System Crashing - not new but more information - just looking for ideas

[LuigiCalamar]

Update: I've since crashed a couple times but haven't been able to SSH in to check what is going on... just the power-off reboot option to get back... nothing new in the logs. Will keep trying to capture what is going on... and will follow up once I do.

[LuigiCalamar]

UPDATE: _ mis-posted this as I had typed the command incorrectly - so very sorry.

NOTE: tried this command via ssh - but the option 'eo' doesn't seem to work?

ps -eo pid,ppid,stat,%cpu,%mem,comm --sort=-%cpu | head -30

[oshunluvr]

For whatever it's worth, that command works fine here - I copied and pasted it into a terminal

[LuigiCalamar]

So Sorry - I'd thought I had deleted that message... I had a mis-type and didn't think I'd sent that reply

[LuigiCalamar]

Still crashing and X11 in lieu of Wayland doesn't seem to be a factor (still crashes on X11).

Other than that 1 time - I can't SSH into it either... can't ping it... just dead.

I'm trying to stay observant as to what may be going on... I've noticed that most of the time I am getting heavy cpu usage from Plex Commercial Skipper.... when it runs my whole system is pretty bogged down and it seems that is when it crashes.

I'm trying to stay out of FIrefox as much as I can but I'm leaning toward it not being just 1 thing... but rather too many things running.... so I'm trying to 'test' quitting Firefox and any other heavy users...

My last crash I was using Firefox to do some things in Plex... (update libraries) and when that started taking over (90+% CPU) - then things crashed HARD... but again - I could only 'see' that because I was also using firefox at that time.

[die.boer]

Warning: AI GENERATED

That makes Plex Commercial Skipper an interesting suspect, particularly because you've noticed the crashes occurring when its CPU usage gets very high.

I'd try to isolate that workload first. Temporarily disable Commercial Skipper or the associated background processing and see whether the machine remains stable under otherwise normal use. If possible, change only that one thing at a time so the result is meaningful.

A process using 90% CPU shouldn't normally make an i7 system with 32 GB RAM completely unreachable. It could, however, expose a thermal, power, kernel or hardware problem.

Since the PC can't normally be pinged or reached over SSH during a crash, I'd also check the previous boot's kernel log after restarting:

journalctl -b -1 -k -p warning

The earlier i915_hpd_poll_init_work and output_poll_execute warnings are still worth investigating, but the fact that X11 makes no difference means we shouldn't focus exclusively on Wayland.

I'd also check CPU temperatures under load and see whether the BIOS/UEFI has any relevant firmware updates.

The most useful next result would be whether the machine remains stable with Commercial Skipper's background processing disabled. That would help establish whether its workload is triggering the problem or whether we're looking at a more general system instability.

[LuigiCalamar]

I've changed some of my transcoding settings in Plex and also some of the post-procesing options (reducing workloads)... I also 'moved' my protonmail webui from Firefox to their app... (that in itself has greatly reduced the load of Firefox).

... all these things seem to be helping - as it hasn't crashed in a while.

I run a temp sensor (psensor) - and yes - things do get pretty hot when things are crashing... that seems to be an indicator it is about to crash.

[Snowhog]

I don't see if it was asked, but is this a desktop PC or a laptop?

[LuigiCalamar]

It is a desktop.


Operating System: Kubuntu 26.04 LTS
KDE Plasma Version: 6.6.6
KDE Frameworks Version: 6.24.0
Qt Version: 6.10.2
Kernel Version: 7.0.0-31-generic (64-bit)
Graphics Platform: Wayland
Processors: 16 × 13th Gen Intel® Core™ i7-13620H
Memory: 32 GiB of RAM (31.1 GiB usable)
Graphics Processor: Intel® Graphics
Manufacturer: GMKtec
Product Name: NucBox K7 PLUS
System Version: V1.0

[LuigiCalamar]

After almost a week of not crashing I've crashed twice in the last day... just doesn't seem to be anything consistent.

That said - I do believe I am hitting some pretty high temps and that 'may' be leading to the crashing.

The issue I'm having - is - when it crashes I'm NOT able to ssh in to look around. AND - to bring the system back I have to do a hard unplug and reboot... but once I'm able to get terminal access to look at logs - most of the logs are full of startup rows.

Is there a way I can look for or 'trap' for a high temperature causing this? There is no question that I'm seeing high temps when I'm doing heavy processing... usually with Firefox and Plex (background services such as transcoding, commercial skipping, etal)... are running. so while I may be having issues related to high usage - I am thinking the high usage IS leading to a high temp causing a system crash

Of note: I have a 4tb SSD card for all my Plex data... and that card really gets hot... (I do have a heat sync)...