X still locks up

X still locks up

[Gwyn Judd]

Here is an update on the status:

1) I tried installing the Xpmac.rev10 server that someone recommened in
the hope that that would fix the problem. Unfortunately it didn't as
five minutes ago the system locked up yet again. This seems to suggest
it may be kernel related rather than X related.

2) I recompiled my kernel wth the "Magic Sysrq" support in it. This
seems to work more or less as designed. However when the system locked
up as before the "magic sysrq" key did not work at all meaning I had to
reboot without being able to shut down properly. This suggests to me
that the kernel had itself crashed.

3) When I rebooted there was no kernel panic in the logs. This has me
puzzled. I suppose it could have crashed and not had it written out to
disk in time. On the otherhand this has happened before and each time
there is no panic.

--
Gwyn Judd (b.judd@xtra.co.nz)
f u cn rd ths, u r prbbly a lsy spllr.

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Re: X still locks up

[Dan Foster]

Hot Diggety! Gwyn Judd was rumored to have wrote:
>
> Here is an update on the status:
>
> 1) I tried installing the Xpmac.rev10 server that someone recommened in
> the hope that that would fix the problem. Unfortunately it didn't as
> five minutes ago the system locked up yet again. This seems to suggest
> it may be kernel related rather than X related.
>
> 2) I recompiled my kernel wth the "Magic Sysrq" support in it. This
> seems to work more or less as designed. However when the system locked
> up as before the "magic sysrq" key did not work at all meaning I had to
> reboot without being able to shut down properly. This suggests to me
> that the kernel had itself crashed.

Exact same thing on my previously rock solid x86 box - only change was that
I'd just upgraded to XFree86 4.0.1 and kernel 2.2.16, from XFree86 3.3.6 and
kernel 2.2.13.

The behavior is identical - makes me wonder if this was the mmap() bug
that BenH previously mentioned, and if this was a cross-platform issue
not just isolated to PPC?

-Dan

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Re: X still locks up

[Gwyn Judd]

On Thu, Jul 06, 2000 at 11:22:59PM -0400, Dan Foster wrote:
> Hot Diggety! Gwyn Judd was rumored to have wrote:
> >
> > Here is an update on the status:
> >
> > 1) I tried installing the Xpmac.rev10 server that someone recommened in
> > the hope that that would fix the problem. Unfortunately it didn't as
> > five minutes ago the system locked up yet again. This seems to suggest
> > it may be kernel related rather than X related.
> >
> > 2) I recompiled my kernel wth the "Magic Sysrq" support in it. This
> > seems to work more or less as designed. However when the system locked
> > up as before the "magic sysrq" key did not work at all meaning I had to
> > reboot without being able to shut down properly. This suggests to me
> > that the kernel had itself crashed.
>
> Exact same thing on my previously rock solid x86 box - only change was that
> I'd just upgraded to XFree86 4.0.1 and kernel 2.2.16, from XFree86 3.3.6 and
> kernel 2.2.13.
>
> The behavior is identical - makes me wonder if this was the mmap() bug
> that BenH previously mentioned, and if this was a cross-platform issue
> not just isolated to PPC?

Okay so you get it on x86 2.2.16 and XFree 4.01
I get it on powerpc kernel >= 2.2.15 and XFree3.3.6
Any other takers?

--
Gwyn Judd (b.judd@xtra.co.nz)
Be frank and explicit with your lawyer ... it is his business to confuse
the issue afterwards.

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Re: X still locks up

[Michel Lanners]

Hi all,

On   7 Jul, this message from Gwyn Judd echoed through cyberspace:
> 3) When I rebooted there was no kernel panic in the logs. This has me
> puzzled. I suppose it could have crashed and not had it written out to
> disk in time. On the otherhand this has happened before and each time
> there is no panic.

If you want to be sure you get all panic logs, the only way is to get a
serial console. The console is the only device that is guaranteed to get
a panic log, if one is produced. You'd also see it on a (screen) console
if you weren't running X...

There's a doc explaining serial console under the linux/Documentation
directory.

