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**dibl** · Jun 17, 2008, 07:08 AM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

Wow, nice hardware!

Let's see, you've got all kinds of issues there -- I don't think a "simultaneous solution" is going to work. Except for the part where you say "the entire OS goes down", I would say it appears to be mostly KDE4 issues. You realize that KDE4 is a beta product, and has known issues that we hope will be fixed before the July release of 4.1, right?

So, what do you mean "the entire OS goes down"? And, did you run a Kubuntu Live CD on this system and check out how things worked, before you installed? It's always good to confirm that there are not hardware issues (wireless, video, etc.) with a Live CD, first.

If you're in the mood for experiments, you might try reinstalling just Kubuntu 8.04 64-bit, (not the "remix") which will bring in KDE 3.5.9. Then you can see if that's all stable on your hardware, as a precursor to installing KDE 4.1 Beta and dealing with those issues.

BTW, Dolphin and Konqueror (KDE4.1) crash on my desktop whenever I right-click in the white space, and Alt-F2 doesn't work to run commands. Those are pre-release bugs.

**saizai** · Jun 17, 2008, 11:19 AM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

Originally posted by dibl

Wow, nice hardware!

Thanks.

(And that's only the possibly-relevant stuff... somehow I doubt my bigass cpu cooler is going to make a difference here. :P)

The intent of the system is to be mostly for my own work (Rails dev), but also function as a gaming system, staging server, music server, and server for random other stuff that doesn't require a real VPS/colo. So yes I actually intend to use the quadcore, and may be upgrading the RAM to 8GB (+?) at some point (memcache eats up a LOT).

Let's see, you've got all kinds of issues there -- I don't think a "simultaneous solution" is going to work. Except for the part where you say "the entire OS goes down", I would say it appears to be mostly KDE4 issues. You realize that KDE4 is a beta product, and has known issues that we hope will be fixed before the July release of 4.1, right?

I do. I'm willing to tolerate a certain amount of UI wonkiness for it. Constant crashes however, not so much. I need to get actual work done on the thing.

So, what do you mean "the entire OS goes down"?

Screen freezes. Keyboard freezes. Will not respond to any stimulus other than power being cut.

I don't know where Kubuntu stashes its logs for this; I presume that if it can it dumps core, but I haven't seen it. Is there a version of dmesg from last boot I can look at eg so I can see what happened just prior to halt?

And, did you run a Kubuntu Live CD on this system and check out how things worked, before you installed? It's always good to confirm that there are not hardware issues (wireless, video, etc.) with a Live CD, first.

I did. All hardware worked out of box. Used the Kubuntu Hardy / KDE4 live CD (though not uber extensively, just enough to install it (and re-re-re install it to get it compatible with the triple boot), use grub & konqueror a bit, rsync stuff to my new HDs from my dying external HDs, etc.

I should note that when I was doing that rsync of ~500GB, it stayed on just fine. At the time, I didn't have wireless; now I do (neighbor's). Together with the wireless came the requisite aptitude update && aptitude full-upgrade, so it's uncertain which aspect of that is to blame.

I'll have DSL today hopefully, so will be on wired; if that's the issue (though from HCLs I checked the card is well supported, which is why I got it) then it'll magically resolve.

If you're in the mood for experiments, you might try reinstalling just Kubuntu 8.04 64-bit, (not the "remix") which will bring in KDE 3.5.9. Then you can see if that's all stable on your hardware, as a precursor to installing KDE 4.1 Beta and dealing with those issues.

I'd like to avoid an OS reinstall; it was tricky enough to get 'em happy with each other in the first place!

FWIW, the KDE4 is what was on the live CD - I don't recall that being a beta version.

BTW, Dolphin and Konqueror (KDE4.1) crash on my desktop whenever I right-click in the white space, and Alt-F2 doesn't work to run commands. Those are pre-release bugs.

Noted.

Is there a clean way to temporarily downgrade to KDE3 while I wait for 4.1?

**dibl** · Jun 17, 2008, 11:46 AM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

Yes, you can install KDE 3.5.9, change to kdm, and remove KDE4 and kdm-kde4, but ...

Looking at the system "from the ground up", I'd say you've got to get a solid Linux system running that will stay running, before you should spend any time changing the KDE version. Otherwise, it's like changing the icing on a cake that keeps collapsing. Besides which, it's hard to tell whether it is the OS taking down your KDE4 apps, or your KDE4 apps taking down your OS. :P

I wonder if it's possible that you installed from a CD or DVD that had a minor "bad burn" issue? Did you burn it real slow (4X) and use "DAO" mode? I know it sounds far-fetched, but it has happened that some flakiness after initial installation turns out to be due to a bad CD, and oh BTW you cannot trust the "Check CD for Defects" thing -- it tells lies.

