[PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
My desktop machine used to respond quickly to the opening of a program, or the return from screen saver. Now those actions are slow. The programs appear to run fine. This didn't used to be the case, as recently as just a few months ago. The most noticeable thing is when returning from screen saver. I have two monitors, one VGA and the other DVI. The VGA screen does come back quickly, but the DVI screen takes a couple of seconds. And when it does, the windows that are open are blank for another second before their content returns. Any recommendations on where to start looking for why this happens and how to fix it? A few of the machine details (built by ENU): Motherboard: ASUS B85M-G CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-4130 CPU @ 3.40GHz Memory (Bank 0 and Bank 2): DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1333 MHz (0.8 ns), 4GiB each Display: NVIDIA GT218 [GeForce 210] -- Regards, Dick Steffens ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 7:54 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: > My desktop machine used to respond quickly to the opening of a program, > or the return from screen saver. Now those actions are slow. The > programs appear to run fine. This didn't used to be the case, as > recently as just a few months ago. The most noticeable thing is when > returning from screen saver. I have two monitors, one VGA and the other > DVI. The VGA screen does come back quickly, but the DVI screen takes a > couple of seconds. And when it does, the windows that are open are blank > for another second before their content returns. > > Any recommendations on where to start looking for why this happens and > how to fix it? > > A few of the machine details (built by ENU): > Motherboard: ASUS B85M-G > CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-4130 CPU @ 3.40GHz > Memory (Bank 0 and Bank 2): DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1333 MHz (0.8 ns), > 4GiB each > Display: NVIDIA GT218 [GeForce 210] > > -- > Regards, > > Dick Steffens > > Try running top to see which applications are using which resources. Bill ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On 05/05/2016 08:29 AM, Bill Barry wrote: > On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 7:54 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: > >> My desktop machine used to respond quickly to the opening of a program, >> or the return from screen saver. Now those actions are slow. The >> programs appear to run fine. This didn't used to be the case, as >> recently as just a few months ago. The most noticeable thing is when >> returning from screen saver. I have two monitors, one VGA and the other >> DVI. The VGA screen does come back quickly, but the DVI screen takes a >> couple of seconds. And when it does, the windows that are open are blank >> for another second before their content returns. >> >> Any recommendations on where to start looking for why this happens and >> how to fix it? >> >> > Try running top to see which applications are using which resources. VirtualBox, floats between 15% and 19% of CPU and 27% of memory. Xorg is next with 2.3% CPU and 0.9% MEM. The others drift up and down, sometimes moving ahead of Xorg, but always with lowish numbers. That's while typing this email. When I start typing in LibreOffice Writer soffice.bin moves up to number 2 with about 5% CPU and 1.7% MEM. In VirtualBox I'm running Win7 which is running GearPlayer4, my USB foot pedal controlled transcription player. I usually leave that running, even when I'm not transcribing. I'll try shutting it down after finishing today's work, and see if it makes any difference to the rest of the machine. Thanks for the recommendation. -- Regards, Dick Steffens ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
My primary suggestion is to check swap usage (can also be done with top, or free). I know we're not running MS Windows here, but I have yet to find a perfectly behaved browser that doesn't eventually leak memory, and if you're like me, you have a browser running for Quite Some Time between restarts, and you may end up using swap even with very little actually currently "happening" on the system. I usually don't need a reboot to reclaim the swap, but I'll restart the browser, and if I want to verify that the swap usage is gone, I'll swapoff -a; swapon -a (as root) to verify that all of that 'used' swap isn't really being used anymore. This last step is not necessary, since the stuff that is swapped out is either unlikely to swap back in and is fine sitting on disk, or does swap in once and then isn't swapped back out (until the next iteration of the vicious cycle), I just like seeing Swap at 0 because it satisfies some compulsion I have for closing things :) That's what tends to cure my "occasional slowdowns" that aren't network-filesystem-related, YMMV On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 7:54 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: > My desktop machine used to respond quickly to the opening of a program, > or the return from screen saver. Now those actions are slow. The > programs appear to run fine. This didn't used to be the case, as > recently as just a few months ago. The most noticeable thing is when > returning from screen saver. I have two monitors, one VGA and the other > DVI. The VGA screen does come back quickly, but the DVI screen takes a > couple of seconds. And when it does, the windows that are open are blank > for another second before their content returns. > > Any recommendations on where to start looking for why this happens and > how to fix it? > > A few of the machine details (built by ENU): > Motherboard: ASUS B85M-G > CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM) i3-4130 CPU @ 3.40GHz > Memory (Bank 0 and Bank 2): DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1333 MHz (0.8 ns), > 4GiB each > Display: NVIDIA GT218 [GeForce 210] > > -- > Regards, > > Dick Steffens > > ___ > PLUG mailing list > PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org > http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug > ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 9:01 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: > On 05/05/2016 08:29 AM, Bill Barry wrote: > > On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 7:54 AM, Dick Steffens > wrote: > > > >> My desktop machine used to respond quickly to the opening of a program, > >> or the return from screen saver. Now those actions are slow. The > >> programs appear to run fine. This didn't used to be the case, as > >> recently as just a few months ago. The most noticeable thing is when > >> returning from screen saver. I have two monitors, one VGA and the other > >> DVI. The VGA screen does come back quickly, but the DVI screen takes a > >> couple of seconds. And when it does, the windows that are open are blank > >> for another second before their content returns. > >> > >> Any recommendations on where to start looking for why this happens and > >> how to fix it? > >> > >> > > Try running top to see which applications are using which resources. > > VirtualBox, floats between 15% and 19% of CPU and 27% of memory. > Xorg is next with 2.3% CPU and 0.9% MEM. > The others drift up and down, sometimes moving ahead of Xorg, but always > with lowish numbers. That's while typing this email. When I start typing > in LibreOffice Writer soffice.bin moves up to number 2 with about 5% CPU > and 1.7% MEM. > > In VirtualBox I'm running Win7 which is running GearPlayer4, my USB foot > pedal controlled transcription player. I usually leave that running, > even when I'm not transcribing. I'll try shutting it down after > finishing today's work, and see if it makes any difference to the rest > of the machine. > > Thanks for the recommendation. > > -- > Regards, > > Dick Steffens > > I don't see anything there intensive enough to be causing the problems you describe. What are the load averages? Maybe it is a transient problem with the screen savers. You could disable them for a while and see if that is slowing things down. Bill ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On 05/05/2016 09:28 AM, Bill Barry wrote: > On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 9:01 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: > >> On 05/05/2016 08:29 AM, Bill Barry wrote: >>> On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 7:54 AM, Dick Steffens >> wrote: My desktop machine used to respond quickly to the opening of a program, or the return from screen saver. Now those actions are slow. The programs appear to run fine. This didn't used to be the case, as recently as just a few months ago. The most noticeable thing is when returning from screen saver. I have two monitors, one VGA and the other DVI. The VGA screen does come back quickly, but the DVI screen takes a couple of seconds. And when it does, the windows that are open are blank for another second before their content returns. Any recommendations on where to start looking for why this happens and how to fix it? >>> Try running top to see which applications are using which resources. >> VirtualBox, floats between 15% and 19% of CPU and 27% of memory. >> Xorg is next with 2.3% CPU and 0.9% MEM. >> The others drift up and down, sometimes moving ahead of Xorg, but always >> with lowish numbers. That's while typing this email. When I start typing >> in LibreOffice Writer soffice.bin moves up to number 2 with about 5% CPU >> and 1.7% MEM. >> >> In VirtualBox I'm running Win7 which is running GearPlayer4, my USB foot >> pedal controlled transcription player. I usually leave that running, >> even when I'm not transcribing. I'll try shutting it down after >> finishing today's work, and see if it makes any difference to the rest >> of the machine. >> >> Thanks for the recommendation. >> >> -- >> Regards, >> >> Dick Steffens >> >> > I don't see anything there intensive enough to be causing the problems you > describe. What are the load averages? Maybe it is a transient problem with > the screen savers. You could disable them for a while and see if that is > slowing things down. top - 09:37:44 up 25 days, 15:53, 2 users, load average: 0.80, 0.44, 0.42 Tasks: 225 total, 2 running, 223 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie %Cpu(s): 3.6 us, 4.5 sy, 0.0 ni, 91.7 id, 0.3 wa, 0.0 hi, 0.0 si, 0.0 st -- Regards, Dick Steffens ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On 05/05/2016 09:18 AM, chris (fool) mccraw wrote: > My primary suggestion is to check swap usage (can also be done with top, or > free). KiB Mem: 8113860 total, 7904916 used, 208944 free, 526492 buffers KiB Swap: 8255484 total, 836256 used, 7419228 free. 2771156 cached Mem > I know we're not running MS Windows here, but I have yet to find a > perfectly behaved browser that doesn't eventually leak memory, and if > you're like me, you have a browser running for Quite Some Time between > restarts, True. I usually fire up Thunderbird and Firefox running as soon as I restart. > and you may end up using swap even with very little actually > currently "happening" on the system. I have had to restart Firefox once in awhile. It used to act strange and the strangeness went away after shutting it down and restart it (Firefox, not the whole machine.) But that hasn't happened for many months. Maybe the fixed a leak during an upgrade. > I usually don't need a reboot to > reclaim the swap, but I'll restart the browser, and if I want to verify > that the swap usage is gone, I'll swapoff -a; swapon -a (as root) to verify > that all of that 'used' swap isn't really being used anymore. > > This last step is not necessary, since the stuff that is swapped out is > either unlikely to swap back in and is fine sitting on disk, or does swap > in once and then isn't swapped back out (until the next iteration of the > vicious cycle), I just like seeing Swap at 0 because it satisfies some > compulsion I have for closing things :) > > That's what tends to cure my "occasional slowdowns" that aren't > network-filesystem-related, YMMV After I finish today's work I'll play around with this and other ideas. Thanks for the tips. -- Regards, Dick Steffens ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 9:45 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: > top - 09:37:44 up 25 days, 15:53, 2 users, load average: 0.80, 0.44, 0.42 > Tasks: 225 total, 2 running, 223 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie > %Cpu(s): 3.6 us, 4.5 sy, 0.0 ni, 91.7 id, 0.3 wa, 0.0 hi, 0.0 si, > 0.0 st I'm so far out of the "practical Linux performance debugging" loop it ain't funny, especially for desktops as the only Linux I've run in the past many years is Ubuntu Server, from a command line. No screensaver to worry about. So I'm somewhat blindly suggesting it "feels" a lot like a hard drive / network delay on wakeup. Have you done anything with mounted network drives lately, removed them from the server but not your path or otherwise created something that might need to timeout before your desktop can resume? Do you have a tool that can show how busy the hard drive is during the seconds the system is waking up? (Is there even such a tool?) Is the HD access light on constantly during resume? Have you tried switching to a SSD? ;-) Regards, NealS ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
[PLUG] TONIGHT! PLUG Meeting: Switching to BSD Unix from GNU/Linux
Portland Linux/Unix Group General Meeting Announcement Who: Michael Dexter What: Switching to BSD Unix from GNU/Linux Where: PSU, 1930 SW 4th Ave. Room FAB 86-01 (Lower Level) When: Thursday, May 5th, 2016 at 7pm Why: The pursuit of technology freedom Stream: http://pdxlinux.org/live (PSU WiFi Permitting) By popular vote! Got the systemd/iptables/wish-I-had-OpenZFS blues? Relief is just a download away! BSD Unix has been quietly powering the Internet and a little bit of just about EVERYTHING that rubs ones and zeros together for... ever. Once named the "Greatest Software Ever Written*", the University of California, Berkeley Computer Science Research Group's "Berkeley Software Distribution" is better than ever in the form of modern FreeBSD, OpenBSD, NetBSD and their derivatives. * http://www.informationweek.com/d/d-id/1046033?print=yes LEARN what Enterprise-class file systems and firewalls are available out-of-the box on modern BSD Unix SEE the bhyve "BSD Hypervisor" in action on FreeBSD FRAG** better on FreeBSD thanks to its faster-than-Linux Linux emulation ** I take people's word for it This talk was originally proposed by long-time GNU/Linux user Larry Cafiero for LinuxFest Nortwest 2016 but was delivered by Portlander Michael Dexter when Larry could not attend the event. About Michael Dexter Michael fell in love with BSD Unix the moment he sat down in front of it at Lewis and Clark College in January of 1991. Since then, he has shepherded five virtualization and containment strategies into three BSDs, raised money for BSD efforts, organized three bhyvecon conferences, written dozens of articles about BSD Unix and spoken about BSD Unix-related topics at more events than he can count. While PDXBSDCon has yet to take place, Michael is seriously considering printing "PDXBSDCon 2014" t-shirts. Calagator Page: http://calagator.org/events/1250469901 Many will head to the Lucky Lab at 1945 NW Quimby St. after the meeting. Rideshares Available PLUG Page with information about all PLUG events: http://pdxlinux.org/ Follow PLUG on Twitter: http://twitter.com/pdxlinux PLUG is open to everyone and does not tolerate abusive behavior on its mailing lists or at its meetings. See you there! Michael Dexter PLUG Volunteer ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
