momentary freeze ups

[Todd And Margo Chester]

On 04/13/2012 05:15 PM, TRINH Minh Hieu wrote:
>
> From: Todd And Margo Chester <toddandmargo at gmail.com
> <mailto:toddandmargo at gmail.com>>
>
>     To: xfce at xfce.org <mailto:xfce at xfce.org>
>     Subject: Re: momentary freeze ups
>     Message-ID: <4F888A2C.2000805 at gmail.com
>     <mailto:4F888A2C.2000805 at gmail.com>>
>     Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed
>
>     On 04/13/2012 12:29 PM, killermoehre wrote:
>      > Am 13.04.2012 21:20, schrieb Todd And Margo Chester:
>      >> Hi All,
>      >
>      > Hi you two.
>      >
>      >> I have two computers running Xfce 4.8.  One is running Scientific
>      >> Linux 6.2 (RHEL 6.2 clone) 64 bit and the other is running
>      >> Fedora Core 16, 64 bit.
>      >>
>      >> Occasionally, in any program, the computers will freeze up from
>      >> anywhere between five seconds and 20 seconds.  Then recover as if
>      >> nothing happened.
>      >
>      > Define ?any?. Just GUI, or CLI, too?
>
>     They both boot into Xfce.  The freeze ups occur in Xfce.  Say,
>     you go on to Firefox, click a link and nothing happens for five
>     seconds.  Mouse works.  Say you are typing into Libre Office,
>     half a sentence will hide and then appear after 10 seconds.
>
>      >
>      >> "top" shows hardly any CPU activity. "free -m" shows three times
>      >> the empty space as used.
>      >>
>      >> Is there some kind of file indexing going on?  On the Gnome side,
>      >> I know they have something called "tracker", but I don't see it
>      >> in Xfce.
>      >
>      > No. Xfce is lightweight.
>
>     And very, very much appreciated.  I "bristle" when I have to work
>     in OS'es/GUI's that think the OS/GUI should be an "amusement park".
>
>      >
>      >> 32 bit FC 16 Live CD does not "seem" to show the freeze ups, but
>      >> it is hard to get a good test as most of the native programs are
>      >> not usable.  Prior to wiping and installing 64 bit, both these
>      >> machines were running 32 bit (CentOS 4.x and CentOS 5.x) with
>      >> no freeze ups.
>      >>
>      >> Any idea how to troubleshoot this?
>      >
>      > Does this happen since the very beginning?
>
>     Since the 64 bit upgrade (wipe and reinstall)
>
>      > Did you alter something in
>      > the last time?
>
>     No.
>
>      > What says pstree?
>
>     Sweet utility.  Did not know it existed.  I have been using
>     gnome-system-monitor, which give the same thing.  Could not
>     find anything out of the ordinary.  Just that both systems
>     seem to be vastly under utilized.
>
>      > How do you start your session?
>
>     Gdm.
>
>      > What
>      > daemons are running in the background?
>
>     What ever came with the Live CD that I installed from
>
>      > Is your RAM busy?
>     "free -m" shows about 384 meg used of 4 gig
>
>      > Is your hard drive working?
>
>     Yes.  Both the front panel LED and lots of rattling
>     noise from the hard drive itself.  This is why I asked
>     about tracker.
>
>
> Can it be hard drive sleep feature ? Hard drive wake up can freeze a bit
> ... May be the update change some settings about hard drive timeout ?

You can hear the hard drive doing its seeks.  And, it happens right
in the middle of using it.  But, I will check the drive's power setting.

Thank you for the help!
-T