Ubuntu

Ubuntu system freeze sometimes when the mouse is clicked.

Asked by DennisVogt

I installed Ubuntu 8.04 a week ago. I have had 9 system freezes while clicking with the mouse. I lose the keyboard, the mouse, and the graphics stays frozen. Many times it happened while in Firefox. One time it happened when opening up Evolution email. It also happened once while doing the installation. I tried Ctrl-Alt-Back Space but that doesn't work. I use the computer power button to start over.
Dennis Vogt

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DennisVogt (unclegoodguy) said : 		#1

Also, I am doing a dual boot with Windows XP.
Dennis Vogt

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HillerD (hillerd-deactivatedaccount) said : 		#2

Hi Dennis,
I'm not an expert.
I had freezes when high performance actions where done with my graphics card, e.g. in GoogleEarth.
I resolved it by adding the boot option nohz=off, which turns the tickless kernel off that is new in the last linux kernels.
There is probably no harm trying it.
Dietmar

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DennisVogt (unclegoodguy) said : 		#3

Thanks Dietmar,
I don't know how to add a boot option yet. If I don't here from you about how to do it then I will do some homework on the subject.
Thanks,
Dennis

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HillerD (hillerd-deactivatedaccount) said : 		#4

Hi Dennis,
if you have the GRUB menu on start-up (e.g. when you have more than one operating system on your PC) it's as follows (otherwise let me know, there is also another possibility.):

in the GRUB menu select the booting entry you use
press "e" for edit
there is another menu, select the entry starting with "kernel" and press "e" again
on my system it is a line like " kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.20-16-generic root=UUID=d515... ro quiet splash"
now you can edit the line, add "nohz=off" at the end
press enter to confirm the changes
press "b" for boot

Note, this change only works temporarily. If it should solve your problem you have to adjust the file "/boot/grub/menu.lst". Let me know if you need help on this.

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DennisVogt (unclegoodguy) said : 		#5

Hi Dietmar,
I still didn't try out the temporary "nohz=off" yet because the freeze only happens once every 3 days so it will be hard to say if it worked or not and I don't understand what the "nohz=off" is accomplishing and what the negatives are when doing it. I did try a different mouse but 2 days later I got a freeze again. Now, I tried using the ps2 port instead of an USB port to plug the mouse into. I'll let you know what I find out.
Dennis