Why does my computer "freeze"

Support & Help Requests
1

Every once "in a blue moon" my computer freezes. Ctrl Alt Del does not work and I have to use this button to reboot the computer.

Freeze_Button
Freeze_Button1024×768 97.4 KB

I looked here and tried a few of the SysRq combinations with no luck.

I have an AMD system.

Model name: AMD A8-7600 Radeon R7, 10 Computer Cores 4C+6G

CPU max MHz: 3100 MHz

8 Gb RAM

What else can I try?
2

Are the freezes temporary, or has the system completely locked up?

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3

As far as I know, Ubuntu can freeze under these conditions, which are items to further analyze:

  • RAM + swap memory saturated (greedy application...)
  • processor too hot (dust embedded in the fan...)
  • short-circuit in the motherboard
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4

It completely freezes up. I have an amd system.

5

A total system freeze is likely a hardware issue and not software. If you have a bootable USB drive, try creating a portable Linux and booting from it. If it too, freezes, you'll know it's hardware-related.

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6

It is none of those.

Model name: AMD A8-7600 Radeon R7, 10 Computer Cores 4C+6G

CPU max MHz: 3100 MHz

8 Gb RAM

7

Could it just be the graphics (X11) that's frozen? Try pressing CTRL+ALT+F4 to switch to a console. If it's out of memory (RAM), it could take minutes before it responds. The disk activity light may be illuminated (if your desktop has one)

Consider adding the System Monitor applets to your MATE panel so you can see the graphs if they fill up at the time it freezes up.

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8

I have 8 Gb of RAM with only Firefox running.

I have Integrated Graphics Processor:

D-Sub port, supporting a maximum resolution of 1920x1200

1 x HDMI port, supporting a maximum resolution of 4096x2160 * The resolution of 4096x2160 can be supported when using an FM2+ APU; the maximum resolution supported is 1920x1200 when using an FM2 APU.

  • Support for HDMI 1.4a version.

Maximum shared memory of 2 GB

9

After it locks and you have restarted, you could open a terminal and look at the system journal to check for any warnings or errors that preceded the lock e.g.:

journalctl -b -1 -n 20 -p 4

Explanation:

  • -b -1: show entries from boot with ID '-1', i.e. previous boot.
  • -n 20: show 20 lines (will show last 20 lines).
  • -p 4: show entries with at least 'warning' priority or higher (e.g. errors, fatal etc).

Most of the time, this doesn't show anything useful (because the error stops the log anyway) - but you never know your luck! :four_leaf_clover:

3 Likes
10

I suspect you won't find much information here either, but you can try the dmesg process for reading the Linux kernel ring buffer. If you want to only display errors, use dmesg --level=err. Read the manual pages for more information man dmesg.

1 Like
11

Thanks guys, it did not show anything.

No big deal as that "unknown button press" restores things.

I sure would like to know what that button does?

I can not find any diagram for it.

Outta here.

12

The little button on the case will be the RESET switch. It's a soft restart button, so kind of like powering it off then on again.

Another idea to figure out why it's freezing could be to set up an SSH server and log in to your desktop from another system (a laptop or tablet).

From a terminal logged in to your main computer, run sudo dmesg -w to keep printing the kernel buffer until the system freezes. If you run htop in a second instance, you'll be able to observe the last processes and memory/swap usage.

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