Suse 11.3 hangs/freezes and I have no idea why.

English Install/Boot/Login
#1

Morning Guys

I installed 11.3 with KDE on Sunday evening. Every thing worked fine.

I installed my hp1020 printer everything worked fine. (added Make and c and C++ packages)

I installed Opera, stil no problem

I tried to play a Audio streaming broadcast. Error message. DO you want to download necessary files. Yes
Also downloaded Realplayer

Then I left the PC to do its thing, as I had to go out.

When I got back the codecs were installed and I wanted to install Realplayer. System hangs

OK reboot.

Since then te system hang intermittently. After a few seconds or few minutes things will just freeze.

The mouse pointer still works but nothing nothing nothing else works. I have to reset via hard reset/ the button on the case.

So I reinstalled 11.3 but the problem still occurs. (with format partition option)

So i thought that somehow 11.3 remembers the options to install the drivers that cause the problem. I say this because some of the desktop changes that I made on the first install, eg change background to blue from green is still activated.

I moved the installation to a new partition on a completely different HD.

Still the same issue

Previously I had 10.? and 11.1 installed but used it for a while and then gave up. This problem however never occurred before.

I am posting this via XP and have no intermittent hanging etc so I doubt wether it is a hdd error or memory or something like that!

As I am a newbie of the prettiest variety I do not know where to find the error logs.

System Intel Core2 CPU 4300 at 1.8GHz
2G RAM
NVIDIA GeForce 6200

Please help!

If you are ever in Madagascar I will buy you a bear or fruit juice!

Thanks!

#2

You will probably want to re-install. It will be a whole lot quicker.

  1. Install needed software via Yast>Software Manager
  2. You will never need to install Real Player (It the biggest load of brown stuff)
  3. Follow this post install: Multi-media and Restricted Format Installation Guide
#3

I will do that!

Thanks so much, I hope!

#4

caf4926

I do this in the normal and not failsafe boot up hey?

#5

I never install anything from a web link like that. Most of them are useless - particularly in Linux.
If in doubt about how to do something, ask here first. And ‘let the reader use discernment’ - don’t necessarily take the first reply as law.

You might want to take a look at parts of this: NEW Users - openSuse Pre-install (general) – PLEASE READ

#6

So i thought that somehow 11.3 remembers the options to install the drivers that cause the problem. I say this because some of the desktop changes that I made on the first install, eg change background to blue from green is still activated.

It may also be worth creating a new user and see if the problem occurs with that new user. In case it is caused by some settings that are accesed in your user directory.

#7

So i thought that somehow 11.3 remembers the options to install the drivers that cause the problem. I say this because some of the desktop changes that I made on the first install, eg change background to blue from green is still activated.

This needs some explanation:
During install you’ve created (at least) 3 partitions:
/ - where openSUSE resides
/home - where the users’ homedirectories are
swap - the swap space
Now on a reinstall, the installer recognizes the /home partition and leaves it untouched, only the “/” partition is reformatted. The folder /home/YOURUSERNAME contains the folders for program and desktop settings (amongst others). Most of them are hidden folders (their names start with a “.”, i.e. /home/YOURUSERNAME/.kde4). Since /home is left untouched during install, your already applied settings will come back after a reinstall. Like your documents, like anything stored in /home/YOURUSERNAME.
Like dvhenry says, if you create a new user, the settings folders for that new user will be created with defaults, so not with the changes you stored in your own /home/YOURUSERNAME. I suggest you do that only in case of real trouble, like desktop crashes etc.

BTW, I see you have an NVIDIA card, do you have the driver for it installed?

#8

Same here,

I am experiencing random system lockups on laptops that were working properly on 11.2

The hardware (quite old, I know, but they do what they have to do: analysing the network):
Pentium M 1.6
1 GB Ram
ATI Radeon 9600 (RV350 NP), radeon driver.
OS: OpenSuse 11.3 totally updated

It happens at random, mostly when using the latest Firefox (3.6.8) in the repository. Rolling back to an older version of Firefox seem to reduce the lockups, but they are still here. It’s not completely related to Firefox, since it also happens in Google Chrome, although even less. Flash may be involved, but it also happens with sites without flash

The system completely locks up, I cannot ping it any more, or have access to it using ssh…
What deviates from the default config: Firewall is disabled, no desktop effects, network manager is disabled.

I cannot find anything in the logs, it just crashed…

Big bummer for a otherwise very nice version of openSUSE.

