Here is top from my old computer:
top - 08:51:03 up 3:04, 1 user, load average: 0.06, 0.08, 0.17
Tasks: 127 total, 1 running, 124 sleeping, 0 stopped, 2 zombie
Cpu(s): 7.5%us, 3.8%sy, 0.0%ni, 88.6%id, 0.0%wa, 0.1%hi, 0.0%si,
0.0%st
Mem: 482776k total, 475472k used, 7304k free, 29076k buffers
Swap: 0k total, 0k used, 0k free, 163588k cached
As you can see I have just 500kb of RAM and a pentium cpu that never
seems to be used much on a percentage basis. When my computer went into
a sudden freeze it was surprising. The curser would sit in one place for
20 seconds and then move quick to another. I wanted to run top and see
what was happening. But it was impossible.
Just before I had the problem I wanted to yum install filename and it
started out and then died. Then the freeze and I looked at the hard
drive light and it was on solid. This means it was using the swap
partition on the hard drive. My HD's are not fast.
I rebooted and then read /var/log/messages and found this was happening
while I had a frozen screen:
Jul 23 19:10:20 k5di NetworkManager: <info> Updating allowed wireless
network lists.
Jul 23 19:10:20 k5di NetworkManager: <WARN> nm_dbus_get_networks_cb():
error received: org.freedesktop.NetworkManagerInfo.NoNetworks - There
are no wireless networks stored..
Jul 23 19:10:20 k5di pcscd: winscard.c:219:SCardConnect() Reader E-Gate
0 0 Not Found
Jul 23 19:10:20 k5di last message repeated 4 times
Jul 23 19:10:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 194.88.2.60
Jul 23 19:10:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:10:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 195.197.239.163
Jul 23 19:10:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:10:38 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 192.36.143.150
Jul 23 19:10:38 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:11:36 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 194.88.2.60
Jul 23 19:11:36 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:11:36 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 195.197.239.163
Jul 23 19:11:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:11:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 192.36.143.150
Jul 23 19:11:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:12:36 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 194.88.2.60
Jul 23 19:12:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:12:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 195.197.239.163
Jul 23 19:12:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:12:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 192.36.143.150
Jul 23 19:12:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:13:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 194.88.2.60
Jul 23 19:13:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:13:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 195.197.239.163
Jul 23 19:13:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:13:37 k5di ntpd[1883]: Cannot find existing interface for
address 192.36.143.150
Jul 23 19:13:37 k5di ntpd_initres[1894]: ntpd indicates no data available!
Jul 23 19:14:35 k5di ntpd[1883]: Listening on interface #4 eth0,
fe80::250:2cff:fea8:69f3#123 Enabled
Jul 23 19:14:35 k5di ntpd[1883]: Listening on interface #5 eth0,
192.168.0.2#123 Enabled
Jul 23 19:19:23 k5di ntpd[1883]: synchronized to 194.88.2.60, stratum 3
Jul 23 19:19:23 k5di ntpd[1883]: kernel time sync status change 0001
I looked up man ntpd and it is the software that sets the clock time in
your computer. It is complaining that it can't get to the internet! I
saw that NetworkManager was looking for a WiFi source of the Internet
which has NEVER existed on this computer. While NM has the Internet from
eth0 turned off ntpd has gone wild about this and the yum install was
stopped and the freeze occured.
I need help to understand this. It isn't this that used up all the RAM.
But this tells me NM was doing stupid things which did not help the
situation.
--
Karl F. Larsen, AKA K5DI
Linux User
#450462 http://counter.li.org.
