System temporarily freezes for around 30 seconds

[jerson]

Of late, I am seeing a freezing of the system. I haven't been able to pin down what causes it. I have the VLC player playing internet radio while I'm at the desk. If I find I need to watch a video post, I stop VLC play watch the post and then go back to play in VLC. Once in a while, I find the sound loops a segment of audio over and over and over for around 30 seconds during which the PC is non-responsive. Any mouse clicks / key presses can aggravate the freeze and cause a total lock up. I have a video recording showing what happens and how it recovers; however, I am unable to attach it to the post, so an off-site link is here instead https://youtu.be/MCcoSNDKmA8 Perhaps someone give a hint what could be causing such behaviour. It's rare, but once or twice a day is the usual thing.

inxi -Fxzi

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System:    Host: JFLMdesktop Kernel: 4.15.0-43-generic x86_64 (64 bit gcc: 5.4.0)
           Desktop: Cinnamon 3.0.7 (Gtk 2.24.30) Distro: Linux Mint 18 Sarah
Machine:   Mobo: Gigabyte model: G31M-ES2L Bios: Award v: F10 date: 09/29/2009
CPU:       Quad core Intel Core2 Quad Q6600 (-MCP-) cache: 4096 KB
           flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3 ssse3 vmx) bmips: 19199
           clock speeds: max: 2400 MHz 1: 1986 MHz 2: 1692 MHz 3: 1760 MHz
           4: 1995 MHz
Graphics:  Card: Intel 82G33/G31 Express Integrated Graphics Controller
           bus-ID: 00:02.0
           Display Server: X.Org 1.18.4 driver: intel
           Resolution: 1360x768@60.02hz
           GLX Renderer: Mesa DRI Intel G33
           GLX Version: 1.4 Mesa 11.2.0 Direct Rendering: Yes
Audio:     Card Intel NM10/ICH7 Family High Definition Audio Controller
           driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 00:1b.0
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k4.15.0-43-generic
Network:   Card: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller
           driver: r8169 v: 2.3LK-NAPI port: be00 bus-ID: 02:00.0
           IF: enp2s0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
           WAN IP: <filter> IF: enp2s0 ip-v4: <filter> ip-v6: <filter>
           IF: virbr0-nic ip-v4: N/A ip-v6: N/A
           IF: virbr0 ip-v4: <filter> ip-v6: N/A
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 1500.3GB (13.0% used)
           ID-1: /dev/sda model: ST3500413AS size: 500.1GB
           ID-2: /dev/sdb model: WDC_WD10EZEX size: 1000.2GB
Partition: ID-1: / size: 92G used: 24G (28%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdb5
           ID-2: /home size: 92G used: 12G (14%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdb6
           ID-3: swap-1 size: 10.00GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sdb1
RAID:      No RAID devices: /proc/mdstat, md_mod kernel module present
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 62.0C mobo: N/A
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info:      Processes: 203 Uptime: 1:18 Memory: 2713.7/3934.9MB
           Init: systemd runlevel: 5 Gcc sys: 5.4.0
           Client: Shell (bash 4.3.481) inxi: 2.2.35 

[deepakdeshp]

Try updating your Bios. Do it carefully otherwise it maY brick your pc

[jerson]

HI DeepakD

The same machine has been running mint without any trouble for almost 3+ years. Only recently, I am seeing such behaviour. To my programmer mind, it appears like some interrupts processing have frozen. When the stack unwinds, the system starts working again. If however, I press mouse/keys, the interrupts stack higher and the system freezes forever. I suspect either a memory leak or a un-handled exception in some module but can't pin it down as yet. My analyses may be totally off-track with my micro-controller programming background. Are you aware of any inbuilt / add-on tools I can run to be able to identify the cause of such behaviour?

Since the behaviour is random, I cleaned the RAM modules to eliminate the possibility of the modules giving trouble. Still, facing the issue.

