[opensuse] Xorg Server Saturates CPU (Kernel Mode) When DPMS Engages
Hi, In the aftermath of my ill-considered attempt to install the Gnome Control Center (*), subsequently removed, I find that when I come back to my system after a long idle period, GKrellM is showing me a solid block of 100% CPU, most of it kernel-mode. This abnormal usage ceases with the disengagement of the DPMS / screen saver. In order to track down the cause of this symptom that vanishes when I use keyboard or mouse (**), I ran a loop of periodic "ps axl" invocations directed into a file before retiring in the evening. From this I deduced that the X server is the culprit. At least it is the process accumulating the CPU usage, but since it's a server, this may just reflect it responding to a barrage of requests from some other process. Furthermore, it is not the case that this extreme CPU use is caused by the screen saver itself, because I can wait for it to kick in, let it run for several minutes (but less than the DPMS initiation interval) and then cancel it (the screen saver) and see from the 5-minute interval displayed by GKrellM that CPU usage is normal (for the screen saver I'm currently using, that's just a few percent). In fact, the abnormal usage does not start until about 10 minutes after the system becomes idle. Additionally, there appears to be a short interval (about 5 minutes) when the CPU usage drops back to normal, and then it goes up and stays up. This is openSUSE 11.1. If anyone can shed some light on this, give me some hints about what might be wrong, what to look at, what experiments to conduct, etc., I'd appreciate it. (*) The other possibility was installing the KDE 4 Personal Settings packages, which unlike the subsequently removed Gnome Control Center, remains installed. However, I don't believe the symptom began until I added and then removed the Gnome packages. (**) I know I could SSH in from another system to monitor it without disengaging DPMS or the screen saver. I may yet try that. Randall Schulz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
On Sunday February 1 2009, Randall R Schulz wrote:
Hi,
In the aftermath of my ill-considered attempt to install the Gnome Control Center (*), subsequently removed, I find that when I come back to my system after a long idle period, GKrellM is showing me a solid block of 100% CPU, most of it kernel-mode. This abnormal usage ceases with the disengagement of the DPMS / screen saver.
Well, I now think I can say that this symptom has been resolved and it was the recent powerdevil update to version 1.4.1-4.5.2 released via the update repository on Feb. 18, 2009. It appears that the real reason this KDE4 component supplied the resolution to the symptom is that shortly before the Gnome Control Center fiasco alluded to above, I'd installed the KDE4 Personal Settings control center (from kdebase4-workspace 4.1.3-10.1), which had as a dependency powerdevil 1.4.1-4.3. So in fact the Gnome business was a red herring and it was the KDE4 components that introduced the bugged code that produced the extreme CPU consumption when in power-save states. Randall Schulz -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
participants (1)
-
Randall R Schulz