Linux Debian support - Computer is very laggy

Author

Computer is very laggy

Pingvin

2005-12-05, 7:47 am

Hello

Debian Sarge, Gnome, Kernel 2.4.27

Intel 3.2ghz 540J
abit aa8xe 3rd-eye
ati x700 radeon 256mb
1gb kingston ddr2
lg dvd-rw dl
2x sata hd, seagate (hda,hdb)
1x pata hd, maxtor (hdc)

My problem is that my system is very unstable. My computer lags when Im
using it. For example my computer is very laggy when Im playing music with
xmms and uncompressing tarballs. I have noticed that this happens
especially when doing I/O operations.

My master harddrive's DMA is off for some reason. I tried to put that on
with command hdparm -d 1 /dev/hda but it says the following:

/dev/hda:
setting using_dma to 1 (on)
HDIO_SET_DMA failed: Operation not permitted
using_dma = 0 (off)

When I see top, I notice that graphical operations are taking much %cpu (6.3
in XFree86). And they load very much when this lagging occurs.

1781 root 16 -10 218m 90m 9516 S 6.3 10.2 160:14.70 XFree86
1991 home 15 0 14656 14m 8928 R 2.0 1.6 0:23.49 gnome-terminal
16322 home 11 0 12696 12m 8460 S 1.0 1.4 1:55.94 gnome-system-mo
17925 root 10 0 1112 1112 852 R 0.3 0.1 0:00.61 top
1 root 8 0 504 472 448 S 0.0 0.1 0:00.35 init
2 root 9 0 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:00.46 keventd
3 root 19 19 0 0 0 S 0.0 0.0 0:02.25 ksoftirqd_CPU0

I also downloaded the following piece of code which told me that Im in text
mode. Whatever it means.
http://www.linuks.mine.nu/people/vga/vgamode.c

I havent installed 3d-support for my ATI x700 but I did install fglrx
drivers (without 3d-module). I also tried to boot from kernel 2.6 installed
via Synaptic but it says cannot locate /dev/console attempted to kill init.

I have heard that Gnome is very slow but it cant be this slow. I want to use
gnome assuming that it will be allright. If the problem even is in Gnome.

I dont have any ideas howto proceed and Im not so familiar with Linux. Any
help is highly appreciated.

--
Pingvin

Janis Blechert

2005-12-05, 5:49 pm

On Mon, 05 Dec 2005 14:15:39 +0000, Pingvin wrote:

> /dev/hda:
> setting using_dma to 1 (on)
> HDIO_SET_DMA failed: Operation not permitted
> using_dma = 0 (off)
>
> I dont have any ideas howto proceed and Im not so familiar with Linux. Any
> help is highly appreciated.

You did execute hdparm as super-user? If you didn't that's the 'cause of
the operation being permitted. you can change to super-user with "su
[enter]"+password and then just type in the command. on some distros
though (ubuntu for example) you have to use sudo, like "sudo command
[enter]"+password.
hope that helps

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Pingvin

2005-12-05, 5:49 pm

yes i did it with root. and the output wouldnt even be as i said when
executing that as a normal user.

Janis Blechert wrote:

> On Mon, 05 Dec 2005 14:15:39 +0000, Pingvin wrote:
>
>
> You did execute hdparm as super-user? If you didn't that's the 'cause of
> the operation being permitted. you can change to super-user with "su
> [enter]"+password and then just type in the command. on some distros
> though (ubuntu for example) you have to use sudo, like "sudo command
> [enter]"+password.
> hope that helps
>

Jeremy Boden

2005-12-05, 5:49 pm

In message <pan.2005.12.05.14.00.56.462348@gmx.net>, Janis Blechert
<janis.blechert@gmx.net> writes
>On Mon, 05 Dec 2005 14:15:39 +0000, Pingvin wrote:
>
>
>You did execute hdparm as super-user? If you didn't that's the 'cause of
>the operation being permitted. you can change to super-user with "su
>[enter]"+password and then just type in the command. on some distros
>though (ubuntu for example) you have to use sudo, like "sudo command
>[enter]"+password.
>hope that helps
>
Or you could setup a proper root user in Ubuntu...

--
Jeremy Boden