

Dibl:
Sorry to bother you again, but I ran the tests exactly as described in (the link in your signature). I don't fully understand the results, but I see too many "error" messages... and for some reason, the last tests didn't run. Anyway, tell me if this means something to you. Just want to confirm the HD failure posibility as the cause of my "freezes".
(sdb is the HD where I have kubuntu. Sda is the sata disk where I have WinXP. So I ran the tests for sdb)

>sudo smartctl -ia /dev/sdb
smartctl version 5.38 [i686-pc-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen
Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Device Model: SAMSUNG SV3063H
Serial Number: 0271J1FNA33510
Firmware Version: PL100-11
User Capacity: 30,616,363,008 bytes
Device is: In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is: 4
ATA Standard is: ATA/ATAPI-4 T13 1153D revision 17
Local Time is: Mon Feb 9 20:07:34 2009 VET

==> WARNING: May need -F samsung or -F samsung2 enabled; see manual for details.

SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status: (0x02) Offline data collection activity
was completed without error.
Auto Offline Data Collection: Disabled.
Self-test execution status: ( 0) The previous self-test routine completed
without error or no self-test has ever
been run.
Total time to complete Offline
data collection: ( 720) seconds.
Offline data collection
capabilities: (0x1b) SMART execute Offline immediate.
Auto Offline data collection on/off support.
Suspend Offline collection upon new
command.
Offline surface scan supported.
Self-test supported.
No Conveyance Self-test supported.
No Selective Self-test supported.
SMART capabilities: (0x0003) Saves SMART data before entering
power-saving mode.
Supports SMART auto save timer.
Error logging capability: (0x01) Error logging supported.
No General Purpose Logging support.
Short self-test routine
recommended polling time: ( 1) minutes.
Extended self-test routine
recommended polling time: ( 12) minutes.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 9
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME FLAG VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x000a 100 100 051 Old_age Always - 1448
4 Start_Stop_Count 0x0032 095 095 000 Old_age Always - 5076
5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct 0x0033 253 253 010 Pre-fail Always - 0
7 Seek_Error_Rate 0x000a 253 253 051 Old_age Always - 0
8 Seek_Time_Performance 0x0024 001 001 000 Old_age Offline - 65535
9 Power_On_Hours 0x0032 098 098 000 Old_age Always - 1664834
12 Power_Cycle_Count 0x0032 097 097 000 Old_age Always - 3720
197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0032 253 253 010 Old_age Always - 0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable 0x0030 253 253 010 Old_age Offline - 0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count 0x000a 200 200 000 Old_age Always - 0
200 Multi_Zone_Error_Rate 0x000a 100 100 051 Old_age Always - 0
201 Soft_Read_Error_Rate 0x000a 100 100 051 Old_age Always - 0

SMART Error Log Version: 1
Warning: ATA error count 10 inconsistent with error log pointer 4

ATA Error Count: 10 (device log contains only the most recent five errors)
CR = Command Register [HEX]
FR = Features Register [HEX]
SC = Sector Count Register [HEX]
SN = Sector Number Register [HEX]
CL = Cylinder Low Register [HEX]
CH = Cylinder High Register [HEX]
DH = Device/Head Register [HEX]
DC = Device Command Register [HEX]
ER = Error register [HEX]
ST = Status register [HEX]
Powered_Up_Time is measured from power on, and printed as
DDd+hh:mm:SS.sss where DD=days, hh=hours, mm=minutes,
SS=sec, and sss=millisec. It "wraps" after 49.710 days.

Error 10 occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 13872 hours (578 days + 0 hours)
When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:
ER ST SC SN CL CH DH
-- -- -- -- -- -- --
00 88 01 00 00 00 e0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:
CR FR SC SN CL CH DH DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- ---------------- --------------------
c6 00 01 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 SET MULTIPLE MODE
91 00 3f 00 00 00 ef 00 00:00:16.000 INITIALIZE DEVICE PARAMETERS [OBS-6]
10 00 00 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 RECALIBRATE [OBS-4]
00 00 3f f2 00 a6 e0 04 00:00:16.000 NOP [Abort queued commands]
c8 00 3f f2 00 a6 e0 00 00:00:16.000 READ DMA