Michel

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Michel Lanners                 |  " Read Philosophy.  Study Art.
23, Rue Paul Henkes            |    Ask Questions.  Make Mistakes.
L-1710 Luxembourg              |
email   mlan@cpu.lu            |
http://www.cpu.lu/~mlan        |                     Learn Always. "


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Re: X still locks up

[Michel Dänzer]

Gwyn Judd wrote:
>
> Here is an update on the status:
>
> 1) I tried installing the Xpmac.rev10 server that someone recommened in
> the hope that that would fix the problem. Unfortunately it didn't as
> five minutes ago the system locked up yet again. This seems to suggest
> it may be kernel related rather than X related.
>
> 2) I recompiled my kernel wth the "Magic Sysrq" support in it. This
> seems to work more or less as designed. However when the system locked
> up as before the "magic sysrq" key did not work at all meaning I had to
> reboot without being able to shut down properly. This suggests to me
> that the kernel had itself crashed.
>
> 3) When I rebooted there was no kernel panic in the logs. This has me
> puzzled. I suppose it could have crashed and not had it written out to
> disk in time. On the otherhand this has happened before and each time
> there is no panic.

All these things may also indicate a hardware lockup - let's not hope so...


Michel


--
The computer revolution is over. The computers won.
______________________________________________________________________________
Earthling Michel Dänzer (MrCooper)  \  CS student and free software enthusiast
Debian GNU/Linux (powerpc,i386) user \   member of XFree86, Team *AMIGA*, AUGS

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Re: X still locks up

[Martin Costabel]

Gwyn Judd wrote:
[]
> Okay so you get it on x86 2.2.16 and XFree 4.01
> I get it on powerpc kernel >= 2.2.15 and XFree3.3.6
> Any other takers?

I don't know if all this is really the same thing, but I have been
getting sudden X freezes randomly with all 2.2.x kernels when using
Xpmac. For me this was the main reason to switch to XFree68_FBDev where
I *never* got these with 2.2.x kernels. Now I am getting these freezes
also with XFree68_FBDev (some 3.3.6 version) when using 2.3.x or 2.4.0
kernels. I very rarely use xmms (but always netscape), and I get these
freezes sometimes when the machine is completely idle. Sometimes this
happens after a couple of minutes, sometimes after 3 days.

The symptoms are: Mouse frozen, no keyboard input possible, no
MagicSysRq, no X shutdown with ctl-cmd-del, no console switching, the
only key combination working is the ctl-cmd-power hard reboot. On the
other hand, the kernel and even X seem to continue to live at least for
a while. I can see messages continue to scroll down and hear downloads
or compilations making their disk noise. The one time I tried to ping
from the outside, I was not successful, but then it sometimes takes 2
minutes of pinging to wake the machine up and get a response even when
it is not frozen.

>From my observations, I concluded that this must be a problem with the
keyboard and/or mouse drivers in X. But since this part of the kernel
and X ( I never understood why XFree has to have their own drivers for
everything that is already in the kernel) is worst black magic, rapidly
changing in incompatible ways, and since my machine (6400, ADB keyboard
and mouse, valkyrie video) belongs to an endangered species anyway, I
did not really try to understand what happens.

--
Martin

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Re: X still locks up

[Gregorio Gervasio Jr.]

>>>>> On Fri, 07 Jul 2000 11:47:14 +0100, Martin Costabel <costabel@univ-rennes1.fr> said:

m> I don't know if all this is really the same thing, but I have been
m> getting sudden X freezes randomly with all 2.2.x kernels when using
m> Xpmac. For me this was the main reason to switch to XFree68_FBDev
m> where I *never* got these with 2.2.x kernels. Now I am getting
m> these freezes also with XFree68_FBDev (some 3.3.6 version) when
m> using 2.3.x or 2.4.0 kernels. I very rarely use xmms (but always
m> netscape), and I get these freezes sometimes when the machine is
m> completely idle. Sometimes this happens after a couple of minutes,
m> sometimes after 3 days.

	This is the main reason I use XFree68_FBDev, too (2.2.17pre3
kernel, PowerWave w/ Newer G3 upgrade, ATI Mach64 GX video, XFree86
3.3.6) -- Xpmac would lock up the machine after a few minutes.  I
haven't tried a 2.[34].x kernel yet.  Ugh.  I guess I'll need to do
that soon.

