[Solved] Help with Random Desktop Lock-up?

[rej]

HI-
I recently purchased a Lenovo ThinkPad T450s and was experiencing random freezing/crashing of the MX and antiX desktop, and intermittent graphic distortions in Grub. Only option was power-off.

I tried hardware diagnostics - including motherboard, memory, and various hard drives, updating the BIOS (which has never been updated at all), rummaging through BIOS settings, changing kernels, and pouring through system logs for days on end, finding no clues. The applications that were open at the crash moments were a browser - usually on Netflix or Youtube [browser sometimes open but not being used...], LibreOffice, sometimes GIMP or Notepad The seller was very interactive and provided many good suggestions also. Sadly, the laptop ended up being returned.

Because I liked this particular ThinkPad model so much, I purchased 2 more - an i7 and i5 CPU, from other sellers.
Both of these are displaying the same behavior. The laptops are in excellent shape otherwise. These are not cheap units and would expect them to be really nice. I think it is safe to assume that this probably eliminates, unless this is a real odd coincidence, hardware.

They came with Windows 10 [seems to run without error so far], which I wiped and re-installed and updated the graphics driver after the crashes started happening. Also reinstalled MX and antiX.

I do not use Windows except for partitioning and other necessary hardware applications that I have not yet been able to find equivalents for in Linux.

I don't know if I have exhausted the possibilities, and don't know if there is any other direction, except for drivers.
I looked in System Information in MX and am not fully understanding what exact graphics driver is installed and what other choices there may be.
----------------------
Graphics: Device-1: Intel HD Graphics 5500 driver: i915 v: kernel
Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.19.2 driver: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa
resolution: 1600x900~60Hz
OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel HD Graphics 5500 (Broadwell GT2) v: 4.5 Mesa 18.2.6
-----------------------
How does MX determine what graphics driver is applicable and what would be the options?

After the last crash, on restart, this is the screen it booted to:

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Phoenix Secure Core Technology (TM) for ThinkPad
Copyright 1985-2014 Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
All rights reserved
COPYRIGHT LENOVO 2005-2016  All Rights Reserved
Build Time: 02/23/2019
CPU = Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-5600U CPU@ 2.60GHz
8192 MB System RAM Passed
256 KB L2[Z?] Cache
Sysetem BIOS shadowed
Video BIOS shadowed
BIOS Version JBET72WW (1.36)
Fixed Disk: Samsung M27TD25GHAFV-000

My apologies for the length of this post, probably more information than necessary, just didn't want to omit any relevent detail that could be helpful in resolving this. MX is what I use every day.

Thank you.

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rj@mx18rj:~
$ inxi -F
System:    Host: mx18rj Kernel: 4.15.0-1-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 Desktop: Xfce 4.12.3 
           Distro: MX-18.3_x64 Continuum March 14  2018 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: LENOVO product: 20BWS06K00 v: ThinkPad T450s 
           serial: <root required> 
           Mobo: LENOVO model: 20BWS06K00 v: SDK0E50510 WIN serial: <root required> 
           UEFI [Legacy]: LENOVO v: JBET49WW (1.14 ) date: 05/21/2015 
Battery:   ID-1: BAT0 charge: 19.7 Wh condition: 19.7/23.2 Wh (85%) 
           ID-2: BAT1 charge: 19.5 Wh condition: 19.6/23.2 Wh (84%) 
CPU:       Topology: Dual Core model: Intel Core i7-5600U bits: 64 type: MT MCP 
           L2 cache: 4096 KiB 
           Speed: 1397 MHz min/max: 500/3200 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1398 2: 1397 3: 1398 
           4: 1400 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel HD Graphics 5500 driver: i915 v: kernel 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.19.2 driver: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa 
           resolution: 1600x900~60Hz 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel HD Graphics 5500 (Broadwell GT2) v: 4.5 Mesa 18.2.6 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Broadwell-U Audio driver: snd_hda_intel 
           Device-2: Intel Wildcat Point-LP High Definition Audio driver: snd_hda_intel 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k4.15.0-1-amd64 
Network:   Device-1: Intel Ethernet I218-LM driver: e1000e 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: 68:f7:28:b2:c0:38 
           Device-2: Intel Wireless 7265 driver: iwlwifi 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: 60:57:18:db:c7:0c 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 245.74 GiB used: 6.73 GiB (2.7%) 
           ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Samsung model: MZ7TD256HAFV-000L7 size: 238.47 GiB 
           ID-2: /dev/sdc type: USB vendor: Kingston model: DataTraveler 2.0 size: 7.27 GiB 
Partition: ID-1: / size: 38.20 GiB used: 6.68 GiB (17.5%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda3 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 40.0 C mobo: N/A 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): cpu: 0 
Info:      Processes: 185 Uptime: 22m Memory: 7.50 GiB used: 469.5 MiB (6.1%) Shell: bash 
           inxi: 3.0.33 

