[ltp] Re: Periodic freeze

[Elias Oltmanns]

(2012-07-03) John Magolske <listmail@b79.net> wrote:
[...]
> I just did an `aptitude upgrade` & rebooted my machine into a
> framebuffer console, have yet to start up X. I'm now typing away in
> Vim & using Mutt, and am seeing the same infernal freezing behaviour.
> Could Xorg be responsible for these problems, even though X is not
> running?

I have had occasion to observe sluggish responses too. (Un)fortunately,
I can't reliably reproduce this state of affairs. One thing I noticed,
though, is that top showed decidedly odd signs of activity. With no home
work on my account, the box said it was something like 80% idle (or even
less). Mind you, this is with no X server running at the time, or
anything else worth mentioning for that matter. Instead, one or two of
those kworker threads seemed to be anxious to make an eager impression.
Since this happens only every once in a while on my machine (x200s) and
I have to read up on domesticating those kworker threads first, I'm not
sure I'll get to the heart of the matter too soon.

> The Nvidia & nouveau drivers don't apply in my case:
> 
> % lspci | grep Graphics
> 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07)
> 00:02.1 Display controller: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 07)

Same here.

> 
> Also, after an `aptitude upgrade` last week I've begun to hear
> periodic ~500ms gaps in audio while listening to music. In the past
> I've *never* heard the audio skip. Not sure if this is related to the
> display freeze-ups...who knows.

This, too, is something I have observed here. By the way, it is my vague
impression that this only happened after I upgraded to 3.2.21 or
something thereabouts. But I did not really do extensive tests to verify
that it does not happen on 3.2.14, for example, yet.

Can you see anything suspicious in top when you experience those freezes
on a supposedly idle machine?

Regards,

Elias