If I were you, I'd boot the Live CD and really beat on it -- open the console, run apps, install "hwinfo" and then run it to see if it reports your hardware correctly, and stuff like that. It seems to me the general approach to working this out would be:

1. Absolutely eliminate the possibility of a hardware problem on your platform (i.e. BIOS settings, overclock issues, memory verification, test results in other OS, blah blah blah).

2. Compatibility verification, via beating on a Live CD booted session, versus the hardware (run wireless, check "hwinfo", run hdparm and observe disk I/O performance, etc). Maybe try another Linux Live CD, to cross check and raise your confidence -- sidux is a "pure" Debian that I'm familiar with, that has a nice Live CD, and of course there are a zillion others.

3. Verification of downloaded image and burn quality (md5 check on download, slow DAO burn of installation media).

4. Reinstall (sorry ....) with only 8.04/KDE3.5.9, and test everything.

Those are my thoughts -- the inability to run stably in CLI mode is a bad thing, and I wouldn't spend any more time working on the GUI until you've got that behind you. :P

**saizai** · Jun 17, 2008, 02:49 PM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

Originally posted by dibl

I wonder if it's possible that you installed from a CD or DVD that had a minor "bad burn" issue?

I checked the md5 of the downloaded image, wrote it slowly, and did the on-cd 'check for defects' (which btw failed on a scratched-up version I had).

Cm'on, I'm paranoid about the OS disks.

FWIW the OSX and Vista disks, burned identically, also passed their self-checks & md5 of the image.

I'm not running any overclock or the like currently (I might? later but hell no until it's rock stable). Ran a memtest at some point, was clean.

Not getting this kind of full halt in either other OS (eg OSX I left on overnight and all day processing itunes stuff, it was still chugging along when I came back [I have ~200gb of mp3s; it takes a while]).

2. Compatibility verification, via beating on a Live CD booted session, versus the hardware (run wireless, check "hwinfo", run hdparm and observe disk I/O performance, etc). Maybe try another Linux Live CD, to cross check and raise your confidence -- sidux is a "pure" Debian that I'm familiar with, that has a nice Live CD, and of course there are a zillion others.

Could do that.

Those are my thoughts -- the inability to run stably in CLI mode is a bad thing, and I wouldn't spend any more time working on the GUI until you've got that behind you. :P

I have not yet run it in single-user mode; all OS halts have come post-wireless-on, while using KDE. Running pre-wireless was OS-stable in KDE aside from minor app crashes.

**saizai** · Jun 17, 2008, 05:09 PM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

FWIW what I'd most like (since this'll be relevant for later) is a way to see crashlogs. E.g. the last run's dmesg would do well, or its syslog entire for that matter.

**dibl** · Jun 17, 2008, 05:20 PM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

There are logs at /var/log/xxxx.

If an intermittent wireless connection was involved, things might get better when you've got a wired ethernet connection.

Come to think of it, I've never installed *buntu in the absence of a network connection. What does it do when it's searching for network connectivity?

**saizai** · Jun 17, 2008, 05:50 PM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

Originally posted by dibl

There are logs at /var/log/xxxx.

I thought those are only for the duration of one boot. Hm...

If an intermittent wireless connection was involved, things might get better when you've got a wired ethernet connection.

Come to think of it, I've never installed *buntu in the absence of a network connection. What does it do when it's searching for network connectivity?

knetworkmanager just sits there waiting to be frobbed really. Then I frob it and it connects without much hassle. Don't recall the dB ratings but it's 2-bar level. (AP is in a different apt downstairs and a door to the side from me.)

When I installed it in the first place, it just installed and that was it. I had issues getting grub to write correctly (OSX, Vista, and *nix have differing ideas of what a MBR should look like and for that matter about the 100% proper formatting of individual partitions; enough that I had to do multiple reformats to get a scheme they could all like and that grub would consent to install onto) but there were no issues at all with the install itself. Apt update manager seems to crash if it's frobbed w/out 'net connectivity though.

I've got the modem sitting next to me (yay getting it 4 days late...) so I'll know when I go home tonight whether the wiredness stops the issue.

**saizai** · Jun 20, 2008, 01:18 PM

Re: Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

'kayso I got the modem and am now wired.

I confess I've primarily been using OSX (I might even defect), but I did run Kubuntu w/ heavyish tasks for a day and it was stable.

Still some issues w/ KDE apps, and GTK looks really bad, but it seems like the OS halt issue *is* caused by using the wireless card.

Strange and annoying, and I'm not sure what to do about it. I haven't gotten the damn thing to work in OSX either, even with the drivers from the manufacturer.

I guess it's more or less moot, but still irritating to have something not work...

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Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

Apps crash, OS halts w/ sig11 in 64 bit Kubuntu Hardy + KDE4

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