f8: PC dies while using firefox

[Les]

On Mon, 2008-04-28 at 15:58 -0500, Aaron Konstam wrote:
> On Mon, 2008-04-28 at 19:48 +0530, Manish Kathuria wrote:
> > 
> > On Mon, 2008-04-28 at 09:38 -0430, Patrick O'Callaghan wrote:
> > > On Mon, 2008-04-28 at 19:21 +0530, Manish Kathuria wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > On Mon, 2008-04-28 at 07:04 -0500, Renich Bon Ciric wrote:
> > > > > Hello,
> > > > > 
> > > > > I've been experiencing, lately, some total freezes. The computer just
> > > > > dies:
> > > > > - The mouse won't respond.
> > > > > - The keyboard won't respond.
> > > > > - X can't be restarted
> > > > > 
> > > > > The only option is to hard-reset. Once done, firefox looses most of it's
> > > > > configuration options and sessions. It doesn't loose field history,
> > > > > history and bookmarks.
> > > > > 
> > > > > I have the following addons:
> > > > > 
> > > > > - Google sync
> > > > > - Google toolbar
> > > > > - Google notebook
> > > > > - Facebook toolbar.
> > > > > 
> > > > > I've experienced problems even without these. Tried removing flash with
> > > > > no luck...
> > > > > 
> > > > > Anybody experiencing the same problems? Any idea of what's the problem?
> > > > > 
> > > > 
> > > > Okay a similar thing has happened with me twice recently. I left my
> > > > laptop running F8 ( 2.6.24.4-64.fc8 x86_64 kernel)  on with Firefox,
> > > > with multiple sites opened, Evolution and maybe some small applications
> > > > like a xterm. When I came back after 4-5 hours, I found that the system
> > > > was frozen and I could not access it either through the GUI where I was
> > > > working or through any of the consoles. None of the keys or key
> > > > combinations were working. I could ping it from the other system but
> > > > could not access it through SSH also and was forced to switch off the
> > > > power and reboot it.
> > > > 
> > > > In the both the instances, after rebooting the system I examined the
> > > > system monitoring graphs I generate using a program called systemgraph
> > > > and discovered that over a 3 hour period:
> > > > 
> > > > 1. The physical memory used increased to 2414 MB out of a total of 2508
> > > > MB (as shown by free command). I have 2.5 GB of RAM installed.
> > > > 
> > > > 2. The swap used had increased to 1999.32 MB against the available swap
> > > > space of 2047MB.
> > > > 
> > > > 3. The CPU context switches had increased to a maximum of about 54,000
> > > > per second as compared to the average of about 4500-5000. Similarly the
> > > > pages in and out had increased to about 1700 and 2300 per second against
> > > > the average values between 20-30 per second.
> > > > 
> > > > 4. The disk I/O also showed a 100 times increase and the load average
> > > > also increased manifold
> > > > 
> > > > 5. However, there was no significant change in number of processes or
> > > > number of open files.
> > > > 
> > > > I tried to find out if there was any data regarding resource utilization
> > > > by various processes during this period but could not find any and
> > > > therefore I was unable to pinpoint the cause and was suspecting some
> > > > kernel bug. But looking at your mail, I think it could be firefox which
> > > > is causing the problem. However, no idea why. Maybe someone can explain
> > > > this.
> > > 
> > > Which version of Firefox are you using? FF2 has known memory leak
> > > problems (in my case it would simply crash after a few days). FF3 seems
> > > much more stable.
> > > 
> > > poc
> > > 
> > 
> > firefox-2.0.0.13-1.fc8
> > 
> > Another thing, this problem has occurred twice only when the system was
> > left unattended for some hours.
> > 
> > 
> > --
> > Manish
> It happened to me this morning. And indeed it happened after it wasa sitting unused for
> awhile.
> 
It just happened to me today, too.  The diskdrive light was flashing,
the screen had a white window in the upper left corner, and nothing
could get the computer to respond.  I just finished rebooting and things
came up normal (I think), but this is too much like BSD to make me
happy!

Regards,
Les H