Date: Sat, 8 Jan 2000 10:49:02 -0800 From: David Bushong <david@bushong.net> To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Subject: load spike strangeness Message-ID: <20000108104902.A47984@Bushong.NET>
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I have noticed a strange occurrence infrequently over the last year or so running -STABLE. I will describe it as best I can, and what I've tried to figure it out. I don't expect anyone here to know immediately why it's happening, but maybe someone can give me tips on things to try to figure it out. System: PII/266 overclocked to 300 3 DIMMs: 2 x 32 + 1 x 64 2 SCSI UW drives: 1 9GB 7200 rpm, 1 4GB 5400 rpm, both IBM Adaptec 2940UW Seagate 4GB travan tape drive IDE Creative 5x DVD w/ mpeg card Creative TNT video card Software: OS: Many different versions of FreeBSD X.Y-STABLE daemons: apache 1.3.6, named, ypbind, ypserv, nfsd, xntpd Symptom: I'm running X, a few xterms, a few ssh's, fvwm2. Have an xload in the corner. Typing along happily, I notice the load running flat at one. Never heard any exciting disk activity. If left unattended (or even if not) goes away by itself in maybe 5 minutes. Must time more precisely next time. Things I tried: Run uptime. Get a load of ~ 1. Check top. Says CPU is 99.5% idle. Run ps, wait 10 seconds, run ps, and compare PIDs. They aren't flying by (difference in 'ps' PID is max 1 or 2). I start up an mp3 encode on a known track and time it. The load reads 2 while I'm doing this. It takes no longer than when my machine is completely unloaded. Now I know everyone says load is a poor indicator of this and doesn't reflect that, but anyone have: a) any idea what could cause a phantom, meaningless spike in the load? b) any idea what other things I could try to figure out why this is happening? (i'll try timing it next time, and keeping track of when it happens to see if there's a pattern) Important? No. Baffling? Yes. --David Bushong To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message
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