Text getting scrambled [Monitoring]

[oldgreygary]

Hello,

I seem to be suffering a re-occuring problem. I have been using programs such as Digikam, Gwen etc. Just recently. after a while I have noticed that there is an increase in HD activity followed by the text getting corrupted. I have to re-start the system to clear this. I presume that there is  some sort of corruption going on that is causing the text to get scrambled?
Possibly the extra HD activity is the software or systems producing some sort of dump? Whatever it is it corrupts the text and makes it unusable. Therefore I have to restart/reboot. Can anyone offer any suggestions to investigate further?

Thanks

Gary

[AS]

Hello,

I seem to be suffering a re-occuring problem. I have been using programs such as Digikam, Gwen etc. Just recently. after a while I have noticed that there is an increase in HD activity followed by the text getting corrupted. I have to re-start the system to clear this. I presume that there is  some sort of corruption going on that is causing the text to get scrambled?
Possibly the extra HD activity is the software or systems producing some sort of dump? Whatever it is it corrupts the text and makes it unusable. Therefore I have to restart/reboot. Can anyone offer any suggestions to investigate further?

Thanks

Gary

Hi oldgreygary,

the first thing I would try is to perform a memory test. You can try, boot a recent LiveCD, and run "memtest", at least a 2 complete pass.

AS

[oldgreygary]

Hello,

I have re-booted from the LiveCD and 'memtest' is not found when I go to the command line?

Gary

[menotu]

Hello,

I have re-booted from the LiveCD and 'memtest' is not found when I go to the command line?

Gary

The Memtest option should be on the main menu (along with the media check and install options etc)

[oldgreygary]

Thanks, it wasn't on the main menu. It appears to not be on there. So, I have gone into the config computer and looked at the boot options. There is a program in /boot called memtest-4.20. I have added that to the boot menu. It is now available and I have run the memory test.

It has run two passes without finding any errors.

Gary

[AS]

How old is your hard disk ?

you could try some check utility, like smartctl or gsmartcontrol. Install from repo gsmartcontrol and smartmontools.
Start gsmartcontrol, right click on the disk icon and select "perform test", try first a "short-selftest", if passed try an "extended-selftest".

AS

[oldgreygary]

Ran both the HD tests and they both ran with no errors. As to the age of the HD. I bought the desktop about 4 years ago (secondhand) so best guess would be >5 years old.

The photo programs I have been using can be quite processor intensive e.g. manipulating RAW and JPEG files. I was wondering if something is happening within the software to cause memory to get corrupted? I will have to try a few sequences to see if I can consistently produce the corruption. But if there are any other suggestions then interested to hear them.

***Addition***

I have been looking at the website of Rawtherapee and it is suggesting that 4GB of RAM is minimum. Can work with less but need to be careful. So, as I only have 1GB Ram this could well be the issue? It looks as though I will have to use this software with caution otherwise it is going to cause problems.

*** end of addition ***

Cheers for now

Gary

[AS]

Ran both the HD tests and they both ran with no errors. As to the age of the HD. I bought the desktop about 4 years ago (secondhand) so best guess would be >5 years old.

The photo programs I have been using can be quite processor intensive e.g. manipulating RAW and JPEG files. I was wondering if something is happening within the software to cause memory to get corrupted? I will have to try a few sequences to see if I can consistently produce the corruption. But if there are any other suggestions then interested to hear them.

***Addition***

I have been looking at the website of Rawtherapee and it is suggesting that 4GB of RAM is minimum. Can work with less but need to be careful. So, as I only have 1GB Ram this could well be the issue? It looks as though I will have to use this software with caution otherwise it is going to cause problems.

*** end of addition ***

Cheers for now

Gary

Does your problem happen only using one Rawtherapee ?

[oldgreygary]

Thats what I will have to isolate and identify.

It was happening the other day when I was reading a .PDF file but that would have been with Okular. That, I think is why I need to run through some sequences of using software to isolate where the actual problem is occuring. I tend to use them in combination. e.g. I might start using Digikam, then move to Rawtherapee then back to Digikam. I often use an OpenGL viewer which is an option in Digikam.

As I now know that HD and memory are error free, Rawtherapee seemed the place to start as it is one of the most intensive in terms of processing. I will try running sequences to see if I can get a consistent pattern of when it fails.

Thanks for your help so far


*** Addition ***

Initially it seems as though using Rawtherapee and using the document viewer can cause problems. I noticed that I can use Rawtherapee, process some images then if I step out of this(minimize) and use say, the document viewer Okular this seems to trigger the problem. Using them independently doesn't seem to cause a problem. So, I presume that this could well be down to lack of memory. In some way it seems to cause some sort of corruption which is reflected in the text getting scrambled.

I think that for the moment I will keep on monitoring the situation and try to avoid scenarios were it could be triggered. On my particular setup this will mean running Rawtherapee in isolation. Then at least I can see if it is this program that is on its own causing the problem.

*** End of addition ***



Cheers

Gary