Random crashes - require power off & reboot
Forum: User Feedback
Topic: Random crashes - require power off & reboot
started by: yangmusa
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 28 2007,19:57
I think this error occurs only when running Firefox 2.0 (from mydsl) or Opera 9 (also from mydsl). Out of nowhere, the entire OS locks up solid. I've tried waiting a good 5 minutes or so, but the machine never unfreezes. It seems the only solution is to cut the power and reboot.Any ideas what it could be?
In case hardware might be important:
Fujitsu Lifebook B2131
400 MHz Celeron, 192 MB ram
IDE-CF adapter, 512 MB CF card
Netgear W511t pcmcia wlan card
I never have trouble with Dillo, but it seems just too limited for any "web 2.0" type apps - Gmail, Google docs etc. Plus Dillo doesn't even seem to remember my cookies between sessions, for example for this forum..
thanks, Magnus
Posted by roberts on Aug. 28 2007,20:34
You need to drastically reduce the default cache size for any browser not already included in the base DSL.
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 28 2007,20:42
Thanks for the always speedy replies!I've now reduced the cache from 20mb to 2mb - I'll see how I go from here.
cheers, Magnus
Posted by florian on Aug. 28 2007,21:21
My computer is more modest than the one mentionned above and I sometimes have this with the default Firefox 1.0.6 and also sometimes with Dillo. The entire system just freeze and I need to switch the machine off.anyone got any tips?
would increase my swap partition help?
would newer kernel in DSL4 help?
how can i decrease browsers' cache size?
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 28 2007,21:27
In Firefox 2.0 it's under Edit> Preferences > Advanced > Network > Cache. In 1.0 it may be somewhere else, but certainly look under Edit > Preferences - it'll be there somewhere.So far my new and reduced cache seems to have done the trick. I've now been running Firefox for at least 30 minutes, must be something of a record
Magnus
Posted by WDef on Aug. 28 2007,21:45
Florian - | Quote |
| entire system just freeze and I need to switch the machine off. |
Does sound like you're running out of memory - if so increasing your swap may help.
How "modest" is your machine?
If you search the forum you will find some additional settings ("hacks") for Firefox' about:config that will limit the amount of memory FF can hog, also the number of pages it can cache in ram for back browsing (different to the disk cache), and some other things. I posted some and so did other people.
(NB: On a low spec machine you should probably not use the setting that starts loading pages before FF has finished composing them - it's resource intensive).
Posted by florian on Aug. 28 2007,22:34
I used a 32mb machine. I also have a 128mb P2 400Mhz on which I had not created a swap partition yet.Thanks for the tips.
I'll search the forums for the firefox hacks.
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 28 2007,22:35
So I guess limiting cache wasn't the silver bullet on this one.. Firefox froze the system again, although this time it was up for over an hour first and I was in the process of opening Google Calendar. I did a search on the forum for about:config but didn't find anything. I also searched for "firefox AND memory", but that didn't turn up anything either.
Grateful for any further ideas..
Magnus
Posted by WDef on Aug. 28 2007,22:46
http://damnsmalllinux.org/static/act=ST;f=26;t=17285;hl=firefox+and+memoryBTW, the problem I was having in my post in that thread was fixed by using swap.
If on a low mem machine you should also search the forums for lots of hints - only use uci and unc extensions, use "minimal" theme, avoid java apps etc etc There have been some good threads on this.
I've never run dsl on low spec machines. You'd probably want to set browser.cache.memory.capacity lower than 16.
For 32MB RAM I'm not sure trying to run FF at all is a good idea?
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 28 2007,23:12
| Quote (WDef @ Aug. 28 2007,15:46) |
| http://damnsmalllinux.org/static/act=ST;f=26;t=17285;hl=firefox+and+memory BTW, the problem I was having in my post in that thread was fixed by using swap. |
Thanks for the link - I've tried that and will see how long I can run for now.. Actually, I guess I should reboot first, to make sure my changes are saved. Sigh.
My machine is 400MHz with 192mb physical ram, I didn't think it was so low end that I would run into any issues like this. I'm booting from a compact flash card, so I'm running in ram and don't want to enable cache.
Posted by roberts on Aug. 29 2007,06:02
My main machine is a 400Mhz 192MB. I run FF all day without issues. I do have a swap partition but then it rarely gets used. But then, I spend more time programming than being on the web.Are you running many .dsl and .tar.gz mydsl extensions?
Are you using many plugins?
What does the free command show?
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 29 2007,07:07
The only plugin likely to be running is usually Firefox or Opera and JRE, though I have quite a few downloaded on my persistent home. They are all .uciTo make a typical usage case, I started aterm, ted, opera and emelfm. When I ran the 'free' command, it says total memory 192mb, used 146, free 44. The display on the desktop says Ram usage: 39.8/187M - 21%. That's quite dramatically different, which should I believe?
