Help with computer not waking from sleep

[SuperKev]

Hi,

I have posted on this recently but the thread kind of got side tracked. I don't know if this is a hardware or software issue but I think it is most likely hardware.

I can set the screen saver and it works fine and I can even bring my PC back from the screen saver by moving the mouse, IF it is within a short time frame, but if I leave my PC alone for several hours, 3-4 for instance, the screen saver will be frozen and when I move the mouse or hit a keyboard key I get nada.

At first I thought it was related to my Mobo (Gigabyte GA-8IPE1000-G) as I saw several posts on the net about it having this issue, but then I saw that other Mobo's appear to have it as well, I have already changed out the weak PSU that came with this when I bought it (Used Craigslist) and that actually seemed to help as I was not getting freezes from just normal activity, then I noticed my HD throwing sector errors and I changed that out as well. I thought that was the end of the problem as it seemed to be running well and it was waking from the screen saver even after a couple hours. But I went away tonight for an extended period and the PC was frozen up again and required a hard reboot. I did buy a new SATA HD this evening to replace the IDE drive installed currently but I don't think that will fix the issue.

So, could it be the old GFX card I am having to use right now (GF2 MX440 128MB AGP) or something else? That is the only thing I can think of as perhaps being connected to my monitor with a VGA connector might be an issue, but when I was on PCLOS 2009 and later the first release of 2010, sleep/ suspend worked fine and I could leave it on all night and just move the mouse in the morning and it would all just come right up. So that brings me back to it being hardware again.

I have tried all the stuff in the stickied thread about this except the script that is posted there as I do not know how to use that. If someone could instruct me I will sure give it a try.

I placed the line that is suggested in that thread in my xorg.conf file but I am not sure if I put it in the right place, in any case I have seen no change.

My only other thought is that it seems that PCLOS has installed both the 96.xx and the 173.xx proprietary Nvidia drivers on this machine and I believe I only need the 96.xx with my particular card- Could this be causing a conflict and locking up my PC or preventing wake up?

I apologize for the length of this post but I figure better too much info than too little and I really need desperately to get this sorted. I have learned my lesson about buying used on Craigslist too I think.

Any help would be very, very much appreciated. Here are my specs:

Intel P4 Dual core 3.0 GHz CPU

Gigabyte GA-8IPE1000-G Mobo

GF2 MX 440 128MB GFX Card

3GB PC 3200 RAM

[Was_Just19]

Do you have the opportunity to swap out the video card for something a little better?

That card is both old and was budget at the time it was released I believe.

It is what I would suspect .......

You could also uninstall the 173 nVidia driver and retain the 96 which should be the one being used for that card .....

NVIDIA kernel module for most NVIDIA GeForce2/3/4 class video cards.
This is to be used with the nvidia-96xx package.

[SuperKev]

I tried an old, but higher spec, AGP card I had forgot I still had but it appears to be dead, no signal. I tried uninstalling the 173.xx drivers but found that I could then not have any resolution above 1024x768 without them.

The odd thing is on my old PC that I was using for this purpose I had a MX400 64MB card (lower spec than the one I currently have) and suspend/hibernate worked fine and it was still working on my LCD screen. That machine was ~9 years old and were it not for a power spike one day a month ago it would probably still be happily chugging along.

I think the bottom line is I wasted 100 bucks on a useless PC. I am half tempted to put XP on it just to see if suspend etc works with Windows, but then I would feel dirty. LOL

[Was_Just19]

After uninstalling the nVidia 173 driver, go into PCC and set up your card to use an nVidia driver and it *should* use the 96 driver if it is installed.

Reboot and see what the effect is.

[menotu]

to see if suspend etc works with Windows,

"Suspend" that thought!!   

[SuperKev]

to see if suspend etc works with Windows,

"Suspend" that thought!!   

Will do. I guess I just don't want to believe I was stupid enough to get scammed to the tune of 100 bucks. "Does it suspend and hibernate?" is just not a question I would have even thought to ask.

I am leaning towards the Mobo just plain being bad but finding a P4 mobo that will handle the P4 dual core is probably next to impossible. If it worked with it's specs it would probably make a pretty decent machine for using Linux.

[Was_Just19]

What version of PCLOS have you installed?  I did not see it above ...  maybe missed it.

Just FYI  I installed LXDE Full (new version) on an old Dell P4 single core with 4MB nvoard graphics ana a total of only 256MB RAM. Dang thing installed in about 6 mins!

Anyway, I can Suspend to ram, and pressing the on/off button on the front of the machine brings it right back up.
I also just now tried Hibernate - Suspend to disk - and it saved to disc.
Switching back on restarted the OS but it picked up the saned session from the Swap partition and came up properly.

