I have an Acer Aspire 5010 laptop (x86_64) running Opensuse 11.0 with the latest updates from the repositories, KDE3 and fglrx (8.11).
The screen regularly freezes with no keyboard or mouse input possible. It happens in bursts with several hours of normal use followed by four or five crashes within 10 or 15 minutes of each other. It can be the other way round - crashes first - so its not overheating.
I am often running Firefox when it crashes often it seems just as I click a scroll bar or link - but it can crash from the desktop. It does not crash when I am playing Morrowind under Wine so it does not seem to be graphics related.
I have set up a crash kernel and usually when the main kernel crashes, the crash kernel takes over and gives me a dump of the computers state when it crashed.
Strictly, it freezes, then maybe 15 seconds later the fan goes onto overdrive and maybe 5 or 10 seconds later the crash kernel takes over - so I cannot be quite sure what the dump is looking at.
I use Crash to look at the dump and that is where the problems start as I do not really know where to look or what to look at.
I usually print the log and usually there is a message at the end to the effect “GPE …”, then it says that the last sysfile was to the battery charge full file. Then I get a back trace which always has an interrupt call as the first item - often an interrupt from SSB - but not always. But the last file is always battery charge full - even when it is not even on charge.
I am interested in any advice or suggestions anyone can offer either as to what the problem might be - or where to look next on Crash.
Just to clarify my original post, please see the end of the log file where the crash is detailed below
general protection fault: 0000 [1] SMP
last sysfs file: /sys/devices/LNXSYSTM:00/device:00/PNP0A03:00/device:0c/PNP0C09:00/PNP0C0A:00/power_supply/BAT0/charge_full
CPU 0
Modules linked in: iptable_filter ip_tables ip6table_filter ip6_tables x_tables ircomm_tty ircomm snd_pcm_oss snd_mixer_oss snd_seq snd_seq_device ipv6 af_packet rfkill_input binfmt_misc cpufreq_conservative cpufreq_userspace cpufreq_powersave powernow_k8 fuse reiserfs loop dm_mod arc4 ecb crypto_blkcipher b43 rfkill mac80211 cfg80211 input_polldev snd_atiixp snd_ac97_codec irda ac97_bus acer_wmi rtc_cmos snd_pcm rtc_core ssb snd_timer video ohci1394 yenta_socket pcmcia led_class crc_ccitt rtc_lib battery ac output snd rsrc_nonstatic usb_storage i2c_piix4 soundcore ieee1394 pcmcia_core r8169 firmware_class wmi k8temp button sr_mod fglrx(P) joydev cdrom i2c_core serio_raw snd_page_alloc sg sd_mod ehci_hcd ohci_hcd usbcore edd ext3 mbcache jbd fan pata_atiixp libata scsi_mod dock thermal processor
Pid: 1929, comm: hald-addon-stor Tainted: P AN 2.6.25.18-0.2-default #1
RIP: 0010:<ffffffff880eed1a>] <ffffffff880eed1a>] :usbcore:usb_hcd_irq+0x87/0x88
RSP: 0018:ffffffff807e4f30 EFLAGS: 00010282
RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: ffff81004dc93bc0 RCX: 0000000000000000
RDX: 0000000000000004 RSI: 0000000000000000 RDI: 0000000000000282
RBP: cccccccccccccccc R08: 0000000000000073 R09: ffffffff807ecf88
R10: 0000000000000022 R11: ffffffff8023caf9 R12: 0000000000000000
R13: 0000000000000000 R14: 0000000000000013 R15: 0000000000000022
FS: 00007f1d73aed740(0000) GS:ffffffff80632000(0000) knlGS:00000000f7c626c0
CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 000000008005003b
CR2: 000000007aeb3000 CR3: 000000004b8d1000 CR4: 00000000000006e0
DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000
DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000ffff0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400
Process hald-addon-stor (pid: 1929, threadinfo ffff81004c92a000, task ffff81004bcc40c0)
Stack: cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc
cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc
cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc cccccccccccccccc
Call Trace:
Inexact backtrace:
Code: 01 00 00 00 75 11 48 89 df e8 19 ff ff ff be 01 00 00 00 eb 02 31 f6 4c 89 e7 57 ff 15 60 82 51 f8 5f 41 5b 5b 5b 89 f0 41 5c c9 <c3> 55 48 89 e5 41 54 53 48 89 fb 48 c7 c7 b8 76 11 88 e8 71 ab
RIP <ffffffff880eed1a>] :usbcore:usb_hcd_irq+0x87/0x88
RSP <ffffffff807e4f30>
I have seen some posts about ReiserFS causing crashes but note that it is only used on the home directories - not the lib or usr ones that the kernel operates from.
I can offer a few more clues.
I tried turning off all the power saving options in Kpowersave and suddenly the laptop stopped crashing. Then I turned cpu mode back to dynamic and the crashes started again. It also did not like powersave mode (slow cpu) but the evidence is limited, I did not leave it on there beyond the first crash. So its now running at high speed and I am enjoying continuous use.
So the problem seems to be around power saving and charging.
I found a new bios for the laptop last night so I am going to try upgrading to that - see what happens.
Any other ideas from anyone?