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#1 2012-11-17 09:33:30

stickyfoot
Member
Registered: 2012-10-10
Posts: 5

[SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

Thinkpad T410
Fresh Arch install (Nov 2012) with Gnome 3.6
Samsung 830 SSD
Previous HD in Ultrabay drive

When I'm copying a large amount of files onto the SSD it sometimes suddenly crashes. Gnome just disappears, some white text streams up a black screen briefly then the laptop turns off.

I first noticed it when I installed Dropbox and it was downloading all my files for the first time.

I've since had it several times when trying to copy my folders of family photos and videos from the ultrabay drive onto the SSD.

I've tried searching for 'gnome 3.6 ssd random crashes' and variations on that.

I've tried looking in /var/log/ for files that look like they might contain useful information but can't find anything.

Any other clues would be gratefully received.

Last edited by stickyfoot (2012-11-24 22:28:24)

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#2 2012-11-17 10:44:31

graysky
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From: :wq
Registered: 2008-12-01
Posts: 10,592
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Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

1) Try switching IO scheduler to noop and repeat.  Problem still there?
2) Try another DE as the problem could be a gnome bug.  xfce4 or lxde are pretty stable and would represent good test cases.  Problem still there?


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#3 2012-11-17 11:26:03

stickyfoot
Member
Registered: 2012-10-10
Posts: 5

Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

Thanks for the suggestions.

IO scheduler changed to noop - same problem happens

Installed LXDE and copied the folder again - same problem happens

Both times my machine just reboots after copying about 1.5 GB

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#4 2012-11-17 12:37:22

graysky
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From: :wq
Registered: 2008-12-01
Posts: 10,592
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Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

Does the machine have another drive?  Perhaps the problem is with the SSD.  Do you have access to an external disk to test?


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#5 2012-11-18 21:04:20

stickyfoot
Member
Registered: 2012-10-10
Posts: 5

Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

Thank you for your suggestions, I'm beginning to think it may be a faulty drive. I tried installing Ubuntu on a separate partition on the SSD and it did the same reboot thing shortly after starting the install process.

My next consideration is whether it's worth installing Windows on the drive in case its something to do with how Linux handles the cache part of the drive. When copying the files it shows it as a gig through the copy but when it has rebooted only about 600kb have actually copied.

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#6 2012-11-19 01:16:02

cfr
Member
From: Cymru
Registered: 2011-11-27
Posts: 7,130

Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

What mount options and filesystem are you using?


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#7 2012-11-19 04:32:57

Max-P
Member
Registered: 2011-06-11
Posts: 164

Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

Here's what someone posted on one of my threads, concerning SSDs. You might want to try it, didn't solve my problem but might solve yours (mine looks to be a bit tricky)

sultanoswing wrote:

On my desktop hardware setup (see below), when I installed an SSD I had to add "libata.force=noncq" to the kernel command line options. The drive was behaving erratically (lots of I/O errors) before I did that. Can't remember where I read that tip, but jus' passing it on in case you suffer similarly.

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#8 2012-11-24 22:27:58

stickyfoot
Member
Registered: 2012-10-10
Posts: 5

Re: [SOLVED] Copying a lot of files causes a complete system crash

Thank you once again for all help offered.

cfr - mount options and file systems - ext4 mounted as relatime with discard as recommended in the Arch Wiki.

Max-P - thanks for the suggestion but I didn't try it because I found a much simpler solution (see below).

graysky - I did test the machine with another drive and it worked fine.

I tried installing Ubuntu on a separate partition and it got to about a gig in and rebooted.

I tried doing a fresh install of Arch and it got about a gig in and rebooted as well.

From that I concluded it was faulty so didn't bother trying to find a software based solution.

I contacted Amazon to say the drive was faulty and they immediately offered me my money back so I took up the offer.

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