Re: FVWM: Intermittent lockups

From: Michael White <michael12_at_mindspring.com>
Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 20:31:34 -0500

All,

I think I may have found the problem, although I can't confirm it. When
poking around inside my PC case to install a drive, I noticed that the power
cable to the motherboard wasn't plugged in completely. I slight jostle would
(and did) disconnect it. I fixed this a week ago, and the lockup hasn't
happened since.

I'll try Dominik's suggestions if the lockup occurs again.

Thanks.

-- 
Michael White         "To protect people from the effects of folly is to
                       fill the world with fools." -Herbert Spencer, 1891
On Tuesday 26 October 2004 03:33 am, Dominik Vogt wrote:
> On Sun, Oct 24, 2004 at 07:47:00PM -0500, Michael White wrote:
> > I don't know if this is an FVWM problem, or somewhere else.  But since it
> > only seems to impact the GUI, I thought I'd try here first.
> >
> > My system: AMD64FX51, 1 GB RAM, 80 GB HD, NVIDIA video card, Mandrake 9.2
> > (official) for AMD64, fvwm 2.5.9.  fvwm 2.5.9 was re-compiled for 64 bit.
>
> Note that I don't have access to a 64 bit machine.  Therefore it
> is very difficult for me to identify and fix bugs that occur on
> such machines.  Some 64 bit bugs are fixed in 2.5.12, but there is
> at least one report that there are still problems.  In general,
> such problems affect the communication between fvwm, its modules
> and the X server.
>
> First of all you should upgrade to 2.5.12 and check if the problem
> persists.  If it does, read on.
>
> > The symptom:  Everything seems to be humming along fine, when suddenly my
> > interaction with Mozilla stops working.  At this point, the only thing
> > that responds is the mouse and the "Num Lock" key (causes the LED to
> > toggle).  The Caps Lock key does not cause the LED to toggle.  I am
> > unable to activate any window or pulldown menu.  I am unable to affect
> > any window in any way.  There is no window selected as the active window,
> > and I am unable to select any window as the active window (I use
> > "FocusFollowsMouse").
> >
> > I am able to telnet into this machine.  A "top" indicates 98.9% idle, and
> > only "X" is using the CPU.
>
> This looks as if some application took control of the pointer or
> the whole X server (in the latter case, no application would be
> able to produce any output).  Try killing all applications from
> the console ("pstree" for a list).  If the problem still does not
> go away, it must be either fvwm or the X server.
>
> > I am able to kill off applications (Mozilla, kmail),
> > but there is no change in the "X" display.  No errors or messages are
> > present in /var/log/messages that are out of the normal.
> >
> > On my one attempt to issue a "reboot" command from the telnet session,
> > the command did not complete.  I issued a second command, which caused
> > the PC to reset immediately (i.e. unclean shutdown).
>
> I can not think of any way how the X server or fvwm could prevent
> a reboot.  That sounds like a much more severe problem.
>
> > This has just started happening in the last few weeks, but I don't think
> > anything I messed with caused this (could be wrong though).  The fourth
> > occurrence was today.  I mucked around with a bunch of DVD player stuff
> > two weeks ago, but I don't -think- I overwrote anything that would cause
> > this. If I did, I would expect to seem something in /var/log/messages.
> >
> > Any suggestions or pointers anyone?  Or advice on what to dig for next
> > time it happens?
>
> Another cause might be the graphics driver.  Do you use the
> drivers written by NVIDIA?  They are known to cause lock-ups and
> crashes.  Try the latest drivers or the drivers built into the X
> server.  On the other hand, if it's the video card, the pointer
> should not be moving.
>
> Ciao
>
> Dominik ^_^  ^_^
>
>  --
> Dominik Vogt, dominik.vogt_at_gmx.de
--
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Received on Sun Oct 31 2004 - 19:28:01 GMT