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wil93

Member

From: Italy

Registered: 2013-09-15

Posts: 72

[SOLVED] Frequent crashes (I can unfreeze only by using SysRq+B)

I have two drives: the first is a 32GB SSD, the other is a 1TB HDD. The HDD broke down but the system is installed on the SSD (only /home was mounted on the HDD) so I can still boot up. Currently, everytime I boot up I copy (from a pendrive) a small /home/$USER folder (with the basics to work, like .config/ and so on).

I don't know it this is the cause, but since then I am experiencing frequent crashes. For example, I am watching a video (VCL, youtube, doesn't matter..) and sometimes my laptop will just hang, endlessly repeating the last second (or so) of audio (while the video, as well as the mouse pointer and everything else, is stuck). It also happens when I am literally doing nothing (I go back to the laptop after being away and it's stuck).

Usually, I would do SysRq+K to kill all processes (and go back to the login screen), but the only command that works is "B" (from REISUB). Any ideas?

Last edited by wil93 (2015-01-24 01:35:58)

karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: [SOLVED] Frequent crashes (I can unfreeze only by using SysRq+B)

You should use the whole REISUB, not just SysRq+B.
Anything interesting in the logs or systemd's journal? Maybe the system was generating a huge coredump and that's why it looked like it froze.

wil93

Member

From: Italy

Registered: 2013-09-15

Posts: 72

Re: [SOLVED] Frequent crashes (I can unfreeze only by using SysRq+B)

You should use the whole REISUB, not just SysRq+B.

Yes I did that, but the other commands seemed to do nothing...

Anything interesting in the logs or systemd's journal? Maybe the system was generating a huge coredump and that's why it looked like it froze.

The journal has some logs about thermald (recently installed) trying to do stuff before the sudden shutdown.

...
Jan 23 22:16:06 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:06 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 7000000 wr:28000000
Jan 23 22:16:06 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 86000, 9, 7000000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:10 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 5250000 wr:29750000
Jan 23 22:16:10 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 93500, 87000, 9, 5250000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:10 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 7000000 wr:28000000
Jan 23 22:16:10 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 9, 7000000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:14 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:14 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 10500000
Jan 23 22:16:14 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 10500000 wr:24500000
Jan 23 22:16:14 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 9, 10500000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:18 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:18 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 14000000
Jan 23 22:16:18 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 14000000 wr:21000000
Jan 23 22:16:18 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 9, 14000000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:22 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:22 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 12250000 wr:22750000
Jan 23 22:16:22 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 86000, 9, 12250000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:26 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 10500000 wr:24500000
Jan 23 22:16:26 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 93500, 86000, 9, 10500000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:30 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 8750000 wr:26250000
Jan 23 22:16:30 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 93500, 87000, 9, 8750000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:30 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 10500000 wr:24500000
Jan 23 22:16:30 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 9, 10500000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:34 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:34 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 14000000
Jan 23 22:16:34 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 14000000 wr:21000000
Jan 23 22:16:34 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 88000, 9, 14000000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:38 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:38 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 17500000
Jan 23 22:16:38 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 17500000 wr:17500000
Jan 23 22:16:38 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 9, 17500000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:42 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:42 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 24500000
Jan 23 22:16:42 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 24500000 wr:10500000
Jan 23 22:16:42 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 88000, 9, 24500000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:46 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:46 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 38500000
Jan 23 22:16:46 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: set cdev state index 9 state 26250000 wr:8750000
Jan 23 22:16:46 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 9, 26250000, 26250000
Jan 23 22:16:50 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:50 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 10, 1, 10
Jan 23 22:16:54 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:54 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 3
Jan 23 22:16:54 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: turbo disabled
Jan 23 22:16:54 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 10, 3, 10
Jan 23 22:16:58 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:16:58 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 5
Jan 23 22:16:58 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 10, 5, 10
Jan 23 22:17:02 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:17:02 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 9
Jan 23 22:17:02 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 88000, 10, 9, 10
Jan 23 22:17:06 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: skip to reduce current state as this is controlled by two zone or trip actions and one is still on 1:2
Jan 23 22:17:06 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: consecutive call, increment exponentially state 17
Jan 23 22:17:06 wil93-arch thermald[1764]: Set : 87000, 87000, 10, 10, 10

It may be causing the freezes, so I stopped and disabled it. After some hours still no crashes... I'll report back if it crashes, until then you can consider the issue solved

UPDATE: the bug is actually caused by a regression (related to the "intel_powerclamp" driver) in the 3.18 version of the Linux kernel. Here's more discussion: https://github.com/01org/thermal_daemon/issues/48

Last edited by wil93 (2015-02-01 20:31:33)