[sclug] System catatonia

[Taiyo Rawle]

--- James Wyper <jrwyper at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

> Hello everyone.
> 
> Every so often, my linux system (Mandrake 10.1;
> 2.6.8 Kernel), which I
> leave running constantly, pretty much stops
> responding.  I think the
> problem is related to disc i/o as while the mouse
> will move in KDE, and
> it still functions as a firewall / router, I can't
> start any new
> programs.  The system always comes back up OK when I
> alt-sysreq-b.

This essentially means that the kernel is still alive.
Can you still run apps from the command line? What
error messages do you get when trying to start new
programs? Sometimes just restarting X solves these
weird KDE-not-responding glitches (Ctrl+Alt+BackSpace
restarts X, in Mandrake at least).

If it's just KDE and the graphical desktop that won't
respond then it's either X or KDE causing problems, or
an X program has crashed and left X or KDE unstable
and/or unresponsive. Can you stil Ctrl+Alt+F2...F6
into a terminal? If so does top report a process
that's hogging all the available CPU power? If there
is such a process, and it keeps hogging CPU, then kill
it with signal 9 and Ctrl+Alt+F7 back into X to see if
KDE responds.

> It's running on 1999 vintage hardware, so this could
> be a hardware
> problem, but - coincidentally or not - it only
> started after I upgraded
> my kernel to 2.6.

Did you upgrade just the kernel or the whole system
from a previous version of Madrake (or another distro)
to mdk10.1? (I'm asking because Mandrake 10.1 came
with kernel 2.6.8.1-12mdk)

> I've looked in /var/log/messages, /var/log/syslog,
> and
> /var/log/kernel/* without finding anything (except
> that /messages stops
> recording anything at the time the machine hangs).

Often, hardware errors manifest themselves as
uberweird stuff turning up in the output of dmesg.

> Is there anywhere else I can look for after-the-fact
> evidence of a
> problem that I can use for diagnosis?  How can I do
> a thorough test of
> my (internal IDE) disk drive?

fsck (or e2fsck for ext2 or ext3 partitions) can do a
fairly thourough check - see man e2fsck.

Hope this helps!
-Taiyo


	
	
		
___________________________________________________________ 
Yahoo! Messenger - NEW crystal clear PC to PC calling worldwide with voicemail http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com