In both cases I had Clemtine playing some music when I selected to suspend ......  and in both cases Clemtine picked right up where it had left off, continuing to play as if nothing had happened. I did not have to tell Clemtine to play after resuming .....  it just continued from where it stopped. I was quite impressed. 

All of the above is by way of explanation only, but it does make me wonder

1.  if you have inspected the CPU/Heatsik to ensure there is no dust in there and that the thermal paste is intact or not dried out.

2.  After that I would be suggesting maybe a parallel install on a small partition of LXDE ....  it is light on resources.

3.  How much Swap space do you have?
With 3GB of RAM you could need up to >6GB of contiguous Swap space to successfully Swap to disk.

regards.

[Was_Just19]

After all that I had a search and came up with this

http://www1.dealtime.com/Gigabyte-MB-GIGABYTE-GA-8IPE1000G-ATX-RET/prices

Miscellaneous
Power Configurations    Suspend to RAM
Regulatory Approval    CE
Bios Type    Flash ROM
UPC    818313001917

[SuperKev]

What version of PCLOS have you installed?  I did not see it above ...  maybe missed it.

Just FYI  I installed LXDE Full (new version) on an old Dell P4 single core with 4MB nvoard graphics ana a total of only 256MB RAM. Dang thing installed in about 6 mins!

Anyway, I can Suspend to ram, and pressing the on/off button on the front of the machine brings it right back up.
I also just now tried Hibernate - Suspend to disk - and it saved to disc.
Switching back on restarted the OS but it picked up the saned session from the Swap partition and came up properly.

In both cases I had Clemtine playing some music when I selected to suspend ......  and in both cases Clemtine picked right up where it had left off, continuing to play as if nothing had happened. I did not have to tell Clemtine to play after resuming .....  it just continued from where it stopped. I was quite impressed. 

All of the above is by way of explanation only, but it does make me wonder

1.  if you have inspected the CPU/Heatsik to ensure there is no dust in there and that the thermal paste is intact or not dried out.

2.  After that I would be suggesting maybe a parallel install on a small partition of LXDE ....  it is light on resources.

3.  How much Swap space do you have?
With 3GB of RAM you could need up to >6GB of contiguous Swap space to successfully Swap to disk.

regards.

I have installed the Gnome version 2010.07 currently. Right now I am running with only 1 GB RAM because I had removed some of the sticks to try to determine if it was bad RAM making my issues. I had set a 3GB swap thinking that was enough, I have in the past only had ~1GB swaps on other installs I have done and had that on my other machine where all this was working properly.

Oddly, I was thinking it sure seemed to be a heat issue at first but did not think that would effect suspend or hibernate. I will check out the CPU and see what condition the thermal paste is in. Could that have affected the suspend/hibernate function? I can see it making the PC freeze up.

I am typing this now from the Zen-Mini Live CD just to see how it works. Seems pretty good. Sure am not looking forward to yet another install process but I need to have my work station. I just can't do all I need to on my laptop.

[SuperKev]

Zen Mini froze up right after I posted that, But we may be on to something, I have the PC open and the heatsink/CPU out, the thermal paste looked very spotty and not smooth. This fool told me he built this himself so I am wondering if he even knew what he was doing. I don't have any arctic silver or anything but I have some standard I think ceramic based that should work (?)

On the bottom of the heat sink it has what appears to be a metallic 'sticker' or something of the sort. I am not familiar with Intel as I have always used AMD, is this supposed to be there or is it something that should have been removed by the builder?

But this, perhaps, might have been the root of my ills. I am guessing one more reinstall won't kill me at this point so if all works well I will do it again, put all my RAM back in to give me back my 3GB, and set a 6GB swap as suggested.

I am thinking the freezes during synaptic updates makes more sense now as the CPU would be working hard and getting pretty warm, causing the freezing issue, and leaving it on for extended period would do the same thus freezing will still in suspend or hibernate and not being able to wake from it.

That sound right?

[Was_Just19]

On the bottom of the heat sink it has what appears to be a metallic 'sticker' or something of the sort. I am not familiar with Intel as I have always used AMD, is this supposed to be there or is it something that should have been removed by the builder?

This sounds like the 'double sided' tape that is shipped with heatsinks these days in place of thermal paste. It is thermally conductive ....  but not great IMO.

If this is what it is then it should be removed carefully along with any other stuff adhering to the heatsink.
You would need to do the same thing with the CPU.

Both surfaces need to be extremely clean prior to placing a very thin film of thermal paste on one of them.
The pressure of the heatisink mounting should essentially expell most of the paste and what remains should fill any microscopic voids in the two surfaces. Thus giving better contact.

Whether or not this is the root cause of your problem it still needs to be attended to as a matter of urgency.

