cpu race when starting mozilla or firefox
 

I have a peculiar issue. When I run a 2.6.x kernel and start mozilla, the cpu starts going into hyper drive. Mozilla and firefox do eventually load and work, but the cpu stays under a full load and the performance is so slow I might as well be on a 386 and not a 2GHz machine.

This is for a debian (testing) install and has been an issue for a while.

Here's where it gets interesting. I don't have this issue when running a 2.4.x kernel. Unfortunately I recently upgraded my testing version and support for 2.4.x kernels has been dropped.

I get the same problem whether I'm using the vesa driver or the via driver in X. With or without DRI. Mozilla and firefox (iceape/iceweasel) are the only apps I have this issue with. I had originally thought it was an X / DRI issue, since this is the only unichrome box in the household. I don't seem to have this issue on any other debian box so I'm at a loss to fix it. Maybe related, but armagetron doesn't seem to run under 2.6.x but did under 2.4.x. But it doesn't hog cpu cycles in the process. And it doesn't matter if glxinfo says direct rendering is enabled in both kernel types.

I'm in the process of grabbing the openchrome drivers to see if that helps. But there may be something odd in my custom kernel config that's causing this. Any insights, or known fixes?

Hi Shadow.

So your using debian testing? What version of debian testing? (Debian Etch stable is finally out, and I've tried it). Also, what version of Firefox are you using? 2.6 generally is more stable and is more secure than a 2.4 kernel is. It could be either your custom built kernel has an error or bug in it, or it could be a bug in your Debian testing. I would recommend upgrading to Debian Etch stable and see if the problem persists, and if it does, contact the Debian community about it and see what they tell you to do. Best of Luck.

LinuxGuru2.

I'm using testing as in my /etc/apt/sources.list is:

deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian testing main contrib non-free

Which was the only entry until I added the ones for openchrome. It was up to date as of this(6/5/07) morning. I'm on dialup, so jumping around between distro releases is not a viable option. As it is, it has taken me nearly a week to get up to date on the 300MB's of updates pending over the past six to twelve months.

This problem has persisted over many kernel versions and updates for the past year or more. To include 2.6.15.5, 2.6.18, 2.6.19.2, 2.6.20.1, 2.6.21.3. With the same end result being normal behavior under 2.4, and abnormal under 2.6. Although only mozilla, and firefox show these symptoms. They do ultimately work, but the cpu useage is such that it's far from diserable to use them. Strace shows some repetitive futex( stuff during the long pauses between clicking and bring up the browser. With equally long pauses while trying to get the browser to do anything.

Unfortunately I need firefox or mozilla so my mom can play her java applet based web games. lynx, links, w3m, and elinks isn't gonna cut it for that. Any help would be appreciated.

Ok, now I fully understand why you can't update easily. When I used Firefox on Windows, it did the same thing to me. I use Ubuntu 7.04 Feisty Fawn and don't use Firefox due to the memory useage and CPU useage problems. Seamonkey though never gave me problems with memory or CPU usage though, on Windows and Linux, but I can't get a Debian or Ubuntu package for it yet. Do you use KDE or GNOME as your desktop environment? If you have KDE installed, you can use Konqueror (which I use). The only thing is, I don't know if you have Java installed globally (in /usr) or just for Firefox. If you have it installed globally, you can access it through any browser you install on your system. As I said before, I use Konqueror and Java, and have very little problems with it. If you don't think you have Java installed globally, let me know and I'll find you the Debian package I used to install it on my Ubuntu system. Another good browser to try is Epiphany Web Browser, which is based on Mozilla, but doesn't use as much CPU or memory. Any other questions, let me know.

LinuxGuru2.

This is no longer an issue. I got tired of spending so much time troubleshooting that I whiped and did a fresh install. Where it's not longer an issue.

It was odd that it didn't have the issue with a 2.4.x kernel, but did with a 2.6.x kernel. And whether I used the via or openchrome DRI drivers, the issue persisted. For now I'm on a fresh knoppix install with a 2.6.21.3 kernel and the default via driver. And so far mozilla and firefox behave themselves.

yes.this is a problem with iceweasel even latest version 2.0.0.4 :(
I am now dating with epiphany a moderate web browser based on gecko.even there is a lite version for mozilla gecko browser called kazehakase.
i am fed up with iceweasel in many ways-famous one being the flash plugin and alsa-oss crashing.(/etc/iceweasel/iceweaselrc=ICEWEASEL_DSP="aoss")
:(