computer freezes up
 

Hi-

my pc freezes up when i am in linux. it gets so bad
i can't even get to a terminal to kill a process.

i read something very recently where another user said
in linux to never hit the power switch on your pc.
i admit i may have done that. i know to use kill and
top now. i just may have been a little impatient.

is it worse to push the on/off switch in linux?
could that be why?

i will reinstall this weekend.

i am enjoying linux. the new SUSE book is really good.
pan newsreader and evolution are cool.

thanks,
jim

Hi Jim,
You should ensure you shutdown properly in both windows and Linux, otherwise certain files (generally system level ones) may not be fully written and synced, and drives may be left in a "dirty" unsynchronised state compared with information cache in memory. Short answer - unless your power management setup allows linux (or windows) to handle the power button then don't use that, and definitely don't turn off via a rocker switch. Use the computer shutdown options.

Now as for freezing, do you know if you can get to a Virtual Terminal? X can freeze up, but there are other ways with linux even if the GUI has completely given up the ghost. Ctrl-alt-f1 should give you a fullscreen terminal to log into to kill processes. I rather like using ps -ef with grep to find processes by name, and then pkill to zap them (pkill will kill all processes matching a search term with a given signal). When top shows processor activity is at a sane level, you can switch back to the GUI with ctrl-alt-f7. You might want to use "exit" or ctrl-d to log out of the terminal session before switching back to gui though.

Pan and Evolution are pretty cool, I am inclined to agree. There is plenty with linux to play with and learn - that is one of the reasons I tinker with it so much.

Danny

if your keyboard is frozen there is still ways to get into your system if you use a router and your suse is in network. simply remote into this machine and perform necessary process checking.

a simplle way is of course to hold the power key till it's off if nothing worked. make sure it can boot back otherwise reinstall and pay me a cup of coffee while you are waiting : )

re: compter freezing up
 

hi shshjun & danny-

those are really good suggestions.
i am not on a network but that is a cool idea.

this kind of information is definitely worth
printing off and putting with my reference materials.

now that i bought a laser printer instead of an inkjet,
i can print all sorts of neat things without the
expense and hassle.

the fact that linux has an option available on a total freeze
up is impressive.

the computer seems to work much better now.
in the event it acts up again, i will be ready.

thanks very much and have a great weekend,
jim

With Suse, every once in while it is good to type init 1 at a command prompt, and once in runlevel 1, do:

ldconfig && SuSEconfig

Also, if you have a bad shutdown, boot the machine and shut down right away before it freezes so you can't shut down. That fixes everything screwed up by a bad shut down.

Emergency Reboot - Raising Skinny Elephants Is Utterly Boring

"Raising Skinny Elephants Is Utterly Boring" is a mnemonic device for remembering a keystroke sequence that should be used as an alternative to hitting the power button if a linux system should ever "hang" and need to be rebooted.

1. Alt + SysRq + R -- takes the keyboard out of raw mode
2. Alt + SysRq + S -- synchronizes the disk
3. Alt + SysRq + E -- terminates all processes (Except init)
4. Alt + SysRq + I -- kills all processes (Except init)
5. Alt + SysRq + U -- remounts all filesystems read-only
6. Alt + SysRq + B -- reboots the machine
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_SysRq_key

Check out other good links in my signature.

Sepero - Nice one there. I knew about Alt+SysRq+t and +1, but not the rest. That wikipedia page is going up on my wall beside my regexp cheat-sheet. Just goes to show, even someone who has been doing this for 10 or so years still has a lot to learn.

Awesome machine - I really don't think doing that as you suggest is a good idea. Booting the machine and shutting down right away may leave files hanging, cached and messed up - not a good plan either. In fact I would go as far as wandering if that was a joke post...

If you are doing work on a machine (be it Win, Lin, Mac or anything else) ensure you are saving your work often. If you have very big files open, or have made a lot of writes to a disk, it cannot hurt to open a console and run "sync" every now and again to flush the drive caches.

Danny

re: computer freezes up
 

hi danny and sepero-

i am trying to accelerate my reading a bit. i will become an ok user of linux. some people may think it is funny right now but i am serious about aquiring basic linux skills. my goal is to become comfortable enough in the use of SUSE so i can do basic scripting in linux and if things go well maybe java. so i am kind of serious (this time).

thanks for the additional tips. i'll print those off as well.

thanks,
jim
-----------------------
website: 3rdshiftcoder.com

One of the main causes for "freezing up" is if your machine is overheated. What kinds of system temps are you seeing? (Normal temps should be in the 40's C or thereabouts, and if you are consistently running over about 55C or 60C it's running hot) Check your fans, especially the CPU fan.

Alternatively you may have RAM going bad. Have you run memtest to confirm that it doesn't have isses?

JW, makes a good point. mtdew3q, does you system run perfectly fine with another OS?

Also, see this thread:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...d.php?t=536089

sep

re: computer freezes up
 

hi-

Sepero and J.W. -

it's not the ram and overheating but thanks as it could have been.
it is the video driver. thanks for that link. SIS 760 is not a good display driver for linux. there are some steps i can take like adjust the refresh rate and or the resolution. i will try this for a few days and see what happens. i think fixing the display settings will really help.

i see lines and distortions which support that theory.

thanks so much for the excellent help!

thanks again,
jim