Arch Linux

z33m

Member

Registered: 2010-05-07

Posts: 12

System Freezes Randomly

My dell studio 1558, running archlinux kernel26-ice with catalyst driver freezes randomly..
the screen stays frozen and nothing works. when i try to reboot from frozen screen the
system freezes again sometime after GDM, or inside GDM where i get a frozen black screen
and a scaled mouse cursor (messed up screen resolution, i guess). So i have to reboot again.
i have to repeat this 2 or 3 times before the system stops freezing.

I have no idea how to isolate the problem, cant find anything in the logs. Maybe im looking at
the wrong places. some problem with graphics driver i guess. Any help?

nixpunk

Member

Registered: 2009-11-23

Posts: 271

Re: System Freezes Randomly

The video driver could certainly be the culprit.  You can try an alternate driver to see if it increases stability.  I would also test the RAM, as well as monitor the CPU and HDD temps during normal operations.

MadTux

Member

Registered: 2009-09-20

Posts: 553

Re: System Freezes Randomly

Did you notice that your machine gets hot? Overheating may cause such random freezes. Can you link the freezing to particular applications?

z33m

Member

Registered: 2010-05-07

Posts: 12

Re: System Freezes Randomly

Sorry for the late reply.

I decided to check if overheating could be the problem so i monitored the temperature for a few days and they seemed to be under control when the freeze/lockup occurs. Sometimes i get lockups even on a cold start.

Recently i came across this https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour … bug/568611 . I hadnt noticed any problems with brightness control but i decided to check anyway. It works most of the time, but if i try to increase or decrease it a few times (using the functions keys or using the gnome applet), the system locks up. I can reproduce this consistently. Also this seems to be consistent with freeze in GDM because the lockup almost coincides with the point when the gnome power manager tries to restore the brightness levels.

There is also a fix https://launchpad.net/~kamalmostafa/+ar … gbacklight for this. Is there way to patch this onto my kernel?

z33m

Member

Registered: 2010-05-07

Posts: 12

Re: System Freezes Randomly

The random freeze problem seem to be the result of some problem with broadcom wireless driver brcm80211. I blacklisted brcm80211 and installed broadcom-wl. Been running for about 6hours now, no freezes yet. Will have to check for some more time.

I still have the back-light brightness problem though. The two are unrelated i guess.

cinan

Member

From: Slovakia

Registered: 2008-07-04

Posts: 251

Website

Re: System Freezes Randomly

I had same problem with stability as you did. brcm80211 is highly unstable driver, actually it is a staging driver in .37 linux kernel.