On 05/05/2016 10:10 AM, Neal wrote: > On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 9:45 AM, Dick Steffens wrote: >> top - 09:37:44 up 25 days, 15:53, 2 users, load average: 0.80, 0.44, 0.42 >> Tasks: 225 total, 2 running, 223 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie >> %Cpu(s): 3.6 us, 4.5 sy, 0.0 ni, 91.7 id, 0.3 wa, 0.0 hi, 0.0 si, >> 0.0 st > I'm so far out of the "practical Linux performance debugging" loop it > ain't funny, especially for desktops as the only Linux I've run in the > past many years is Ubuntu Server, from a command line. No screensaver > to worry about. So I'm somewhat blindly suggesting it "feels" a lot > like a hard drive / network delay on wakeup. > > Have you done anything with mounted network drives lately, removed > them from the server but not your path or otherwise created something > that might need to timeout before your desktop can resume? I regularly connect to a couple of other machines in the house, but always through Samba, or in the case of my wife's Win7 machine, from my virtual Win7 machine to hers using MS's tool. > Do you have a tool that can show how busy the hard drive is during the > seconds the system is waking up? (Is there even such a tool?) I haven't found one, but I got caught up in work. > Is the > HD access light on constantly during resume? I haven't noticed. The box is under my desk. I'll watch for it the next time. > Have you tried switching to a SSD? ;-) No. I have a 1TB drive with only about half of it used, and access speed hasn't really been a problem. -- Regards, Dick Steffens ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
[PLUG] Import a mobile device from the alternate future where the iPhone didn't ruin everything
Someone is making an actual proper pocket computer with an onboard 4G modem: https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/ -Leander ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Import a mobile device from the alternate future where the iPhone didn't ruin everything
Reminds me of this: http://makezine.com/projects/build-raspberry-pi-powered-linux-laptop-that-fits-your-pocket/ I wonder if a quad 1.2ghz processor is faster than a dual 1.5? I guess it depends on the application and how it uses the cpu... On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 5:40 PM, Leander S. Harding wrote: > Someone is making an actual proper pocket computer with an onboard 4G > modem: > > https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/pages/pyra/ > > -Leander > ___ > PLUG mailing list > PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org > http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug > ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
Re: [PLUG] Snappy response not so snappy anymore
Ideas: Uninstall Flash, see if problem persists, reinstall if you must. try a: sudo su - and then a: lsof -Pni maybe install smartmontools and try a: smartctl -a /dev/sd*X* with sd*X* being your root drive Is your drive getting full? look around in your dmesg and your syslog with: dmesg | tail -200 (or whatever value for tail you find appropriate) and: less /var/log/syslog On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 3:52 PM, Dick Steffens wrote: > On 05/05/2016 10:10 AM, Neal wrote: > > On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 9:45 AM, Dick Steffens > wrote: > >> top - 09:37:44 up 25 days, 15:53, 2 users, load average: 0.80, 0.44, > 0.42 > >> Tasks: 225 total, 2 running, 223 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie > >> %Cpu(s): 3.6 us, 4.5 sy, 0.0 ni, 91.7 id, 0.3 wa, 0.0 hi, 0.0 si, > >> 0.0 st > > I'm so far out of the "practical Linux performance debugging" loop it > > ain't funny, especially for desktops as the only Linux I've run in the > > past many years is Ubuntu Server, from a command line. No screensaver > > to worry about. So I'm somewhat blindly suggesting it "feels" a lot > > like a hard drive / network delay on wakeup. > > > > Have you done anything with mounted network drives lately, removed > > them from the server but not your path or otherwise created something > > that might need to timeout before your desktop can resume? > > I regularly connect to a couple of other machines in the house, but > always through Samba, or in the case of my wife's Win7 machine, from my > virtual Win7 machine to hers using MS's tool. > > > Do you have a tool that can show how busy the hard drive is during the > > seconds the system is waking up? (Is there even such a tool?) > > I haven't found one, but I got caught up in work. > > > Is the > > HD access light on constantly during resume? > > I haven't noticed. The box is under my desk. I'll watch for it the next > time. > > > Have you tried switching to a SSD? ;-) > > No. I have a 1TB drive with only about half of it used, and access speed > hasn't really been a problem. > > > -- > Regards, > > Dick Steffens > > ___ > PLUG mailing list > PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org > http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug > ___ PLUG mailing list PLUG@lists.pdxlinux.org http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
