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#1 2017-01-03 18:10:12

lumeno
Member
Registered: 2014-04-21
Posts: 20

Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

I'm running Arch on a Thinkpad X260. I've been experiencing random total system freezes. 90% of the time, the screen is frozen to whatever was already on it -- e.g. the Chrome browser or the terminal. The mouse and keyboard don't work, Ctrl+Alt+F11 doesn't do anything etc. I need to do a hard power off (hold power button) to use the system again. 10% of the time, it freezes on a blank screen.

Journalctl shows nothing unusual happening just before the freeze. Same, even after enabling kernel debug before boot.

I've noticed that I'm able to reproduce this more easily if I pick up the laptop and move it, or shake it a bit. Sometimes the freeze is preceded by some screen flickering. However, I'm not able to reproduce this under similar conditions when I'm running a CPU diagnostic from the BIOS -- I can never get that to freeze.

Please help?

Last edited by lumeno (2017-01-03 18:11:52)

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#2 2017-01-03 19:05:06

bart_vv
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From: Poland
Registered: 2011-04-12
Posts: 51

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

Try an older kernel, or better - a different OS. If problem persists there, it's a hardware failure.

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#3 2017-01-03 19:34:56

lumeno
Member
Registered: 2014-04-21
Posts: 20

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

The problem persisted after I downgraded the kernel a week ago. I'm now installing Debian to see if this happens there too.

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#4 2017-01-03 21:02:06

honestly
Member
Registered: 2014-04-12
Posts: 18

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

My Dell Latitude E5450 (5450-6693, Core i5-5300U) that had been running fine since I bought it a year ago, dual-booting arch and windows 7 (uefi), has developed random freezes that manifest with the same symptoms as yours, except never a blank screen. Additionally, the hard drive audibly powers off and when I reboot I get orphaned inodes in fsck.

Probably not related (According to http://shop.lenovo.com/il/en/laptops/th … ries/x260/ the X260 isn't available with i5-5300U CPU?) but who knows... I guess I'll see if it happens in Windows too, and then maybe try the lts kernel...

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#5 2017-01-04 02:19:54

lumeno
Member
Registered: 2014-04-21
Posts: 20

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

honestly wrote:

My Dell Latitude E5450 (5450-6693, Core i5-5300U) that had been running fine since I bought it a year ago, dual-booting arch and windows 7 (uefi), has developed random freezes that manifest with the same symptoms as yours

Is yours also associated with how you hold the laptop or when you move it around?


I've been able to reproduce this behaviour even on the command prompt after booting from a fresh Arch iso, and on a fresh Ubuntu install.

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#6 2017-01-04 12:59:45

honestly
Member
Registered: 2014-04-12
Posts: 18

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

lumeno wrote:

Is yours also associated with how you hold the laptop or when you move it around?

I haven't observed that yet. I've lugged it around while in standby mode - that never seemed to trigger any freezes.

lumeno wrote:

I've been able to reproduce this behaviour even on the command prompt after booting from a fresh Arch iso, and on a fresh Ubuntu install.

It hasn't happened to me when I spent about one and a half hours reinstalling all packages (after it crashed while pacman was upgrading packages leading to massive filesystem corruption), from a (probably year-old) arch iso usb, or during the few hours I've been running windows 7 now.

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#7 2017-01-04 13:08:59

lumeno
Member
Registered: 2014-04-21
Posts: 20

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

I'm feeling more confident that the problem I'm having is the same as the one described in this Yoga 3 thread:
https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/Lenovo-Yog … -p/2112947

Essentially, a loose WiFi adapter causes these freezes. So I can either disable the WiFi adapter (and get an external one), or open up the case and try to tighten the adapter. This might explain why I've never experienced the freezes while running the Debian install ISO -- Debian doesn't recognize my WiFi adapter.

I'll test out disabling the WiFi adapter in Arch, but need to get a backup system before I do that.

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#8 2017-01-04 17:44:09

honestly
Member
Registered: 2014-04-12
Posts: 18

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

I downgraded all packages to 2016/11/01 state using ALA (https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arch_Linux_Archive) and experienced another freeze. It didn't freeze while letting it run in a normal usage mode (a mosh connection and firefox open, with firefox playing youtube videos), without interaction, for three hours but then frozes when I was actually using it to watch youtube videos and use the mosh connection, after about an hour.

So that makes a hardware issue more likely. I'll run Windows for a while now to see if I get any problems in windows...

...and I just realized that in Windows the wireless keeps breaking in a weird way (doesn't disconnect from the network but eventually shows it as "limited" (i.e. no network connectivity) and I have to reconnect. Huh. So what exactly makes you think your wireless adapter is loose?