[Head_on_a_Stick]

I recently purchased a Lenovo ThinkPad T450s and was experiencing random freezing/crashing of the MX and antiX desktop, and intermittent graphic distortions in Grub. Only option was power-off.

Did you try switching to a console (TTY) screen?

Most people who migrate from Windows mistake a graphical problem for a "freeze" when in fact the system is still running.

am not fully understanding what exact graphics driver is installed and what other choices there may be.

You are using the i915 Intel kernel driver, the modesetting DDX driver and the Mesa 3D drivers.

The Intel DDX driver can be used instead of modesetting, the MX Tweak tool can change this for you or see https://mxlinux.org/wiki/hardware/intel-video-driver/ for the manual method.

[colin_b]

I used to have random lock-ups when I used a Chrome based browser. Turning the browser's hardware acceleration off solved the problem.

[rej]

Head_on_a_Stick-

Thank you for your help.

No, I am not familiar with TTY screen. I will look into what that is and does

Is the box in the attached screenshot what needs to be selected to change the driver?
------------
colin_b-

Yes, I always uncheck that routinely on any browser.

Thanks for the input.

[Richard]

Kind of an obvious question, but have to ask.
Did you check the MD5SUM of the downloaded ISO? And did you use the same ISO to install the others?

[BitJam]

I did a search for (linux Intel HD Graphics 5500 (Broadwell GT2)) and found that other people are reporting system freezes with this graphics hardware. So I think the problem is related to your choice of hardware.

There have been a lot of bugs with the i915 driver for Intel graphics. Often there is a tradeoff between power saving and stability. There are options to tweak the i915 driver, There is also a choice between the "intel" X driver or the "modesetting" X driver. The "modesetting" driver is preferred for newer hardware due to many bugs in the "intel" driver. There are also tweaks to the "intel" driver for older graphics hardware. Our live system forces the use of the "modesetting" driver for the more powerful Broadwell graphics. You could try switching to the "intel" driver but the inxi (quick system info) output says it is not available.

MX-18.3 uses a fairly recent 4.19 kernel which is needed to be compatible with newer hardware. I would suggest you try a 4.9 kernel. This is what antiX is planning to use in their upcoming antiX-19 release because it has fewer issues with older hardware. What sometimes happens is when newer hardware gets supported then support for older hardware suffers and is often not tested as much as the newer hardware.

With either kernel you can explore which power-savings i915 features are enable in the /sys/module/i915/parameters/ directory. The power saving features are listed in the file /etc/modprobe.d/i915-power-saving.conf. They should be commented out but they are:

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enable_rc6=1 enable_fbc=1 lvds_downclock=1 semaphores=1

Running antiX-19 on Intel Skylake I see that enabled_rc6 is turned on. I used this command to find out:

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head /sys/module/i915/parameters/enable_rc6

and it give me the answer "1". If this is the case on your machine then you could try disabling this power saving feature by editing the file /etc/modprobe.d/i915-power-saving.conf and add the line:

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 i915 enable_rc6=0

You would then need to reboot for this change to take effect.

This might all sound massively complicated but I have two straightforward suggestions:

1) Try a 4.9 kernel
2) Try disabling the rc6 power saving feature

There are also plenty of other things we could try. I suggest doing a web search like (linux Intel HD Graphics 5500 (Broadwell GT2) i915 freeze) and see if anyone with similar hardware has reported a solution to the freeze problem. This problem is between the kernel and the hardware so it does not matter which distro but the kernel version may be relevant. It is possible that someone on these forums or over on the antiX forums has already solved the problem for your hardware.

