Help with locking up issue

[dbpbandit]

Hello, sorry if this is the wrong forum.

I'm running a fairly recent (about two weeks) installation of Mint 18.3 Sylvia on a Dell T3600 workstation. Everything is working great with one exception. When I leave for the day I simply lock it and invoke the xscreensaver. Sometime over night the system is locking up. When I cone in in the morning the screens are blanks (power button LED's indicate "sleep mode" as in no signal going to the monitors) The PC is still on but completely unresponsive. My only course of action is to hold in the power button until it shuts down. Upon reboot it seems fine. My question is, where and how should I look to see what may be causing this? It just recently started doing this, about a week now. Any help is greatly appreciated, thank you. -David

[Cosmo.]

What is your version of Mint and what is the desktop environment? Which kernel and which architecture? If you don't know open a terminal and enter:

Code: Select all

inxi -Szxx

Paste the output here.

You need to give this information for every help request in every thread.
Do not forget this in the future.

Regarding "hold the power button". A very bad and dangerous idea.

The cold reset of a hanging computer will sooner or later end in a damaged file system with the consequence of possible data loss.
This is the method to restart an otherwise not reacting computer:
Press and hold the alt key and the print key. Whilst still holding both keys pressed enter those letters one after one with a little break between them: r e i s u b. After the last letter the computer will immediately reboot without risking the file system. You can replace the letter b with the letter o, if you want to shut down instead of rebooting.

If the LED indicates a sleeping aka suspending computer, than this is most likely the case. How does it behave, if you suspend manually? Can you wake it up properly?

[dbpbandit]

Here is the information, sorry for not including it initially:
inxi -Szxx:
System: Host: PCNAME Kernel: 4.13.0-38-generic x86_64 (64 bit gcc: 5.4.0)
Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.8.9 (Qt 5.6.1) dm: sddm,sddm
Distro: Linux Mint 18.3 Sylvia

Thank you for the information on how to restart the PC properly, I will do this from now on.

Q - "If the LED indicates a sleeping aka suspending computer, than this is most likely the case. How does it behave, if you suspend manually? Can you wake it up properly?"

A - The LED indicator I was referring to is on the monitor, not the PC. The PC, visually, is on and active. The HDD indicator flickers every now and then but other than that the PC is completely unresponsive. One thing I did notice this last time was that pressing num lock and or caps lock, the keyboard indicators were working, as far as the led being on when num-lock ins on and then goes out when you press num-lock again. Same with caps lock.

When I manually suspend the PC it does suspend fine. When I hit the power button it comes back on but the graphics are messed up and you can't make anything out, just seems to be a static meshed pattern. After hitting "shift + 1" the screen goes back to normal and I can log in. It looks to me like the graphics are not recovering properly, just my opinion.

Thank you.

[Cosmo.]

The LED indicator I was referring to is on the monitor, not the PC.

I completely misunderstood this, because you wrote about a unresponsive PC.

I don't use KDE and cannot give help about that.
Does the problem also exist, if you lock the computer manually (= start xscreensaver) and try to unlock it?

[dbpbandit]

If I manually start the xscreensaver it will still lock up over night.

This weekend I suspended the PC, when I cam in this morning I hit the power button and it came up just fine. Is there a log that I can look at that may shine some light on what is occurring when it locks up? Thanks.

[dbpbandit]

BUMP - Still looking for help on this. Thank you.

[dbpbandit]

Just FYI - my system locked up again. I tried the RSEIUB commands but they did nothing. I ended up having to hold in the power butting again to get it to shut down so I could reboot it.

[kc1di]

Next time it happens take a look in the

Code: Select all

/var/log/syslog 

see if there is any indication what may have caused the crash.
Good Luck.

[dbpbandit]

When I run the "/var/log/syslog" it tells me that the "command not found"?

[trytip]

When I run the "/var/log/syslog" it tells me that the "command not found"?

that's not a command it's a location

[powerwagon75]

Just throwing this out there from left field, but next time you get to that state, try clicking your mouse once, then, flying blind, type your password and hit enter. See if your system video comes back OK or with the dysfunctional graphics, or if it is no help. Kind of odd its locking it up so hard that reisub won't work.