first slow, then lock up[solved]

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

Hi there,
Some time ago I already had gentoo on my desktop. And I thought it was nice. But then, we used Debian at work, so I thought it might be better to get used to Debian quick, so I switched. Two month ago I got a new system with a shiny amd64 cpu, so I decided to go back to gentoo.

Now I'm having some difficulties running gentoo on my new system. When I try to emerge something, most of the times my system 'dies'. It just gets slower and slower. And sometimes, after a while of trying to emerge stuff or doing some other things (like 'less /var/log/messages' to find out what the cause could be), the system locks up completely (no keyboard, no ping).

If anybody has a clue what this might be, I'd be more than glad. Currently I'm using Windows x64 which I only installed for games... or at least I thought so. Oh, btw, memory is fine, I had Debian running on the new system for about a month, so this can't be the cause.

My specs are:
AMD Athlon X2 64 4200+ (dual core)
nForce 4 based mobo (dfi lanparty)
250Gig Western Digital UDMA 133 HDD
Geforce 7800GT (but I don't have the nvidia drivers installed yet)

*EDIT:
dmesg or /var/log/messages don't give any hints about the problem. Or at least I think they don't.

some info:

emerge --info:

i92guboj · Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2005 7:06 pm Post subject: Re: first slow, then lock up

badchien · Guru Joined: 16 Feb 2004 Posts: 415 Location: doghouse

You have DFI LanpartyUT nF4 Ultra-D? This is the board I have. I had problems very similar to what you describe when I first put my system together, only they were probably worse. I could hardly emerge anything. After two weeks of fucking around I found a tip in the DFI forums about a bios setting.
Setting "Max Async Latency" in the bios to "7ns" solved my problem.

Maybe this will help you as well. If not, you might check out this place for other things to try: http://www.dfi-street.com/

Certainly possible it could be bad memory, but on the other hand this board has a million bios settings you can change, and it can be a bit finicky until you get it just right. Mine has been running rock solid ever since I figured out my problem.

Avuton Olrich · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 02 Jul 2004 Posts: 114

I'm having the same problems: I'm getting an MCE with my Athlon X2 at the moment, turning off IOMMU fixed most of the issues but I still get the occasional lockup. I've been told by an amd rep I need to send my processor in for replacement.

See: http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-kernel&m=113239372109342&w=2 for more info.

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

First of all, thank you guys very much for your advice!
I'm glad to see that people are still *very* helpful on the gentoo forum. One more reason I want this distro to run on my computer

I'll try your suggestions and will report on how it went tomorrow. Of course I will try the BIOS settings first

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

hi,
testing my memory using memtest86+ gave me several errors.
So I do have faulty ram! I tried one bank first, but using only that one, I couldn't even log into the system. After I got rid of the other bank, first everything ran fine. It compiled xorg-x11 without problems. But after a while my system got very slow again. I'm going to test the other bank tonight. Hopefully its faulty too, lol. Then I at least know where the problem is. But that would suprise me. Two brand new banks of crucial ballistix memory and both faulty? Well, I'll see.
Thanks so far for your help!
Btw, the first thing I'm going to do next time I get new ram is memtest86+ :wink:

urcindalo · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2005 4:06 pm Post subject:

Prior to installing Gentoo AMD64 almost a year ago, I tried FreeBSD AMD64. Every compilation would freeze the computer sooner or later. After much frustration, I changed to Gentoo, thinking it was FreeBSD to blame, but again the same horror movie.

Until it occurred to me that maybe it was a faulty BIOS setup. The computer was just-bought at that time, and memory bus speed was set to 400 MHz by the guys that delivered it. I just chose an automatic memory speed detection in the BIOS, instead of forcing one, and the computer chose a 333 MHz speed on the next boot. Since then, no more hang-up's when compiling.
What's more, out of curiousity I changed the memory speed back to 400 MHz two months ago. Again, the very first compilation I tried froze the computer.

So, check out your BIOS setup, and maybe apply a more conservative one.

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

But would a wrong BIOS setting give me errors in memtest86+?

And another thing that bothers me. I'm running Windows x64 right now. It hurts to say that, but it runs just fine. When I boot up Gentoo, it's just a matter of minutes until the system slows down and locks up. I don't even have to compile things, trying to open some file is often enough.
But maybe thats an issue with the different types of memory management of the two OSs.

i92guboj · Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2005 8:46 pm Post subject:

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

I had Gentoo running for a few hours now and it seems that everything is working fine on the one stick. I will still check my BIOS settings though and will test both of the sticks seperately using memtest86+.

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

After setting every possible DRAM setting in the BIOS to automatic, memtest didn't give me any errors on either one of the sticks. I tested both seperately for about 6 hours each. Well, I booted linux to see if the BIOS settings have the expected effect, but they didn't. The system is still slowing down and locking up after a few minutes. I guess the previous run was really just a luck shot...
Any other hints you guys can give me?
I will look around the dfi-street forum a little bit, in the hope to find something about my problem.

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

I'm going to test both sticks tonight. Maybe it's something wrong with the second memory bank on the mobo.

MixMax · n00b Joined: 28 Jan 2005 Posts: 73 Location: Finland

I had similar issues (with my amd64 laptop, thou I think it might ably to here too), and compiling all the needed usb options in to the kernel (not as module) fixed it for me.

danielr · n00b Joined: 13 Dec 2005 Posts: 18

I could remember that the LiveCD worked, so I figured (after my RAM was tested and the right BIOS settings were found), that it might be a wrongly configured kernel.
Running 'genkernel' fixed the problem. Then I, step by step, changed the kernel config to my needs and now everything runs smooth.
I'm under gentoo right now, while typing this.
It's a good feeling to be back :wink:

But being a total idiot, I deleted my old kernel config and cannot say which setting produced the problem. Sorry!

Thanks for all your suggestions!

AngelKnight · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 14 Jan 2003 Posts: 90

slithy · Guru Joined: 26 Nov 2005 Posts: 321 Location: Kansas