[jerson]

This problem seems to persist. Narrowed it down to a few applications that are running together whenever this happens

Currently this is the configuration

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inxi -Fxzi
System:
  Host: JFLMdesktop Kernel: 4.15.0-74-generic x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc 
  v: 7.4.0 Desktop: Cinnamon 4.4.8 Distro: Linux Mint 19.3 Tricia 
  base: Ubuntu 18.04 bionic 
Machine:
  Type: Desktop Mobo: Gigabyte model: G31M-ES2L serial: <filter> BIOS: Award 
  v: F10 date: 09/29/2009 
CPU:
  Topology: Quad Core model: Intel Core2 Quad Q6600 bits: 64 type: MCP 
  arch: Core Merom rev: B L2 cache: 4096 KiB 
  flags: lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 19198 
  Speed: 1600 MHz min/max: 1600/2400 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1745 2: 1764 
  3: 1763 4: 1735 
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel 82G33/G31 Express Integrated Graphics vendor: Gigabyte 
  driver: i915 v: kernel bus ID: 00:02.0 
  Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.19.6 driver: intel resolution: 1360x768~60Hz 
  OpenGL: renderer: Mesa DRI Intel G33 v: 1.4 Mesa 19.2.1 direct render: Yes 
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel NM10/ICH7 Family High Definition Audio 
  vendor: Gigabyte GA-D525TUD driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel 
  bus ID: 00:1b.0 
  Sound Server: ALSA v: k4.15.0-74-generic 
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet 
  vendor: Gigabyte driver: r8169 v: 2.3LK-NAPI port: be00 bus ID: 02:00.0 
  IF: enp2s0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter> 
  IP v4: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global 
  IP v6: <filter> type: noprefixroute scope: link 
  IF-ID-1: virbr0 state: down mac: <filter> 
  IP v4: <filter> scope: global 
  IF-ID-2: virbr0-nic state: down mac: <filter> 
  WAN IP: <filter> 
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 1.36 TiB used: 232.02 GiB (16.6%) 
  ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: Seagate model: ST3500413AS size: 465.76 GiB 
  ID-2: /dev/sdb vendor: Western Digital model: WD10EZEX-08WN4A0 
  size: 931.51 GiB 
Partition:
  ID-1: / size: 91.54 GiB used: 59.92 GiB (65.5%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdb5 
  ID-2: /home size: 91.54 GiB used: 29.26 GiB (32.0%) fs: ext4 
  dev: /dev/sdb6 
  ID-3: swap-1 size: 9.31 GiB used: 91.4 MiB (1.0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sdb1 
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 89.0 C mobo: N/A 
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A 
Info:
  Processes: 236 Uptime: 8h 01m Memory: 3.84 GiB used: 2.75 GiB (71.7%) 
  Init: systemd runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 7.4.0 Shell: bash v: 4.4.20 
  inxi: 3.0.32 

1 - browser - doesn't really matter (chromium/firefox/falkon)
2 - vlc player
3 - virtualbox (my hunch is VBox and browser are into some conflict)

If the crash is sever, it takes down with it the pulseaudio system so much that vlc player happily puts out audio, but the audio does not come out of the speakers

when pulseaudio has crashed, qjackctl does not show any audio devices. Only alsa tab shows MIDI through is available. Only remedy so far is to log out and back in to the user.

any clues what to look for please?

[kukamuumuka]

Command top tells much, and if you install iotop, it shows if something read/write much.

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apt install iotop
top
sudo iotop

[jerson]

appreciate your reply. However, once the freeze happens, audio usually plays the last segment that was playing in a loop something like la-la-la-la-......... ad-infinitum till it comes out of the freeze. During that time, mouse does not move, keyboard is unresponsive, can do literally nothing.

Wonder if iotop will show something after coming out of the freeze. Will definitely inform here when it happens again. For now, I have disabled the VBox sound output in the machine just to rule out audio conflict.

[kukamuumuka]

It is somekind of cache issue, so try to increase cache.
https://www.vlchelp.com/stop-hd-video-f ... ezing-vlc/

[jerson]

Sounds interesting. Let me check on it. Thanks for helping me with this.