[Solved]Random Freezes

[gryphoninc]

Hi thanks

Ok the PSU is new, the old one died so I installed a new one 600W.

The motherboard seems fine, no capacitors rusty or bulging, everything is as new.

As for the video card, it is the only one I have. I do not have any AGP card installed.

The problem is that this freezing problem only started about two weeks ago, before that everything was working fine.

thanks anyway.

[zorlac]

"PClinuxOS 2012 be too much OS for my old PC? Should I use the XFCE OS system instead?"

When I ran KDE it would freeze up with annoying regularity, so I ditched KDE and went with the XFCE desktop, problem solved.

[T6]

your recommendation, it is a option but doesn't solve the original problem and certainly is discouraging for us kde users, you just say that kde is bad and other de's are good 

not sure what driver are you using with the video card but probably is the right one if you don't report graphical problems, worth to verify which one is, also verify that kde desktop effects are disabled, last time i used a S3 on linux didn't had hardware acceleration so can't do much with desktop effects but can make it crash

fsck sounds useful but also i'm worried for the hard disk itself, hard disks over 5 years tend to do weird things and bad sectors makes weird things like the one you mention, have you done a surface test on a hard disk in the past?  not sure if fsck can do that too

[Archie]

your recommendation, it is a option but doesn't solve the original problem and certainly is discouraging for us kde users, you just say that kde is bad and other de's are good 

not sure what driver are you using with the video card but probably is the right one if you don't report graphical problems, worth to verify which one is, also verify that kde desktop effects are disabled, last time i used a S3 on linux didn't had hardware acceleration so can't do much with desktop effects but can make it crash

fsck sounds useful but also i'm worried for the hard disk itself, hard disks over 5 years tend to do weird things and bad sectors makes weird things like the one you mention, have you done a surface test on a hard disk in the past?  not sure if fsck can do that too

Very true. The OP's specs are good enough to run KDE smoothly and can take advantage of the features KDE can offer. Installing LXDE WILL not solve the problem because the issue goes beyond the DE and could either be a misconfiguration or hardware problem.

[zorlac]

"your recommendation, it is a option but doesn't solve the original problem and certainly is discouraging for us kde users"

I'm not trying to discourage anyone, I'm just stating what worked for me. 

[gryphoninc]

Ok

The hard disk is also new , and yes I did check it.

By the way could it freeze if there was an outside intrusion? I know that at one stage someone tried to hack me, don't know why but it happened and when that occurred it froze.

Continuing to diagnose this problem, desktop effects is not enabled , I do not have any ATI or Nvidia drivers installed, power supply is new, no capacitors loose or corroding............I can only suspect that the KDE4 OS is damaged so my question is how do I reinstall it over the damaged KDE4 without formating my pc. I think this could be the solution, HELP.

Thanks

[Just17]

I would suggest you do a memory test to ensure your memory does not have problems.

There should be a "memtest" option on the liveCD/DVD.

Run it for a couple of hours to see if any  errors are reported.

[T6]

"The hard disk is also new , and yes I did check it."

how did you checked it, when?

the idea of run fsck is determine if there is files damaged or errors in the partition and fix them or if necessary reinstall saving your personal files and then wiping the partitions required to reinstall as quick as possible

about the new psu, i had faulty psus in the past, can you verify the voltages in it the way i mentioned?  the idea is discard completely a hardware error

[CaptainSarcastic]

I agree - memtest and fsck are in order.

Rather like diskcheck in Windows, fsck checks the directory structure and file integrity, and fixes it if need be.  It needs to be run without the filesystem mounted, so doing it from a Live CD is usually easiest.

Let memtest run for a full test sequence (tests 4 and 6 are particularly important) to make sure your RAM is not failing.

Then run fsck to check for any errors caused by hard shutdowns.

[gryphoninc]

Thanks

But how do I do fsck and memtest, do I run it in terminal?

One other thing , when the PC freezes I tried the Alt+Sysrq key while typing reisub but no response.

thanks

[CaptainSarcastic]

I'm not sure if the current Live CDs have it as an option, but it may be an option from GRUB there (I believe it used to be).

Otherwise I'd recommend burning a copy of the Ultimate Boot CD - it's a very handy collection of tools, including memtest86+ (my personal preference for memtest).  It can be found here:  http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html

You can run fsck from the terminal on a live CD, or you could boot the live CD, install Gparted, and run the check using that.

[gryphoninc]

ok
I did a memtest and everything was fine, now I am downloading the ultimate boot cd and I will perform the tests see what happens.

It is really annoying, didn't have this problem while I was on Fedora 16........

Does anyone know whether it could freeze if someone tried hacking my pc?

thanks

[T6]

ultimate boot cd is not required to do memtest, that tool is on out repos and can be used easily

you need to do fsck as mentioned before by using the livecd

[ternor]

If you think the freezing may be caused by hacking, how would that occur?  I had an intrusion problem (not freezing) because of the default settings in my wireless modem which I had foolishly never checked.

[kjpetrie]

There are plenty of threads on this forum telling you how to use fsck. Just search and you will find them.

As for hacking attempts, I did have my computer slow down quite seriously here when I had sshd running and the ssh port forwarded in my router, and someone started bombarding the port with automated log-in attempts, so yes, it is possible if you have external access enabled for some reason.

I have since tidied up my iptables rules to ensure the port is only open to the machine which needs it.

However, a corrupted file system is a more likely cause, and hardware problems are even more likely.

My first computer (1997-2003) would suddenly reboot about every six months for no apparent reason. My second one would sometimes stop suddenly (even the fans) at about the same frequency. I blamed the OS (I was on Windows at the time). Then one day (about ten years after I got my first computer) it happened in the evening when I was working under artificial light, and I discovered the real cause was a momentary drop out of mains power which reset the computer. The BIOS on my first machine had been set to reboot. My second machine was set to stay off. Random problems are difficult to track down and need a methodical approach. Don't guess unless you know how to test the hypothesis.