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On Sun, Feb 15, 2009 at 3:42 PM, Harry Putnam <reader@×××××××.com> wrote: |
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> I've been experiencing spontaneous reboots on one gentoo machine |
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> lately. Looking thru /var/log/messages... I see the restarts but |
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> looking above that... I'm not seeing anything I recognize as being a |
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> culprit. |
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> |
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> Its been happening for a few weeks... but I've been busy and only now |
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> digging into it ( The machine is no kind of server ). |
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> |
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> It appears to only happen in X (I'm using xfce4) and I've only noticed |
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> it since I started running 2.6.28 kernels. Although I couldn't say |
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> that it seemed to be directly related. |
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> |
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> I mean I didn't boot into 2.6.28 and suddenly notice spontaneous |
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> rebooting. |
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> |
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> It does not appear to be heat realated... but I am only now using |
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> lm_sensors to keep an accurate record and see if there appears to be a |
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> relationship. |
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> |
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> I've had two today so either its happening more often or I'm just |
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> spending more time on that machine. |
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> |
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> It may also be on the first or second time its happened while I as |
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> actually right at the keyboard. |
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> |
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> I'm sorry to be so vague about it, but in truth, I've been pretty lazy |
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> about it... since no real harm comes of an unexpected reboot on that |
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> machine (so far anyway). But clearly something that has to be figured |
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> out. |
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> |
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> The only things I've checked so far... |
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> 1) browsing thru /var/log/messages (Having trouble recognizing any |
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> thing that looks suspicious. |
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> |
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> I have noticed what appears to be a time/date anomaly where the |
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> progression of time is suddenly irregular. That is, an earlier |
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> time shows up amongst some later times. |
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> |
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> It appears to have been me sudoing to visudo. And apparently |
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> having /etc/sudoers open long enough for the closing of it to be |
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> earlier than other events taking place. |
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> |
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> Again ... I'm not real sure exactly what happened there but it |
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> does not appear to coincide with a reboot anyway. |
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> |
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> 2) checking how hot the cpu is getting (Doesn't appear to be a |
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> problem) But now running a cron job recording temperatures every 10 |
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> minutes. So that may turn up something. |
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> |
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> 3) checking for overfilled disks. (none show in df -h) |
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> |
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|
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Reseat memory and PCI cards, etc. Consider removing for a period of |
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time any hardware not absolutely necessary to debug the problem. (I.e. |
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- second video card, extra disk drives, extra network adapters, etc.) |
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Run memtest86 for a few days if you can spare the machine. Run |
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spinrite, etc., to look for drive problems. Open the box up and place |
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a fan blowing extra air for additional cooling. |
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|
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good luck, |
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Mark |
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