Magnus
Posted by curaga on Aug. 29 2007,15:25
With free you don't count buffers and cache into used memory (ie subtract them and you will get the same result as the bar in torsmo). Free does count them into that, but it's no big deal, they are freed the second that ram is needed..
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 29 2007,16:33
| Quote (curaga @ Aug. 29 2007,08:25) |
| Free does count them into that, but it's no big deal, they are freed the second that ram is needed.. |
Ok, so either way it doesn't look like I'm running low on ram?
I forgot to mention - since I'm booting from a CF card, I'm running with no swap and the 'toram' boot option. So there's no flexibility on that upper limit.
Which is incidentally why I ended up choosing DSL over Puppy. I started out with Puppy, being slightly less minimalistic, some useful scripts & GUI things for n00bs. But it created a swap file without me noticing it, until I wondered why the hard drive light was flashing.. DSL has more of a learning curve, but at least it isn't second-guessing me like that!
Posted by roberts on Aug. 29 2007,17:58
I would try without 'toram'.Also, seeing JRE, if you hit a site with Java then that would consume much memory.
Running without swap on 192MB means as soon as your free memory is consumed you will freeze/crash.
You almost need to be monitoring your free memory available.
Without a swap, perhaps you should consider some of the lowram boot options available with DSL.
See F2 and F3 at the initial boot prompt.
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 29 2007,18:29
| Quote (roberts @ Aug. 29 2007,10:58) |
| I would try without 'toram'. Running without swap on 192MB means as soon as your free memory is consumed you will freeze/crash. You almost need to be monitoring your free memory available. Without a swap, perhaps you should consider some of the lowram boot options available with DSL. See F2 and F3 at the initial boot prompt. |
I'm running toram and without swap since I've installed DSL on a compact flash card. I was under the impression that I needed to do this to minimize writes to the CF card. What would happen if I didn't run toram?
I chose the CF card for silent running, and I chose DSL so I could run a modern OS & apps on older hardware (hence I don't want to go minimal). I guess I'll just have to decide which feature is more important to me.. If I keep getting problems with crashes, I may end up getting a hard drive so I can use swap.
OR, I suppose my CF-IDE adapter has two slots. I could buy a cheap CF card and "sacrifice" it as swap space?
Posted by roberts on Aug. 29 2007,19:25
It is writes that will cause failures on CF not reads.You have unlimited read capabilities on CF/Pendrive devices.
You have a limited number of writes.
So going without toram is not an issue.
Even using DSL's backup restore onto a CF/Pendrive partition is much easier on these devices than installing and running traditionally on such device. We are in a sense using the device as a huge floppy drive.
Running DSL without toram is still like running from the read-only CDROM. In fact, you can eliminate the frugal boot option to force a true read-only parttion and use a second parition for backups, or a secondary removable device for backups, e.g., another CF, a pendrive, a usb mini-hardrive, or even the web.
Selecting jwm is lighter than using fluxbox, not running torsmo is lighter too. Not staring dillo is lighter, not constantly running wmswallow/dmix & mount.app but instead selecting from menu or make an icon for them using icontool. Not displaying a background image. These are all things you can do to maximize use of low memory systems.
DSL does not force decisions on the user, we are more of a construction kit and allow much freedom in how you setup your machine.
However, 192 MB running to toram, no swap, and expecting JAVA/Firefox to run is pushing the limits.
Posted by ^thehatsrule^ on Aug. 31 2007,03:56
A possible alternative: did you try the small swap-in-ramdisk technique?| Quote |
| I could buy a cheap CF card and "sacrifice" it as swap space? |
Posted by yangmusa on Aug. 31 2007,04:36
> did you try the small swap-in-ramdisk technique?No - I haven't even heard of that. Sounds interesting, but a little counter-intuitive. I mean, if part of ram is set aside as a swap disk, then it won't be available for other stuff?
Anyway, I found a 2GB microdrive on sale for $15 (yes, really!) so I'll set that up as swap. Until then, I'm trying to be a little more disciplined about not leaving too many programs running at once.
I'm hoping that swap will be used relatively rarely, so I should still mostly get the silent running benefits of booting from CF.
Posted by yangmusa on Sep. 11 2007,21:58
The microdrive hasn't arrived yet, so in the meantime I've implemented most of your suggestions:* booting without the toram option - no noticable performance penalty
*]using the supplied Firefox 1.0 instead of the 2.0 .dsl - I can do pretty much all I need to using this
* changed wm from Fluxbox to JWM. I wish JWM was themable, but I guess I can live with its looks. I'm getting used to it
The reason I originally went to 2.0 was that I thought I needed it to run AdBlock Pro - without which I just can't stand to use some of my preferred sites. Then I found that AdBlock is still available and also compatible with Firefox 1.0 - so I can browse without all the annoying ads. I haven't run into any sites I use that don't work with 1.0, so I think I'm in the clear.
Since making these changes I've