Gregorio Gervasio, Jr.
gtgj@pacbell.net

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Re: X still locks up

[Gwyn Judd]

On Fri, Jul 07, 2000 at 12:53:32PM +0200, Benjamin Herrenschmidt wrote:
> >1) I tried installing the Xpmac.rev10 server that someone recommened in
> >the hope that that would fix the problem. Unfortunately it didn't as
> >five minutes ago the system locked up yet again. This seems to suggest
> >it may be kernel related rather than X related.
> >
> >2) I recompiled my kernel wth the "Magic Sysrq" support in it. This
> >seems to work more or less as designed. However when the system locked
> >up as before the "magic sysrq" key did not work at all meaning I had to
> >reboot without being able to shut down properly. This suggests to me
> >that the kernel had itself crashed.
> >
> >3) When I rebooted there was no kernel panic in the logs. This has me
> >puzzled. I suppose it could have crashed and not had it written out to
> >disk in time. On the otherhand this has happened before and each time
> >there is no panic.
>
> Can you give a try to my current rsync tree (linuxcare.com.au::linux-
> pmac-benh) and tell me if it helps ?

Okay I got that kernel working but it crashed overnight :(. Seems like
the problem is still there. It seems to happen most often when I'm
listening to streaming mp3's (ie. internet radio stations or the like)
if that helps.

--
Gwyn Judd (b.judd@xtra.co.nz)
A citizen of America will cross the ocean to fight for democracy, but
won't cross the street to vote in a national election.

		-- Bill Vaughan

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Re: X still locks up

[Iain Sandoe]

Sat, Jul 8, 2000  Gwyn Judd wrote:
> On Fri, Jul 07, 2000 at 12:53:32PM +0200, Benjamin Herrenschmidt wrote:
[...]
>>
>> Can you give a try to my current rsync tree (linuxcare.com.au::linux-
>> pmac-benh) and tell me if it helps ?
>
> Okay I got that kernel working but it crashed overnight :(. Seems like
> the problem is still there. It seems to happen most often when I'm
> listening to streaming mp3's (ie. internet radio stations or the like)
> if that helps.

Three things:

1/ did you try the backported audio stuff I posted yesterday - there were
some issues that were resolved between 2.2.xx and 2.3/4.xx these should be
present in the backport.  It does work OK against 2.2.17pre10-ben1.

2/ You could try separating out audio, X, & network-related fault areas by
running each area separately for a while?

3/ It tends to look (as Michel said yesterday) potentially like a hardware
problem.  I assume you have no over-clocking or stuff like that going on?
(unlikely on PPC I agree but I thought I'd ask).

BTW I've never had a random lock-up on Xpmac...

good luck,
Iain.

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Re: X still locks up

[Gwyn Judd]

On Sun, Jul 09, 2000 at 01:58:42AM +0100, Iain Sandoe wrote:
>
> > On Sat, Jul 08, 2000 at 11:06:40PM +0100, Iain Sandoe wrote:
> >> Three things:
> >>
> >> 1/ did you try the backported audio stuff I posted yesterday - there were
> >> some issues that were resolved between 2.2.xx and 2.3/4.xx these should be
> >> present in the backport.  It does work OK against 2.2.17pre10-ben1.
> >
> > Oh whoops can you send that to me or tell me where I can get it? I
> > thought it was part of bens kernel.
>
> Well, I wish it might be one day - but it's quite new (yesterday) and it
> will take a bit more testing before it's accepted.
>
> here's the URL:
>
> http://quimby.gnus.org/circus/dmasound_backport.patch.bz2
>
> (but there's no reference to it anywhere higher up so use something like
> anarchie/interarchy get via http - or whatever).

Okay I tried that one by applying the patch to the current stable kernel
(2.2.17 I believe). Once gnome started up I got an error message "No
mixers found". When I tried to play an mp3 through xmms X locked up
completely although I was able to change VT's, however I was unable to
kill X or reboot properly. Oh well at least fsck is getting a work-out
this week :).