Last edited by honestly (2017-01-04 17:54:25)

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#9 2017-01-07 13:15:44

honestly
Member
Registered: 2014-04-12
Posts: 18

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

I've now been using Windows for several days and have experienced zero problems. The wifi breakage only happens when connected to a specific Vodafone LTE Hotspot router. So I'm rather confused.

EDIT: I'm now using openbox instead of i3wm. No freezes for over an hour. Very weird.

EDIT: Just realized I've been posting in the wrong topic, will continue here: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=221252

Last edited by honestly (2017-01-09 08:46:07)

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#10 2017-02-18 21:05:20

lumeno
Member
Registered: 2014-04-21
Posts: 20

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

My random freezes are back again. Still associated with laptop motion. It's really starting to annoy me. This time I have two additional pieces of information:

1. the fan is on full blast every time this happens (i.e., the CPU is on full load?)
2. if music is on, it continues to play, but stuck repeating the last ~1 second segment

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#11 2017-09-26 20:36:41

mpfei
Member
Registered: 2017-09-26
Posts: 1

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

Lumeno, did you manage to figure out anything else? My x260 developed what appears to be the same thing two days ago, and I'm trying to figure it out. Same symptoms with the freeze, and same thing with the fan being on full blast. Issue happens with both linux and linux-lts, though I haven't tested multiple operating systems.

I'm not sure it is the same issue since I haven't noticed too much of a correlation with laptop motion, but it could be. Your link to the Yoga 3 problems was the best lead I've found so far, though I opened my laptop up and didn't find anything that was obviously shorting.

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#12 2017-10-02 15:53:32

lumeno
Member
Registered: 2014-04-21
Posts: 20

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

After a warranty servicing due to water damage, Lenovo replaced several of the components in my laptop. I never saw this issue again after that.

My bet is that it is either the WiFi or the bluetooth module. I would recommend disabling either/both somehow and see if the problem persists.

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#13 2017-10-04 22:25:34

Alpha37
Member
Registered: 2014-01-06
Posts: 2

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

For posterity:

Unfortunately, I was able to reproduce the issue in Memtest86+ as well as Lenovo Boot Diagnostics, and the laptop was out of warranty. I took it to my university's IT, who recommended system board replacement, but it turned out their supplier as well as all the third-party suppliers I could find online were out of replacements.

So I'm SOL. Glad your story had a happy ending, at least.

(Edit: wow, nothing like rediscovering an old account you forgot existed by posting from an older computer. That's awkward.)

Last edited by Alpha37 (2017-10-04 22:30:33)

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#14 2017-10-05 17:59:35

reading
Member
Registered: 2017-10-05
Posts: 5

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

mpfei, I also have an X260 and I have the exact same problem that you and Lumeno had. I have noticed that the freeze usually happens when I pick up the laptop from the left bottom corner of the base when the laptop is open. I have the same screen freeze, with sound stuck in the last ~second, and magic sysrq keys don't work. The thing is completely frozen.

I recently replaced my hard drive with an SSD, and didn't have this problem before that. So I'm thinking it's possible that I knocked one of the wireless adapters.

When I get a chance, I'm going to take it apart again and see if there's anything obviously loose. If I solve the problem I'll update you.

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#15 2018-01-08 20:03:34

reading
Member
Registered: 2017-10-05
Posts: 5

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

Lumeno or mpfei, have either of you learned more about this issue?

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#16 2018-01-08 20:39:49

rodrigoaguilera
Member
Registered: 2017-04-14
Posts: 2

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

I suffered from this issue and it became more frequent until 3 weeks ago the X260 wasn't turning on.

Opened a ticket with lenovo support and it seems is a frequent problem but they don't have spare motherboards until February.

I'll tell you if the motherboard replacement fixed this issue.

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#17 2018-01-26 23:53:37

reading
Member
Registered: 2017-10-05
Posts: 5

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

Hi guys, quick update: I solved this issue the way it's mentioned here:
https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/Lenovo-Yog … -p/2112947

I was doing a ram upgrade, and simply pressed down the wires around the wifi adapter. They didn't seem loose exactly, but now I can't get my laptop to freeze no matter how I hold it!

Unfortunately the computer won't boot with the ram I'm trying to install, but that's another story.

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#18 2018-01-27 05:53:41

rodrigoaguilera
Member
Registered: 2017-04-14
Posts: 2

Re: Total system freezes slightly correlated with laptop motion

After some days with the replacement motherboard I don't get freezes. I'd say this is a hardware problem.

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