Chrome Freezing After Recent System Update

[DAMIEN1307]

There is another reason why some of these chromium/chrome based browsers may be crashing/freezing as well.

It is a program called "preload" that is a "runtime" type of daemon that is using root priviledges that preloads programs/apps etc into Ram and can also be taxing of CPUs...It has been said that i may also be effecting boot times as well because of these reasons.

If any of you here have this installed and are suffering these problems, you may want to consider uninstalling it.

To my knowledge, this program is not a default installation in any of the Linux Mint or Peppermint distros but may be in others such as "Elementary" OS...DAMIEN

https://askubuntu.com/questions/110335/ ... by-default

EDIT...One statement caught my eye in this article.

First, Google Chrome. Now a browser is opened only once per boot, maybe twice (for me, I am a web developer). Chrome and its related libraries stay in memory because I am always using it. Even when I close all the chrome windows it's still in the background doing its thing. Thus all the ram dedicated to holding a preload copy of Chrome is a total and utter waste. It's never (or rarely) unloaded. For the average user this is true for a great number of applications. A Office user will almost always have their email app open. So the small savings in startup time is completely wasted because they only open their email app once a day, and leave it open.

[Joe2Shoe]

Damien, I installed "Preload" several weeks ago, about the same time Chrome went ape. I uninstalled Preload, rebooted, reinstalled Chrome and same ole same ole. I'll stay away from Chrome for awhile, and will be using Firefox, Opera and Vivaldi (no freezes).
Thanks for the heads up.

[DAMIEN1307]

Your going to want to follow up the preload removal with this in order to remove detritus that is left over...DAMIEN

Code: Select all

sudo apt autoremove --purge

Code: Select all

dpkg -l | grep '^rc' | awk '{print $2}' | sudo xargs dpkg --purge

[jerson]

I'm facing the same problem after the recent Chromium update. Randomly freezes screen updates. More noticeable when viewing video content.

My work-around solution to the problem for now

Open a second tab
When the current tab freezes, click on the second tab and click back to first tab.
That unlocks the freeze.

To my untrained mind, that appears to be something broken in the screen refreshing code ?

[ShellKnobCat]

Does going to the second tab permanently stop the freezing or does it continue meaning that you have to keep going to the second tab?

[jerson]

Going to the second tab and back to the original unfreezes for a while before it happens again. When it refreezes, you need to do it again to unfreeze.

[dizzyman]

Same problem here: laptop with Chromium-based browsers that have the latest update (79.0.3945.88). The problem seems to be with Chromium 79.X though because Opera, which as not yet been updated (78.x), is running fine.

Edge on Windows is also fine (because it is still on the x.58 and not x.88 build?), and strange enough so is Chrome (x.88) This laptop does have discreet graphics though, and I'm wondering if that makes any difference. Also, I'm getting the impression that the problem is limited to Linux distro's based on Ubuntu 18.04 in combination with Chromium 79.x because I experience no problems on my Laptop with Ubuntu 19.04.

In any case, the bug has been reported on the Chromium bug tracker, so lets wait:
https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/is ... 7&q=freeze

/Edit
I spoke too soon; Chrome 79.x on Ubuntu 19.04 is also affected although it doesn't happen as often as on my Mint/Cinnamon 19.3 machine (same model and config.).

[DAMIEN1307]

This problem still exists in Chromium based Brave Browser "Version 1.1.23 Chromium: 79.0.3945.88 (Official Build) (64-bit)" but has slightly less occurances than in previous update...they are aware of this and have many "crash/freeze" reports to them as well as does "chromium" have to its troubleshooting forums etc...

This is just going to be a "hurry up and wait" scenario until the "powers that be" find a solution to this very "frustracting" situation...DAMIEN

[pcpunk]

I'm having issues too guys, and as usual cannot figure out why more people are not having the same issue??? I also was thinking it has something to do with my CPU and the Integrated graphics, and that chrome and chromium is just to much for it anymore???
I'll be watching this thread guys as I cannot live without my chromium based browser haha, well I guess I can get buy if needed.

[racer-x]

FYI, I use Chromium on my desktop and two laptops. All use integrated graphics and none have any issues. all are using Version 79.0.3945.79. One of my laptops was bought back in 2009.

[pcpunk]

Mine's 2006 haha, and may be an issue though has not been in the past.

[DAMIEN1307]

The only 2 chromium based browser that i am aware of that do not have this problem are Slimjet which im using right now till this is fixed and i believe the other is Vivaldi, and the reason why is that they do not update/upgrade their browsers to the very newest "OOOOOOH SHINEY" versions right away.

The moral of the story is..."having to have the newest update of anything on linux is not always beneficial and can be a major PITA"...DAMIEN

[pcpunk]

I'll wait it out and make sure not to update it on other installs.

[Hoser Rob]

... i did notice a few freezes but only with mint 19.3 which i downgraded back to 19.2 where all seems well for the moment....

Actually I've been experiencing the same issue on Mint 18.3 Xfce. Am currently checking out Qupzilla.

[jbarbieri]

I joined basically to say "me too" in this case.

What I did was downgrade google-chrome-stable

Downloaded the 78 version for Debian/64-bit from here: https://www.slimjet.com/chrome/google-c ... ersion.php

Removed it via apt

Then installed that package manually.


I also made sure I disabled the repo in /etc/apt/sources.list.d so that it did not get upgraded next time around.

Hope this helps others!
--John

[pcpunk]

@jbarbieri, thanks as I struggled to find those anywhere, thanks stupid google chrome devs for making things so hard to find.

[racer-x]

I don't know if this has any effect or not. I only run Chromium in incognito mode. Has anyone with problems tried this to see if it makes a difference? I use a custom command for my launchers like this example: chromium-browser %U -incognito

[DAMIEN1307]

I cant speak for chromium/chrome in particular but Brave issued an update yesterday and im using it now...no freezes yet...DAMIEN

[ShellKnobCat]

I just installed a Chrome update to version 79.0.3945.117 and, so far, appears to have solved the problem. Came across on Update manager.

[pcpunk]

Yeay! Thanks for the report!