I'm going back to 2.2.14 for a bit to see if I get the same problem with
a slightly older kernel.

--
Gwyn Judd (b.judd@xtra.co.nz)
I hate quotations.

		-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Re: X still locks up

[Iain Sandoe]

Sun, Jul 9, 2000 Gwyn Judd wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 09, 2000 at 01:58:42AM +0100, Iain Sandoe wrote:
>>
>> > On Sat, Jul 08, 2000 at 11:06:40PM +0100, Iain Sandoe wrote:
>> >> Three things:
>> >>
>> >> 1/ did you try the backported audio stuff I posted yesterday - there were
>> >> some issues that were resolved between 2.2.xx and 2.3/4.xx these should be
>> >> present in the backport.  It does work OK against 2.2.17pre10-ben1.
>> >
>> > Oh whoops can you send that to me or tell me where I can get it? I
>> > thought it was part of bens kernel.
>>
>> Well, I wish it might be one day - but it's quite new (yesterday) and it
>> will take a bit more testing before it's accepted.
>>
>> here's the URL:
>>
>> http://quimby.gnus.org/circus/dmasound_backport.patch.bz2
>>
>> (but there's no reference to it anywhere higher up so use something like
>> anarchie/interarchy get via http - or whatever).
>
> Okay I tried that one by applying the patch to the current stable kernel
> (2.2.17 I believe).

It was against 2.2.17pre7 (linuxcare linux-pmac-stable tree) - but tested
against Ben's pre10-ben1 as well rsync'ed as of yesterday.

>Once gnome started up I got an error message "No
> mixers found".

Are you using modules - or complied in?  Modules currently require a
different insertion thingy:

modprobe soundcore
modprobe dmasound_core
modprode dmasound_awacs

I asked Geert about this - will get back to you/list when this is resolved.

check you have action with cat /proc/modules and cat /dev/sndstat before
doing anything too exotic.

suggestion ;-) boot 'single' do the modprobes and a simple check before
going to init 5.

Also please remind me what machine you are on and whether you have any OSS
stuff enabled as well.

>When I tried to play an mp3 through xmms X locked up
> completely although I was able to change VT's, however I was unable to
> kill X or reboot properly. Oh well at least fsck is getting a work-out
> this week :).

Does Magic SysRq work for you (alt-F13) on my G3
try:
 alt-f13-k  (kill processes in current vt)
 alt-f13-s  (emergency sync)
 alt-f13-e  (kill everything except init)

This *should* at least save some fsking time :-)

thanks for the report...
Iain.

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Re: X still locks up

[Michel Dänzer]

Gwyn Judd wrote:

> When I tried to play an mp3 through xmms X locked up completely although I
> was able to change VT's, however I was unable to kill X or reboot properly.

Strange, if X hangs you actually shouldn't be able to switch VT...


Michel


--
Software is like sex; it's better when it's free  - Linus Torvalds
______________________________________________________________________________
Earthling Michel Dänzer (MrCooper)  \  CS student and free software enthusiast
Debian GNU/Linux (powerpc,i386) user \   member of XFree86, Team *AMIGA*, AUGS

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Re: X still locks up

[Iain Sandoe]

Sun, Jul 9, 2000, 20:24 Michel Dänzer wrote:
> Gwyn Judd wrote:
>
>> When I tried to play an mp3 through xmms X locked up completely although I
>> was able to change VT's, however I was unable to kill X or reboot properly.

another thought - Which version of XMMS ?

> Strange, if X hangs you actually shouldn't be able to switch VT...

True...

More info.

I observed an effect (*before* doing the back-port) that when I reduced the
buffer size to minimum X ran like treacle (ATI Mach64 + G3 shouldn't be)...
could (just) possibly look a little like a lock-up if the machine was
slower...

Update:

I just used the back-ported drivers to run Benno Senoner's latency test code
- which simultaneously stresses various parts of the system whilst playing
sound...  The includes running x11perf.

No problems here... (the results are not so good but that's another
story)...

I might leave Benno's test running overnight to see if I can get the 'lock'
effect - but I've been hammering this system (with complies, debugs, find /,
netscape etc. etc.) and can't replicate the problem.


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