Any hints are very welcome.

Steven

#9

It may also be worth creating a new user and see if the problem occurs with that new user. In case it is caused by some settings that are accesed in your user directory.

One further note, when I stated create a new user, I don’t mean replace the current user, I mean to have an extra user to do this testing with.
There are other other steps that can be taken if this proves to be related to the desktop, and not video drivers etc.

#10

if you create a new user, the settings folders for that new user will be created with defaults, so not with the changes you stored in your own /home/YOURUSERNAME. I suggest you do that only in case of real trouble, like desktop crashes etc.

I do this either during install or just after, then check that it works well, then leave it, as I have found a second user account to be useful for trouble shooting.
I use the QT based KDE, I also install a GTK based window manager, for the same reason. I find I usually have something to fall back on, and an easier diagnosis of the problem.

#11

Likewise, on my systems there’s always a user called ‘gebruiker’ which is dutch for ‘user’, as there’s one called ‘beheerder’ which means ‘administrator’.

The first one is an account that I can clean out completely when needed because it’s for testing purposes only
The latter is meant to do the post install updates for f.e. KDE
Then, since it’s there, I always install LXDE next to KDE, just to have a working desktop when KDE is messed up in a way I cannot fix.

BTW I stopped using QT packages from the QT repos. They never gave me any advantage, like having KDE4 4.5 does.

#12

BTW I stopped using QT packages from the QT repos. They never gave me any advantage, like having KDE4 4.5 does.

I don’t use the Qt repos either.

#13

Hi nijs, I feel that this differs enough from the original post to deserve its own thread. I’m thinking different issues at work here.

#14

Your issue is different from the original post.

You may be a flashplayer victim. Next time your PC seems to hang try this,

open a terminal session | mouse right click | Open in terminal

then in the terminal session:

 pkill -9 npviewer]

If that releases your screens then it’s a flashplayer issue.

#15

I am trying to follow caf4926 installation instructions but I keep getting this in the terminal
Multi-media and Restricted Format Installation Guide

What do I do now?

Retrieving repository ‘openSUSE-11.3-Non-Oss’ metadata ]
File ‘/repodata/repomd.xml’ not found on medium ‘http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/11.3/repo/non-oss/’

Abort, retry, ignore? [a/r/i/?] (a): i
Retrieving repository ‘openSUSE-11.3-Non-Oss’ metadata [error]
Repository ‘openSUSE-11.3-Non-Oss’ is invalid.
Can’t provide /repodata/repomd.xml : User-requested skipping of a file
Please check if the URIs defined for this repository are pointing to a valid repository.
Skipping repository ‘openSUSE-11.3-Non-Oss’ because of the above error.
Retrieving repository ‘openSUSE-11.3-Oss’ metadata /]
File ‘/repodata/repomd.xml’ not found on medium ‘http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/11.3/repo/oss/’

Abort, retry, ignore? [a/r/i/?] (a):

#16

I think you need to remove the repos OSS and NON-OSS and then add them back again.
Yast > Software > Repositories

Is this the first time you used them?

You can always go to a mirror near to you asa well
openSUSE Download Mirrors - 11.3

#17

Hello all,

I posted a new thread for this issue.

Tararpharazon, the system totally locks up, the only way to kill it is with the power button…

Thanks for spending some time on this.

Regards,

Steven

#18

Hello,

On the OP, I no longer spend time looking to solve multimedia problems with the restricted format things…
I simply install VLC, plays everything I want…

Regards,

Steven

#19

Hello, the freezes are already known and our friends from the community and the engineers are going to work on it:
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=625339

#20

ClrScr wrote:

> Morning Guys
>
> I installed 11.3 with KDE on Sunday evening. Every thing worked fine.
>
> I installed my hp1020 printer everything worked fine. (added Make and
> c and C++ packages)
>
> I installed Opera, stil no problem
>
> I tried to play a Audio streaming broadcast. Error message. DO you
> want to download necessary files. Yes
> Also downloaded Realplayer
>
> Then I left the PC to do its thing, as I had to go out.
>
> When I got back the codecs were installed and I wanted to install
> Realplayer. System hangs
>
> OK reboot.
>
> Since then te system hang intermittently. After a few seconds or few
> minutes things will just freeze.

Has your disk run full? I had that happen to two systems. See bug:

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=626253

I think it has been resolved by the 11.3 updates.

–
Per Jessen, Zürich (15.1°C)
http://en.opensuse.org/User:pjessen