If you switch to the older kernel and the quick system info says the "intel" X driver is available (added to the "disabled" list that currently includes fbdev and vesa) then you could try using that with this command:

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sudo make-xorg-conf intel -o /etc/X11/xorg.conf

You would then have to log out of X windows and log back in again. It is possible this will cause X to not start. If that happens get to a console with <Alt><F2>, log in, and then run:

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sudo rm /etc/X11/xorg.conf
sudo service lightdm restart

The reason I suggest this is because in years past the "intel" X driver seemed to be more stable on early Broadwell hardware. Often upstream paints in broad strokes and so now they give everyone the "modesetting" driver even if "intel" may be better on some older hardware.

[JayM]

Look in your BIOS for something called SpeedStep or EIST, probably in the chipset settings, and disable it. Or do as BitJam suggested and install and boot to the 4.9 kernel.

AMD's version of SpeedStep is called Cool'n'Quiet. What they both do is scale the CPU frequency according to load to save energy and battery, and newer kernels seem to have a problem with that. I get lockups if Cool'n'Quiet is enabled when I use the default 4.19.x kernel but not with 4.9.x kernels.

[rej]

Thanks so much for all this information!
-----------
Richard-

Thanks - yes, always compute the MD5SUM.
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JayM-

Thought I tried the 4.9 antiX kernel when it first happened on the first laptop - trying it again.

The only options that I had found in the BIOS that might be related are:

Config -

Total Graphics Memory [256MB]

Intel (R) Hyper-Threading Technology [Enabled]

No SpeedStep or EIST setting in there.

Thank you.
------------
BitJam-

The non-modesetting driver did not work out - the laptop just instantly shuts down instead of freezing the desktop.

It seems to happen sometimes several instances closer together and sometimes with very longer intervals. Yesterday was the first time that it happened as soon as it was booted and only the browser opened. Waiting for it to randomly happen makes the testing process very long.

Trying the 4.9 driver in antiX currently (previously 4.18.7), but think I did this already on the very first laptop that was returned.

Now running 4.19.0-5 in MX (previously 4.15.0-1). This would be good if it works.

The rc6 power saving feature appears to be already commented out.

If the kernel change does not work, will return both laptops while the window of opportunity to do so is still there, and hopefully find one that runs linux smoothly.

My older ThinkPads and one [2017] HP run MX, antiX and Win with no problem. Just wanted a newer Thinkpad with good display and more updated hardware. Will likely go with nVidia next time.

Have done the on-line search and been collecting and saving information, not that I am understanding a lot of it - Lenovo, Intel, Ubuntu, stackexchange, Thinkpads.com, reddit etc etc.

Thank you very much for all your help. I really appreciate the time and effort you put into researching this for me!

[rej]

bitjam-

The previous post included an attachment with the Intel i915 power settings that are default. Is that configuration what it should be to conform to your suggestion?

So far, the 4.9 kernel is working well - running the longest without issue.

4.15 and 4.19 eventually continued to crash and freeze the desktop on both the i5 and i7.

If the 4.9 kernel proves to be stable, is there not an option to update the kernel in the future? I ask because of past vulnerabilities/bugs, and also that the antiX kernel 4.9 did not work for the WiFi (on my other T420, T520 Thinkpads) in the past and had to be updated to connect.

-----------------------
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Le ... el_version

[Lenovo ThinkPad T450s]

"The Intel display is run with the i915 driver, which has become unstable in the 4.2+ series of kernels. Regrettably, this instability has found its way into the current linux-lts kernel (see this forum thread). A working fix is to downgrade your kernel to version 4.1.21-1, and wait for the problem to be fixed."
------------------------

Does this quote from Arch-wiki mean that eventually the crashing issue should resolve itself by future patches? Or would that only pertain to something that impacts more users? Is the antiX 5.1.2 kernel a possibility, or likely to fail?

Also - Debian 4.9 kernel and antiX 4.9.176 kernel is there a difference?

Thanks again! All this is very new to me and I am grateful for your assistance.

[rej]

BitJam-

Hi-

Is there a way to reverse this bash command?:

sudo make-xorg-conf intel -o /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Thanks.
===================
[Solved] Update: deleted "xorg.conf" file and reversed the driver to modesetting on reboot.
----------------------
Installing Intel proprietary driver resolved desktop lock-up/freeze and other Xfce Power-Management related issues.