ubuntu 100% CPU usage 3 out of 4 computers

jc_anthro · 05-19-2009, 08:24 PM

OK, this is giving me the willies. Three of my four computers have an issue with constant 100% or near cpu usage, which makes them virtually impossible to use.

The affected computers are:

IBM thinkpad P3 (M) running Jaunty (1 meg ram)
Toshiba sattellite P4 running Hardy (1 meg ram)
Asus eeepc running easy peasy (hardy) (1 meg ram)
my Dell running hardy and with roughly the same software set as all my other computers (and I don't run anything weird) sits on around 3-4%. None of the computers is maxing on ram usage or swaps.

Looking at a range of other threads out there and the bug track there is a persistent pattern of this problem, but I haven't seen an effective solution. I think there is a general view that it is a kernel problem or something in gnome (but easy peasy is not gnome so that doesn't really follow).

I've tried using a cpu limiter but that just kills everything (suggesting the CPU hog processes are a symptom not a cause).

Can anybody out there help me? Please......

stress_junkie · 05-19-2009, 08:50 PM

First, I hope that you have more than 1 megabyte of RAM in each computer. You should try to be accurate when you are describing a problem. 1 MB?

Try booting without the network attached. Make sure that the wireless NIC in each is also not trying to attach to a network. There should be a switch on the outside of each computer to turn off the wireless NIC.

syg00 · 05-19-2009, 09:01 PM

And what are the major CPU consumers ???.

jc_anthro · 05-19-2009, 10:07 PM

Sorry yes that is 1 gig of ram on each.

The main culprits seem to be xorg gnome monitor and FF. More so xorg. If I limit xorg, the whole things goes downhill rapidly.

Yes it does help if I boot with no network access, but only for a little while and then it flatlines at 100 again.

For some reason the Toshiba doesn't seem as badly affected, but the IBM is unusable at this point.

I am currently downloading xubuntu and I might try that to see if the problem is gnome related.

I do note that there are quite a few CPU/ lag/ bug threads out there similar to this, so I do feel that maybe it's not something specific that I'm doing, although it is strange the 3/4 of my comps are affected.

It may be software related, but the only non standard software packages i use are freemind and openproj, and these aren't even running when this happening.

Help appreciated

syg00 · 05-19-2009, 10:29 PM

I was in a similar thread recently. Odd, because I run several Ubuntu systems, and don't see this. But then I wouldn't even think of running gnome-monitor.
F/F is a pig - always has been. Better these days, but still a pig. I see issues when it has problems loading a page - X usage will go up (not 100%) until the page is interrupted. Worse as the tab count increases.
X will be a symptom in all likelihood, not the problem - it will be doing the bidding of those wanting to display candy.