Error 9 occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 13872 hours (578 days + 0 hours)
When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:
ER ST SC SN CL CH DH
-- -- -- -- -- -- --
00 88 01 00 00 00 e0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:
CR FR SC SN CL CH DH DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- ---------------- --------------------
c6 00 01 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 SET MULTIPLE MODE
91 00 3f 00 00 00 ef 00 00:00:16.000 INITIALIZE DEVICE PARAMETERS [OBS-6]
10 00 00 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 RECALIBRATE [OBS-4]
00 00 0f 02 00 00 e0 04 00:00:16.000 NOP [Abort queued commands]
c8 00 0f 02 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 READ DMA

Error 8 occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 13872 hours (578 days + 0 hours)
When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:
ER ST SC SN CL CH DH
-- -- -- -- -- -- --
00 88 01 00 00 00 e0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:
CR FR SC SN CL CH DH DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- ---------------- --------------------
c6 00 01 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 SET MULTIPLE MODE
91 00 3f 00 00 00 ef 00 00:00:16.000 INITIALIZE DEVICE PARAMETERS [OBS-6]
10 00 00 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:16.000 RECALIBRATE [OBS-4]
00 00 01 ff 03 fb e0 04 00:00:16.000 NOP [Abort queued commands]
20 00 01 ff 03 fb e0 00 00:00:15.000 READ SECTOR(S)

Error 7 occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 13872 hours (578 days + 0 hours)
When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:
ER ST SC SN CL CH DH
-- -- -- -- -- -- --
00 88 01 00 00 00 e0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:
CR FR SC SN CL CH DH DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- ---------------- --------------------
c6 00 01 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:15.000 SET MULTIPLE MODE
91 00 3f 00 00 00 ef 00 00:00:15.000 INITIALIZE DEVICE PARAMETERS [OBS-6]
10 00 00 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:15.000 RECALIBRATE [OBS-4]
00 03 45 00 00 00 e0 04 00:00:15.000 NOP [Reserved subcommand]
ef 03 45 00 00 00 e0 00 00:00:15.000 SET FEATURES [Set transfer mode]

Error 6 occurred at disk power-on lifetime: 13872 hours (578 days + 0 hours)
When the command that caused the error occurred, the device was active or idle.

After command completion occurred, registers were:
ER ST SC SN CL CH DH
-- -- -- -- -- -- --
04 80 05 01 aa 00 a0

Commands leading to the command that caused the error were:
CR FR SC SN CL CH DH DC Powered_Up_Time Command/Feature_Name
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- ---------------- --------------------
b0 d5 01 01 4f c2 00 00 00:40:52.000 SMART READ LOG
b0 d1 01 01 4f c2 00 00 00:40:52.000 SMART READ ATTRIBUTE THRESHOLDS [OBS-4]
b0 d0 01 00 4f c2 00 00 00:40:52.000 SMART READ DATA
b0 da 00 00 4f c2 00 00 00:40:52.000 SMART RETURN STATUS
b0 da 00 00 4f c2 00 00 00:40:52.000 SMART RETURN STATUS

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
No self-tests have been logged. [To run self-tests, use: smartctl -t]


Device does not support Selective Self Tests/Logging





sudo smartctl -t short /dev/sdb
smartctl version 5.38 [i686-pc-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen
Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/

=== START OF OFFLINE IMMEDIATE AND SELF-TEST SECTION ===
Sending command: "Execute SMART Short self-test routine immediately in off-line mode".
Drive command "Execute SMART Short self-test routine immediately in off-line mode" successful.
Testing has begun.
Please wait 1 minutes for test to complete.
Test will complete after Mon Feb 9 20:14:23 2009

Use smartctl -X to abort test.

sudo smartctl -l selftest /dev/sdb
smartctl version 5.38 [i686-pc-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen
Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
No self-tests have been logged. [To run self-tests, use: smartctl -t]


sudo smartctl -t long /dev/sdb
smartctl version 5.38 [i686-pc-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen
Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/

=== START OF OFFLINE IMMEDIATE AND SELF-TEST SECTION ===
Sending command: "Execute SMART Extended self-test routine immediately in off-line mode".
Drive command "Execute SMART Extended self-test routine immediately in off-line mode" successful.
Testing has begun.
Please wait 12 minutes for test to complete.
Test will complete after Mon Feb 9 20:33:18 2009


sudo smartctl -l selftest /dev/sdb
[sudo] password for eric:
smartctl version 5.38 [i686-pc-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen
Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
No self-tests have been logged. [To run self-tests, use: smartctl -t]