How to check the cause of several PC restarts in Mint?

[ovisergiu]

My PC keeps restarting several times a day, sometimes 4-5 times in a row (right after the desktop loads and very seldom when the Mint logo is being displayed before the Desktop will appear.
Is there a way to find out if Linux Mint 18.3 is to blame or the power source is dying?

[gm10]

If that machine was stable before then it sounds like a hardware issue indeed. I'd always look at the PSU first, too, but the mainboard can be the cause, too, or even faulty memory or in some cases the CPU.

That said, if you updated your kernel recently then you may want to go back to the previous version first to make sure it's not related to that - reboot, hold shift after the BIOS screen until the GRUB menu comes up, then select Advanced and choose a previous kernel version. If the kernel is segfaulting you may find info about that in the kernel logs, too (/var/log/kern.log and /var/log/kern.log.1).

You can also boot the system from a live USB to see if it's stable there, although the only conclusive evidence from that will be if it is also unstable, because then it's clearly the hardware (as long as the system worked fine with your LM18.3 before).

[karlchen]

Is there a way to find out if Linux Mint 18.3 is to blame or the power source is dying?

The logfiles under /var/log might hold hints what is wrong, specifically the file /var/log/syslog and the previous syslog version, named /var/log/syslog.1.
On Mint 18.3, you can inspect the same information, or rather even more detailled, by executing journalctl -b -1, journalctl -b -2, etc, whereby the negative number specifies how many sessions back you want to go.

[ovisergiu]

I found the log files both of you told me but there are hundreds of lines I do not understand... total Chinese for a non-Chinese speaker.

[gm10]

I found the log files both of you told me but there are hundreds of lines I do not understand... total Chinese for a non-Chinese speaker.

Try if this command turns up anything:

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grep -e "segfault" -e "panic" /var/log/syslog*

[ovisergiu]

Just a blinking cursor that shows nothing...

[gm10]

Just a blinking cursor that shows nothing...

That means there's nothing in the logs concerning kernel panics and segmentation faults. They may still have happened but the system reset before the log could get written, so this doesn't really help you.

[trytip]

what do you have in Terminal for sensors might be temperatures too high also open .xsession-errors in your home folder, you'll find hundreds of lines but maybe something might hit you in the face

[ovisergiu]

what do you have in Terminal for sensors might be temperatures too high also open .xsession-errors in your home folder, you'll find hundreds of lines but maybe something might hit you in the face

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oks@oks ~ $ sensors
acpitz-virtual-0
Adapter: Virtual device
temp1:        +27.8°C  (crit = +106.0°C)
temp2:        +29.8°C  (crit = +106.0°C)

radeon-pci-0100
Adapter: PCI adapter
temp1:        +40.0°C  (crit = +120.0°C, hyst = +90.0°C)

coretemp-isa-0000
Adapter: ISA adapter
Physical id 0:  +39.0°C  (high = +85.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 0:         +39.0°C  (high = +85.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 1:         +35.0°C  (high = +85.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 2:         +39.0°C  (high = +85.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)
Core 3:         +39.0°C  (high = +85.0°C, crit = +105.0°C)

.xsession-errors says:

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** Message: couldn't access control socket: /run/user/1000/keyring/control: No such file or directory
[cinnamon-settings-daemon-smartcard] Failed to start: no suitable smartcard driver could be found
[cinnamon-settings-daemon-smartcard] Failed to start: no suitable smartcard driver could be found
dropbox: locating interpreter
Cjs-Message: JS LOG: About to start Cinnamon
dropbox: logging to /tmp/dropbox-antifreeze-D1Y1Aq
dropbox: initializing
dropbox: initializing python 3.5.4
dropbox: setting program path '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/dropbox'
St-Message: cogl npot texture sizes SUPPORTED
dropbox: setting home path '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88'
dropbox: setting python path '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88:/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/python-packages-35.zip'
Cjs-Message: JS LOG: Cinnamon started at Tue Sep 25 2018 06:29:08 GMT+0300 (EEST)
Cjs-Message: JS LOG: network applet: Cannot find connection for active (or connection cannot be read)
dropbox: python initialized
dropbox: running dropbox
dropbox: setting args
dropbox: applying overrides

(cinnamon:1970): St-WARNING **: Ignoring length property that isn't a number at line 1526, col 13
openGL version 4.5 detected (GL3 Cogl Driver)
MetaSyncRing disabled: couldn't find required GL extensions, or the minimum safe openGL version was not met
** Message: nemo-desktop: session is cinnamon, establishing proxy
failed to create drawable
Cjs-Message: JS LOG: Invalid network device type, is 14
Cjs-Message: JS LOG: network applet: Found connection for active
dropbox: running main script
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._constant_time.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
Nemo-Share-Message: Called "net usershare info" but it failed: 'net usershare' returned error 255: mkdir failed on directory /var/run/samba/msg.lock: Permission denied
net usershare: cannot open usershare directory /var/lib/samba/usershares. Error No such file or directory
Please ask your system administrator to enable user sharing.

dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._openssl.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._padding.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/psutil._psutil_linux.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/psutil._psutil_posix.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/linuxffi.pthread._linuxffi_pthread.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/cpuid.compiled._cpuid.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/linuxffi.fcntl._linuxffi_fcntl.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/linuxffi.sys.compiled._linuxffi_sys.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/linuxffi.resolv.compiled._linuxffi_resolv.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/tornado.speedups.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/linuxffi.gnu.compiled._linuxffi_gnu.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/posixffi.libc._posixffi_libc.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/librsyncffi.compiled._librsyncffi.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtWebKit.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtCore.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtNetwork.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtGui.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtWebKitWidgets.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtWidgets.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtPrintSupport.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/oks/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-58.3.88/PyQt5.QtDBus.cpython-35m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'

(cinnamon:1970): St-WARNING **: Ignoring length property that isn't a number at line 1526, col 13

(cinnamon:1970): St-WARNING **: Ignoring length property that isn't a number at line 1526, col 13
Cinnamon warning: Buggy client sent a _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW message with a timestamp of 0 for 0x5e00085 (.xsession-)

There is also an .xsession-errors.old but can not be opened.

[trytip]

your temperatures are OK, the thing i notice is that lot of dropbox logging. you'll need to open .xsession-errors.old with TEXT editor but only after the machine restarts on it's own. the .old errors will tell you what happened right before the shutdown, it should be towards the bottom of the file