[mythtvnz] Pointers on how to track down machine lockup

[Wade Maxfield]

On 25/10/2010, at 2:45 PM, Solor Vox wrote:

> Also, how good is your power from the mains?  Any power protection
> surge/UPS in fault condition?  If you're comfortable with bash, I'd
> suggest writing a wee script to log CPU load, free memory,
> temperatures/etc. and current date/time to a file every few 20-30 seconds.
> 
> A kernel panic could cause a reboot as well.  Have you changed or looked
> at /etc/sysctl.conf for kernel.panic times?  (or look at sysctl -a)
> 
> Cheers,
> sV

No panics to report, but it's still randomly rebooting.  No hard lock ups in the last month but at least 5 random reboots. 

$ sysctl -a | grep panic
kernel.panic = 0
kernel.panic_on_oops = 0
kernel.unknown_nmi_panic = 0
kernel.panic_on_unrecovered_nmi = 0
kernel.panic_on_io_nmi = 0
kernel.softlockup_panic = 0
kernel.hung_task_panic = 0
vm.panic_on_oom = 0
fs.xfs.panic_mask = 0

I've switched out the motherboard for a different model, and I've even moved the PCI cards (2 x DVB-S, 1xPVR 350) to different slots. Since doing both of those, I've had 2 reboots, one 2 days ago, and another 3 hours ago.

I've gone back to the original PSU (the newer 650W) since the random reboots happened while using the old 430W as well.

The temperatures at the time of the last reboot were all low (34-37° CPU, 31-34° HD), and scanning through my logs, 56° is the max the CPU has ever reached and 42° is the highest any HD has reached. So I don't think temps are a problem.


2010-11-29 21:22:01 
top - 21:22:02 up 2 days,  3:54,  1 user,  load average: 1.21, 1.04, 0.92
Tasks: 301 total,   1 running, 300 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu(s):  1.5%us,  0.2%sy,  0.0%ni, 98.1%id,  0.1%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Mem:   3922116k total,  3891028k used,    31088k free,     2844k buffers
Swap:  3906552k total,      116k used,  3906436k free,  2964492k cached

  PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND            
29154 mythtv    20   0  434m  67m  22m S   14  1.8   4:43.21 mythcommflag       
29176 mythtv    20   0  431m  64m  22m S   10  1.7   5:14.20 mythcommflag       
29779 mythtv    20   0  430m  65m  22m S   10  1.7   2:06.94 mythcommflag       
 1584 mythtv    20   0  825m  85m 7228 S    8  2.2  43:09.32 mythbackend        
 1956 myth      20   0 52488 2632 1888 S    2  0.1   1:30.67 gvfsd-trash        

fan1:       1530 RPM  (min =   10 RPM)
Core 0:      +37.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
Core 1:      +34.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
Core 2:      +36.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
Core 3:      +35.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
/dev/sda: ST3500418AS: 33 C
/dev/sdb: ST31000528AS: 31 C
/dev/sdc: ST31000528AS: 34 C


Then about a minute after booting, with 3 commflag jobs getting up to speed

2010-11-29 21:24:01 
top - 21:24:01 up 1 min,  1 user,  load average: 1.50, 0.45, 0.15
Tasks: 316 total,   4 running, 312 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu(s): 13.8%us,  3.8%sy,  0.0%ni, 75.6%id,  6.5%wa,  0.1%hi,  0.2%si,  0.0%st
Mem:   3922116k total,  2017100k used,  1905016k free,    79184k buffers
Swap:  3906552k total,        0k used,  3906552k free,  1367092k cached

  PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND            
 2303 mythtv    20   0  421m  61m  22m R  100  1.6   0:29.45 mythcommflag       
 2329 mythtv    20   0  426m  60m  22m R  100  1.6   0:24.89 mythcommflag       
 2344 mythtv    20   0  426m  60m  22m R  100  1.6   0:16.30 mythcommflag       
 1835 mythtv    20   0  786m  66m  22m S    6  1.7   0:03.90 mythbackend        
 1344 mysql     20   0  255m  48m 7492 S    2  1.3   0:10.54 mysqld             

fan1:       1530 RPM  (min =   10 RPM)
Core 0:      +44.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
Core 1:      +47.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
Core 2:      +49.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
Core 3:      +48.0 C  (high = +84.0 C, crit = +100.0 C)  
/dev/sda: ST3500418AS: 33 C
/dev/sdb: ST31000528AS: 31 C
/dev/sdc: ST31000528AS: 34 C


Could it be something as simple, yet non obvious, as the Core i7 hyper threading being enabled? Or the Turbo boost technology being enabled?

 - Wade