From owner-freebsd-questions Fri Aug 20 20:34: 2 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from allegro.lemis.com (allegro.lemis.com [192.109.197.134]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C2A2014BE1 for ; Fri, 20 Aug 1999 20:33:51 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from grog@freebie.lemis.com) Received: from freebie.lemis.com (freebie.lemis.com [192.109.197.137]) by allegro.lemis.com (8.9.1/8.9.0) with ESMTP id NAA03316; Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:03:29 +0930 (CST) Received: (from grog@localhost) by freebie.lemis.com (8.9.3/8.9.0) id NAA71262; Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:03:27 +0930 (CST) Date: Sat, 21 Aug 1999 13:03:27 +0930 From: Greg Lehey To: Fredrik Carlen Cc: freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG, d93-awe@nada.kth.se Subject: Re: Computer running FreeBSD 3.2-RELEASE freezes completely Message-ID: <19990821130327.Q14964@freebie.lemis.com> References: <99082019241400.00282@entityone.leonissystems.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.95.4i In-Reply-To: <99082019241400.00282@entityone.leonissystems.com>; from Fredrik Carlen on Fri, Aug 20, 1999 at 07:15:31PM +0200 WWW-Home-Page: http://www.lemis.com/~grog X-PGP-Fingerprint: 6B 7B C3 8C 61 CD 54 AF 13 24 52 F8 6D A4 95 EF Organization: LEMIS, PO Box 460, Echunga SA 5153, Australia Phone: +61-8-8388-8286 Fax: +61-8-8388-8725 Mobile: +61-41-739-7062 Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Friday, 20 August 1999 at 19:15:31 +0200, Fredrik Carlen wrote: > Question from Fredrik Carlen > > Hello! I have a really annoying problem, and I can't seem to be able to > find an answer to it on the Net. I recently "bought" and installed FreeBSD > 3.2-RELEASE. I have been using it for a couple of weeks, and it's a very > pleasant experience, except for the fact that *every* *single* *day* the system > *freezes*. Hangs. I've been told not to reinstall, so, still painfully > ignorant in the field of UNIX, I am humbly asking for more knowledgeable help. > > This is what happens: > 1.I log in on my usual, every-day account. > 2.I start X up. > 3.I start doing the normal stuff, nothing fancy (e.g. reading mail, writing > notes). > 4.The system freezes. Every input device stops working. The mouse cursor > disappering is the first indication. The system is *not* reading from the hard > drive, at least as far as I can see and hear. No matter how long I wait, the > system won't respond. It's a complete denial-of-service! The only option > left is to reboot the hard way. Which doesn't exactly make things better!!! > > It happens *frequently* in the following circumstances: > A. When I try to change something in "preferences" or "options", in > any program (epecially Netcape). Sometimes it works, sometimes the system > freezes. > B.When I am trying to do something in two programs simultaneously, > e.g. surfing and writing small notes. (By goood I hope it doesn't happen > right now, please, please, my dear OS, just let me finish this freakin' mail!) > C. Sometimes without any action from my part whatsoever. > > And: Once it happened when I disconnected my PPP connection when Mozilla was > still downloading a webpage. My experience is that if I have been using X for > an hour or so, it *will* freeze. > > This is my system, in a nutshell: > Intel Pentium, 166 MHz. > Motherboard:PA-2007 with VIA VP2/97 chipset > Video card: S3 trio64V+ > Sound card: Soundblaster compatible (ESS ES1868) > HD: 4 gigs > RAM: 32 megs > +I've installed the old object format, aout, to be able to use Netscape. What do you mean by "install"? > Both my everyday user account and my root account is left as-is, no fancy stuff > there. I'd guess that this is some kind of hardware problem, but that doesn't help you much. The fact that the mouse cursor disappears suggests that it's related to X. A couple of things to try: 1. When it happens next, try changing virtual terminals to, say, ttyv1. You do this by pressing ctrl-alt-F2. If this works, it's not the system freezing, it's X. You can log in and shoot X down. Look for the process called Xwrapper. 2. If that doesn't help, switch to ttyv1 *before* it freezes. Leave it overnight or longer to see if it still freezes. 3. If you still have no joy, let's hear more about the X configuration. Are you using some exotic window mangler? Greg -- When replying to this message, please copy the original recipients. For more information, see http://www.lemis.com/questions.html See complete headers for address, home page and phone numbers finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message