[Solved] Shutdown/Startup problem

sulaweyo · 2013-09-10 16:45:40

I hope the category isn't totally wrong

I have an issue that i could not track down so far and search did not give me anything helpful too.

Whenever i shutdown, be it from console or out of KDE, everything works fine. The startup though is a bit more problematic as the power button does not react instantly. Sometimes there is a delay of a few seconds but it can be minutes or nothing at all happens. In that case i have to hold the power button for 10sec+ to reset it and then the next press boots up my box instantly. I don't find anything in a log file but from the 10sec power press to reset i'm quite sure there is something not properly shut down and so the mainboard still thinks it's on.

I use a Asus Sabertooth X79 with Corsair AX PSU and as i could not put the finger on anything specific i did not change any acpi settings or anything like that. I never had this problem with Ubuntu or when i boot up Win from an external disk. I use refind as UEFI boot loader.

Did anybody have an issue like that before? I'm pretty sure it has something to do with the power management or maybe my UEFI firmware. As it never happened with another OS i doubt it's the firmware though. Maybe i'm just missing a module????

Any help would be highly appreciated.

Last edited by sulaweyo (2013-09-10 18:31:05)

WonderWoofy · 2013-09-10 18:07:42

As it never happened with another OS i doubt it's the firmware...

So if I am reading this correctly and you are having this problem when the machine is off (cold boot), then the Arch is not in play here whatsoever. So there is nothing it could be other than the firmware/bios.

If you really really suspect that it has something to do with the way the machine shuts itself down, it would probably have something to do with the kernel (I doubt this), since the kernel is the last thing to have control of your machine before the power is cut off. So you could try downgrading to an old kernel version or try upgrading the the [testing] kernel and see if the problem persists.

Otherwise, the only other thing I can think of trying would be to use halt instead and then power off the machine manually. Then see if the problem persists.

In any case, even if it is something about how the final resulting power down takes place, it would still likely be a firmware bug as it would then be incorrectly responding to the kernel's calls to power the machine down.

sulaweyo · 2013-09-10 18:16:40

Thanks for your Reply WonderWoofy.
I have a windows installation on an external drive, you know just for the rare times where you kind of need windows, and if i shut that down everything is fine on the next boot. When i switched to Arch from ubuntu there were no other changes but the problem started at this point in time.
I really have no idea how arch's shutdown could cause this but that's still the only thing that changed when this first appeared. Your reasoning is absolutely plausible though
Most likely it's just an odd situation where the firmware got something wrong in combination with arch. You are definitely right about the firmware being the last and first player in this scenario...

WonderWoofy · 2013-09-10 18:23:13

Yeah, so I think that the only reasonable way to see if this is Arch related would be to try a newer or older kernel and see if that makes things work as expected.

I think that windows doing things (what fir firmware considers) right is not a surprise since the standard by which firmware is tested is whether it will work with windows. But the implementation of acpi in Linux actually sticks to the real acpi spec. This is why it is so common to see acpi errors within the journal or dmesg.

Most vendors do a shitty job of actually getting things right in terms of acpi, but this is a result of windows also doing a shitty job of actually adhering to the standards of acpi. So once things work fine in windows, vendors tend to say "That's good enough" and are done with it.

BTW, welcome to the Arch Linux forum community (and it sounds like to Arch Linux in general). I hope you enjoy your stay.

sulaweyo · 2013-09-10 18:29:17

Thx for the welcome

I'm pretty sure it's a firmware issue by now as your test with "halt" showed the same behavior. I'll see if there is a firmware upgrade or i'll kind of live with it as i did until now. As i know how to get it to power up it's not a major issue but the first time it really did not start at i all i got a bit nervous

Set it to solved as it's unlikely that Arch is the real cause.

Last edited by sulaweyo (2013-09-10 18:31:31)

Arch Linux

#1 2013-09-10 16:45:40

[Solved] Shutdown/Startup problem

#2 2013-09-10 18:07:42

Re: [Solved] Shutdown/Startup problem

#3 2013-09-10 18:16:40

Re: [Solved] Shutdown/Startup problem

#4 2013-09-10 18:23:13

Re: [Solved] Shutdown/Startup problem

#5 2013-09-10 18:29:17

Re: [Solved] Shutdown/Startup problem

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