It will be interesting to see if that changes the behaviour in any way ......

regards.

[SuperKev]

On the bottom of the heat sink it has what appears to be a metallic 'sticker' or something of the sort. I am not familiar with Intel as I have always used AMD, is this supposed to be there or is it something that should have been removed by the builder?

This sounds like the 'double sided' tape that is shipped with heatsinks these days in place of thermal paste. It is thermally conductive ....  but not great IMO.

If this is what it is then it should be removed carefully along with any other stuff adhering to the heatsink.
You would need to do the same thing with the CPU.

Both surfaces need to be extremely clean prior to placing a very thin film of thermal paste on one of them.
The pressure of the heatisink mounting should essentially expell most of the paste and what remains should fill any microscopic voids in the two surfaces. Thus giving better contact.

Whether or not this is the root cause of your problem it still needs to be attended to as a matter of urgency.

It will be interesting to see if that changes the behaviour in any way ......

regards.

Right. I have cleaned the CPU and the heat sink using a Q-Tip and ISO alcohol, as I ahve done in the past, but left the sticker on until heard from some one more familiar with Intel. I did some looking while waiting to see a post back and have read that the thermal 'sticker' is only good for use one time anyhow so I will get a razor blade and scrape it off then clean again with alcohol.

This may or may not have been the what is causing everything but, I would say the symptoms are consistent with an overheating CPU, would you agree?

I certainly appreciate you helping me get this sorted. Results to follow in a little bit.

[Was_Just19]

On the bottom of the heat sink it has what appears to be a metallic 'sticker' or something of the sort. I am not familiar with Intel as I have always used AMD, is this supposed to be there or is it something that should have been removed by the builder?

This sounds like the 'double sided' tape that is shipped with heatsinks these days in place of thermal paste. It is thermally conductive ....  but not great IMO.

If this is what it is then it should be removed carefully along with any other stuff adhering to the heatsink.
You would need to do the same thing with the CPU.

Both surfaces need to be extremely clean prior to placing a very thin film of thermal paste on one of them.
The pressure of the heatisink mounting should essentially expell most of the paste and what remains should fill any microscopic voids in the two surfaces. Thus giving better contact.

Whether or not this is the root cause of your problem it still needs to be attended to as a matter of urgency.

It will be interesting to see if that changes the behaviour in any way ......

regards.

Right. I have cleaned the CPU and the heat sink using a Q-Tip and ISO alcohol, as I ahve done in the past, but left the sticker on until heard from some one more familiar with Intel. I did some looking while waiting to see a post back and have read that the thermal 'sticker' is only good for use one time anyhow so I will get a razor blade and scrape it off then clean again with alcohol.

This may or may not have been the what is causing everything but, I would say the symptoms are consistent with an overheating CPU, would you agree?

I certainly appreciate you helping me get this sorted. Results to follow in a little bit.

Some of the problems are definitely consistent with an overheat problem, and the others might be related also.
If that heatsink was not "stuck" to the CPU then it was not of much use. It may have been removed and replaced at some time which could have left it ....  well .... not optimum.

Whether or not this sorts some or all of the problems, from your description it badly needed to be done. So in that respect it is not a waste of time.

regards.

[SuperKev]

Looks like we may have cracked it my friend. I should have gone with my first thought that it was acting as if it was overheating than all the other stuff I did. I just now left it for about 45 minutes, screen had gone black and when I moved the mouse it came right back up. The test will be a bit later tonight when I am gone a couple hours, but as of now it seems to be working.

I guess I can reinstall my RAM as well so I can get back my full 3GB. Do you think I should do a reinstall of the whole OS?

When I took the Intel thermal pad off it seemed as if it was some black material covered with a tin foil like material, I don't know, but I wonder if that was supposed to be removed first. I did get Open Office installed too and that was blowing up every time I tried it before.

Lesson learned: Check your hardware.

Thanks for helping me kind of sort out my thought process with your posts and thoughts, I was so frustrated I was ready to install a small charge of high explosive and see if the old axiom was correct

Will let you know how it does after sitting a few hours. But hopefully that was the issue all along. We shall see.

[Was_Just19]

I am glad to hear that at least some of the problems have been sorted out.

In your position, as soon as you are sure that the hardware is continuing to operate correctly, I would definitely do a reinstall.

You will just never be sure in the future, if something goes awry, if it is the fault of a bad update, or something new.

So yes ....  I recommend a new install ......  including /home ......  as harsh as that seems.

Aim for long term stability rather than short term easy-way.

When I took the Intel thermal pad off it seemed as if it was some black material covered with a tin foil like material, I don't know, but I wonder if that was supposed to be removed first.

If it was under the pad then it was meant to be there I would guess.


regards.