Random System Freezes in AMD64.

[rnejdl]

I have found a random but reproducible system freezes using the AMD64 195.22 driver. I had reverted my system to an older card and that resolved my kernel panic on logging out of X. However, I have had 3 system freezes where the system completely freezes and plays a buzzing sound in the speakers.

In 2 of the cases I was using VirtualBox with at least 2 vm's running. I am not sure but believe it is possibly related to turning on 3d acceleration. In the other, I wasn't using any vm's at all but streaming pandora using the flash plugin.

Not sure if this is an NVIDIA issue or not but I have seen enough reports in this area I had to check.

Rusty Nejdl

[mgmartin]

Hey rnejdl,

I encountered two types of hangs with the beta NVidia x86_64 driver. One of my regular hangs was fixed by disabling powerd from running. This definitely fixed a very repeatable kernel lock.

My other hang, like you, happened when I ran VirtualBox. I read somewhere that disabling Linux ABI compatibility in the NVidia driver solved this for someone. I re-installed the NVidia driver removing Linux ABI support ( see Chapter 5 in the NVIDIA-FreeBSD-x86_64-195.22/doc/README ). I ran VirtualBox for over an hour the other day with no hangs. Prior to removing Linux ABI, VirtualBox would hard lock the system within a few minutes, so I think that fixed my VirtualBox hang issue.

Worth a shot of you haven't tried either/both methods.

[rnejdl]

That almost makes sense since the other freeze was using linux emulation for the flash 10 player on Pandora radio. I just wish I could get something more out of it but with the system completely frozen I couldn't break into anything to get any sort of info on where it froze.

Rusty Nejdl
http://networking.ringofsaturn.com

[mgmartin]

So much for the VirtualBox/No Linux ABI theory. My system just froze after a few minutes of running a Windows guest inside VirtualBox.

[rnejdl]

Yes, had the same thing. I caused mine to happen by enabling 3D acceleration and then resizing the window. I need to validate that disabling 3d acceleration will fix it.

Rusty Nejdl
http://networking.ringofsaturn.com

[mgmartin]

I didn't have 3d enabled, so no help there on my end.

[rnejdl]

I confirmed this behavior this morning. Running an Ubuntu virtual box with the virtual box additions froze my system completely within 5 minutes. I didn't even have it on the screen I was working on. Not 100% convinced this is an NVidia issue but the only way I can think of confirming is by running nouveau driver.

Rusty Nejdl
http://networking.ringofsaturn.com

[mlobo]

I am inclined to think that IT IS an nvidia issue because I have 2 machines, both with:

- FBSD 8 revision (FreeBSD 8.0-STABLE #0 r204106M: Sat Feb 20 03:29:09 UTC 2010) svned and compiled on the same day on both machines.

- KDE 4.3.5 with openGL, composite and direct rendering enabled on both.

- Vbox 3.1.4 (plus the same version guest additions on each guests i.e. XP, Win7 and Fedora).

- Both machines run the SAME 3 vdi guest files.

One has an Nvidia 9800 GT and the other an GM45 intel.

Only the Nvidia machine always freezes with virtual box :(