System "freezes" maybe randomly

Hi,
since March I’m using openSUSE 12.2 and then after its release 12.3 version. Sometimes, without apparent reason the system freezes. I’m not able anymore to move the mouse pointer nor give any Key commands (as for example CTRL+ALT+BACKSPACE or whatever). Everything that was open is still being displayed on the screen, but I can’t interact with it, it’s simply frozen.
Curiously, the system seems to continue working, as the Harddisk still makes noise and the LED blinks, but I have no other choices than press the reset button :frowning:
I tried to look what thinks I was doing to look for some reason, but it just happens randomly (maybe once a week). I thought it could be the use of Virtualbox, but after more and more events, I realized that it sometimes happens when I’m reading mails on Kmail, sometimes while surfing the web with Firefox, sometimes with many programs opened and sometimes with nothing running…
I tried to take a look to some log files, but I’m too newbie to understand what’s wrong. Looking at /var/log/Xorg.0.log I see a lot of error of this type:

   160.947] (II) fglrx(0): Modeline "1400x1050"x0.0  101.00  1400 1448 1480 1560  1050 1053 1057 1080 +hsync -vsync (64.7 kHz e)

but I’ve no idea what this means or where to look, maybe I’m looking to the wrong logs… some googleing did not help, as I didn’t found a similar error report… could someone help me in this search?

That is not an error unless it says error somewhere that is a modeline that defines a monitor mode

freezing and having constant disk activity could indicate a failing hard drive You should run smartctrl and see if there are disk errors. If so back up any important data and replace that drive.

thank you for the info… was just a guess…

I have. Everything seems normal and well funktioning… Here is the output of ** smartctl -l selftest /dev/sda
**


=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:     Seagate Barracuda 7200.14 (AF)
Device Model:     ST500DM002-1BD142
Serial Number:    Z3TCA1EN
LU WWN Device Id: 5 000c50 04f811e7d
Firmware Version: KC45
User Capacity:    500,107,862,016 bytes [500 GB]
Sector Sizes:     512 bytes logical, 4096 bytes physical
Rotation Rate:    7200 rpm
Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:   ATA8-ACS T13/1699-D revision 4
SATA Version is:  SATA 3.0, 6.0 Gb/s (current: 6.0 Gb/s)
Local Time is:    Thu Aug 29 16:43:09 2013 CEST
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:
Offline data collection status:  (0x82) Offline data collection activity
                                        was completed without error.
                                        Auto Offline Data Collection: Enabled.
Self-test execution status:      (   0) The previous self-test routine completed
                                        without error or no self-test has ever 
                                        been run.
Total time to complete Offline 
data collection:                (  592) seconds.
Offline data collection
capabilities:                    (0x7b) SMART execute Offline immediate.
                                        Auto Offline data collection on/off support.
                                        Suspend Offline collection upon new
                                        command.
                                        Offline surface scan supported.
                                        Self-test supported.                                                                                                                                            
                                        Conveyance Self-test supported.                                                                                                                                 
                                        Selective Self-test supported.                                                                                                                                  
SMART capabilities:            (0x0003) Saves SMART data before entering                                                                                                                                
                                        power-saving mode.                                                                                                                                              
                                        Supports SMART auto save timer.                                                                                                                                 
Error logging capability:        (0x01) Error logging supported.                                                                                                                                        
                                        General Purpose Logging supported.                                                                                                                              
Short self-test routine                                                                                                                                                                                 
recommended polling time:        (   1) minutes.                                                                                                                                                        
Extended self-test routine                                                                                                                                                                              
recommended polling time:        (  79) minutes.                                                                                                                                                        
Conveyance self-test routine
recommended polling time:        (   2) minutes.
SCT capabilities:              (0x303f) SCT Status supported.
                                        SCT Error Recovery Control supported.
                                        SCT Feature Control supported.
                                        SCT Data Table supported.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 10
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME          FLAG     VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE      UPDATED  WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
  1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate     0x000f   110   099   006    Pre-fail  Always       -       28243016
  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0003   100   100   000    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0032   100   100   020    Old_age   Always       -       109
  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0033   100   100   036    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
  7 Seek_Error_Rate         0x000f   076   060   030    Pre-fail  Always       -       4341101721
  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0032   099   099   000    Old_age   Always       -       1551
 10 Spin_Retry_Count        0x0013   100   100   097    Pre-fail  Always       -       0
 12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0032   100   100   020    Old_age   Always       -       109
183 Runtime_Bad_Block       0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
184 End-to-End_Error        0x0032   100   100   099    Old_age   Always       -       0
187 Reported_Uncorrect      0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
188 Command_Timeout         0x0032   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0 0 0
189 High_Fly_Writes         0x003a   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
190 Airflow_Temperature_Cel 0x0022   062   054   045    Old_age   Always       -       38 (Min/Max 22/39)
194 Temperature_Celsius     0x0022   038   046   000    Old_age   Always       -       38 (0 18 0 0 0)
195 Hardware_ECC_Recovered  0x001a   047   033   000    Old_age   Always       -       28243016
197 Current_Pending_Sector  0x0012   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable   0x0010   100   100   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count    0x003e   200   200   000    Old_age   Always       -       0
240 Head_Flying_Hours       0x0000   100   253   000    Old_age   Offline      -       1552h+14m+10.658s
241 Total_LBAs_Written      0x0000   100   253   000    Old_age   Offline      -       1099292389
242 Total_LBAs_Read         0x0000   100   253   000    Old_age   Offline      -       4240000718

SMART Error Log Version: 1
No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1
Num  Test_Description    Status                  Remaining  LifeTime(hours)  LBA_of_first_error
# 1  Extended offline    Completed without error       00%      1517         -
# 2  Extended offline    Completed without error       00%      1514         -

SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 1
 SPAN  MIN_LBA  MAX_LBA  CURRENT_TEST_STATUS
    1        0        0  Not_testing
    2        0        0  Not_testing
    3        0        0  Not_testing
    4        0        0  Not_testing
    5        0        0  Not_testing
Selective self-test flags (0x0):
  After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.
If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute delay.