X server crashes within 15 minutes of booting

logicalfuzz · 03-01-2011, 12:38 AM

Less than 2 days ago i upgraded from slackware 13.0 to 13.1.
Since then, I have not been able to use my laptop for more than 15-20 minutes, 'coz the KDE screen freezes all of a sudden without any crash report and in some time the screen goes blank with just a mouse pointer to be seen (Black Screen of Death?)

I can do a CTRL-ALT-F* to switch to a console a continue, or reboot (using console) to get the X server started again. (CTRL-ALT-Backspace does not work either).

Can someone help we with resolving this?
Would be happy to provide command outputs if required.

edit: i've seen this on both KDE and XFCE

lazardo · 03-01-2011, 12:57 AM

Reboot in to runlevel 3 by adding a '3' at the end of the boot command. This will prevent X-anything from starting. If you still crash in 15 minutes, you have some piece of hardware going bad. Could even be a dead fan.

If you do last for more than 15 minutes, then maybe something got missed during the upgrade. Try comparing '/var/log/removed_packages/*-upgraded-*' to '/var/log/packages/*' and look for what's missing.

Cheers,

logicalfuzz · 03-01-2011, 03:04 AM

Thanks Lazardo.
I am not sure if rebooting in runlevel 3 would help, because, even when X has crashed, i can do a CTRL-ALT-F4 (without reboot), login to the console, and keep working without X. I have tried to look into /var/log/messages and /var/log/xorg but could not find anything that could corelate to the problem (dont remember the correct xorg logfile name.. not near my slackware now)

I will look into the second part and report here.

repo · 03-01-2011, 03:15 AM

Perhaps some power settings, which start after 15 minutes?

Kind regards

logicalfuzz · 03-01-2011, 11:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lazardo

If you do last for more than 15 minutes, then maybe something got missed during the upgrade. Try comparing '/var/log/removed_packages/*-upgraded-*' to '/var/log/packages/*' and look for what's missing.

After a line by line compare of *-upgrade-* packages with /var/log/packages/ files, nothing seems to have missed
Is there a log entry we can refer to find clues?

lazardo · 03-02-2011, 01:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by logicalfuzz

After a line by line compare of *-upgrade-* packages with /var/log/packages/ files, nothing seems to have missed
Is there a log entry we can refer to find clues?

All clues can be found in /var/log. Since you already looked at Xorg.0.log and messages, debug and syslog are next. An easy way to find each crash/restart point is to search for 'syslogd' in messages. The time stamp will mark when the system rebooted.

The other thing I would do is to force reinstall the KDE packages. Crashes based on a time duration like yours are usually running out of a resource (like memory), a hardware component heating up and/or failing (CPU, graphics card) or some system event measured from boot time.

That's why I suggested booting in to runlevel3 from cold boot and play around there until you make it past the magic point.

Cheers

logicalfuzz · 03-03-2011, 12:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by lazardo

All clues can be found in /var/log. Since you already looked at Xorg.0.log and messages, debug and syslog are next. An easy way to find each crash/restart point is to search for 'syslogd' in messages. The time stamp will mark when the system rebooted.

I see numerous messages like these just before the reboot time in /var/log/syslog:

Code:

Mar  3 00:24:31 slackhome kernel: [drm:i915_hangcheck_elapsed] *ERROR* Hangcheck timer elapsed... GPU hung
Mar  3 00:24:31 slackhome kernel: [drm:i915_do_wait_request] *ERROR* i915_do_wait_request returns -5 (awaiting 92547 at 90759)
Mar  3 00:24:31 slackhome kernel: render error detected, EIR: 0x00000000

Quote:

Originally Posted by lazardo

The other thing I would do is to force reinstall the KDE packages. Crashes based on a time duration like yours are usually running out of a resource (like memory), a hardware component heating up and/or failing (CPU, graphics card) or some system event measured from boot time.

That's why I suggested booting in to runlevel3 from cold boot and play around there until you make it past the magic point.

Cheers

Well there is no strict interval after which X stops responding.. on an average, its usually 15 minutes.. more if i am lucky.
Nevertheless, i will reinstall slackware on my system to see if that helps.
BTW i ran a live CD of Sabayon today just for the kicks.. the X never crashed during 1.5 hours i was using it. I am hoping a reinstall helps.

logicalfuzz · 03-05-2011, 11:51 PM

I reinstalled slackware on my system.. Also tried a different distro.. made no difference.
Its got to be a hardware issue.

Ramurd · 03-07-2011, 02:35 AM

Either that or your graphical driver has an issue; Since you get messages like "GPU hung" it's either a problem with your graphical card or the driver is acting bad. Try to either upgrade or downgrade your graphical driver and see if that makes any difference.

Alien Bob · 03-07-2011, 04:04 AM

I had this too for a while. Your description fits exactly with what I experienced.
It happened on my Lenovo T400 laptop with an Intel onboard graphics, and only running KDE.
I have seen the "GPU hung" message once.

Only, for me this never happened in Slackware 13.1... only when I upgraded to a version of X.Org and KDE that went into slackware-current months ago.
I finally got rid of it by upgrading to the very latest slackware-current which has a newer kernel, and X.Org server.
And since I am running KDE 4.6 which I suspected of trggering it, I also I disabled the "blur" effect in the advanced section of the compositing effects of the Window Manager (the "blur" effect seems to be responsible for most of the compositing issues in KDE since 4.5 was released).

Eric