I want to leave my system up and running all or most of the time. Sometimes it crashes or just shuts down overnight or during the day when I'm not using it. I'm not really sure what happens; it never happens when I'm on the system using it. Usually it occurs after a day or so of uptime.

Where can I look for clues as to what caused the system to shut down or crash? For example, which log files should I look at, and where do I find them? Is there any other information recorded during a crash that would be helpful?

I'm running Slackware 10.2, and the system is an AMD64 3200 on an Abit KV8-MAX3 motherboard.

i hope a the /var/log/messages and dmesg helps.

I can't see anything in /var/log/messages or dmesg that gives me a clue.

Help!!! It did it again. My Linux system is not stable. There must be something I can do, but I don't know what.

Any chance you have it set up to go to sleep / hybernate or standby. I have had desktops not do well because of the bios. Just a thought because it doesn't happen when you use it.

As far as I can tell, no. I guess you configure that in KDE? I have a screen saver set that kicks in after 10 minutes. The screen locks in 5 and requires a password to unlock, but I'm not telling it to hibernate anywhere that I can see. Where would I find that setting?

I'm using run level 3 and I typically have two user's with KDE sessions that I switch between.

well if there's a problem regarding power (i.e; no electricity) then i think it won't show up in those logs else as far as i know it should. you can also do a more /var/log/syslog or where ever your syslog resides to see whats happening with your machine. did you actually found your machine in a crashed state? if so what was the error messages? maybe your bios is tuned to do stand by or shutdown to preserve power. anyway's you can make yourself stay up whole night once just to watch what's really happening?

I am having a similar problem. Mine crashes when left unattended and often while I am using it. There are only two sure ways for me to crash it. Let it sit idle for a while or use imgSeek and tell it to add files to the database. Any other crashes seem to have no rhyme or reason.

I am using Mandrake 10.2 on a Chaintech? M7NCD Ultra mb with a AMD Barton 2500 processor. I am kind of suspect of the board because it is so cheap.

I have looked at dmesg, syslog, and messages but I do not really know much.

dmesg has this message:

NFORCE2: IDE controller at PCI slot 0000:00:09.0
NFORCE2: chipset revision 162
NFORCE2: not 100% native mode: will probe irqs later
NFORCE2: BIOS didn't set cable bits correctly. Enabling workaround.
NFORCE2: BIOS didn't set cable bits correctly. Enabling workaround.
NFORCE2: 0000:00:09.0 (rev a2) UDMA133 controller

does it mean anything?


syslog has this:

Mar 11 15:23:11 localhost xfs[5305]: ignoring font path element /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/drakfont/Type1 (unreadable)
Mar 11 15:23:11 localhost xfs[5305]: ignoring font path element /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/drakfont/ttf (unreadable)
Mar 11 15:23:11 localhost xfs[5305]: ignoring font path element /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi:unscaled (unreadable)

and

Mar 11 14:23:42 localhost kernel: smb_lookup: find photos/.directory failed, error=-13
Mar 11 14:23:42 localhost kernel: smb_lookup: find photos/.directory failed, error=-13
Mar 11 14:23:43 localhost kernel: smb_lookup: find photos01/.directory failed, error=-13
Mar 11 14:23:43 localhost kernel: smb_lookup: find photos01/.directory failed, error=-13
Mar 11 14:23:43 localhost last message repeated 2 times
Mar 11 14:26:18 localhost kernel: end_request: I/O error, dev fd0, sector 0
Mar 11 14:26:29 localhost last message repeated 9 times

I do not know what this means? It might be related to ImgSeek loading files into its database.

In the BIOS the only power saving features I am using is going to a blank screen. I am not powering down any disk drives or such.

Redskins82,
why don't u note down the err msgs that comes up at your system crash. that could help to diagnose and correct the problem.