Xorg eating 100% CPU

[sturge24]

So I got Ubuntu (Dapper) installed on this system (caps leaked on my old mobo) and it works fine. Had a little trouble finding the right packages to install in order to get SEQ to compile, but I got past that hurdle.

Now, when I start SEQ, everything is fine until SEQ picks up the EQ client. At that point, Xorg goes from 8-12% of CPU cycles to 100%. Needless to say the computer becomes nearly useless. Everything returns to normal when I exit SEQ. It does not clear up when I log out of EQ.

I've put the system through it's paces, and SEQ is the only thing that has this effect.

I've searched the forums and found a few matches dating back to 2002, but never a resolution. Never had this type of trouble with SEQ on any system before.

Suggestions please?

[bonkersbobcat]

I had a problem a couple of years ago where it appeared that SEQ would just start eating CPU like nuts. It would get way behind on packet processing as well. It turned out that it was a bad screen saver. I had random screen savers turned on and when it hit the bad one, the CPU would just peg. X was mostly borked as well. Once I figured out which screen saver module it was, I disabled it and haven't seen the issue since. I don't remember off hand, which module it was, but the problem only occurred when that particular screen saver kicked off and SEQ was running. Might want to hunt around there.

BB

[sturge24]

I hate screensavers, personally, and have them disabled.

[purple]

I believe the old resolution was to upgrade qt as it was a problem with 3.0.x version of qt. But I'm not sure. I assume you're using xorg and not XFree86?

[sturge24]

Yes, Xorg, not XFree86. QT version is 3.3.6. I don't know if this will add any insight, but when SEQ is running and decoding, my mouse cursor blinks in and out of existance very rapidly, even when it's not being moved.

Given that I've never had any trouble with SEQ before, what do you think are the odds of this being either a) corrupt/wrong video driver or b) Corrupted Ubuntu disc?

[purple]

I'd say b is very low. Wrong video driver I guess maybe. Or some X extension enabled by default or something. I don't know of any way of asking X what is is doing to try to figure things out. Maybe close parts of seq to try to narrow it down or something?

[sturge24]

I'll give it a shot tonight, but for now, I'm off to work. Thanks for all the help!

[sturge24]

Still no luck on this, but I did happen to notice something that may help. When I fore up SEQ...


sturge24@Ubuntu-Linux:~$ su
Password:
root@Ubuntu-Linux:/home/sturge24# showeq
X Error: BadDevice, invalid or uninitialized input device 166
Major opcode: 144
Minor opcode: 3
Resource id: 0x0
Failed to open device
X Error: BadDevice, invalid or uninitialized input device 166
Major opcode: 144
Minor opcode: 3
Resource id: 0x0
Failed to open device
Session management error: Authentication Rejected, reason : None of the authentication protocols specified are supported and host-based authentication failed
I haven't the slightest idea what any of that means, but it doesn't look good to my inexperienced eyes. The normal stuff follows in the terminal window and SEQ GUI starts. Then my system boggs down.

[SinginSam]

same issue here and also using ubuntu (edgy 6.10) with default GUI. If it matters, I installed Ubuntu with the desktop image and it worked fine (once I installed all the dev stuff to compile it, couldn't get the APT-GETS to work from tanner's sig). But I then wiped that install and installed from the SERVER image, and have had the 100% proc usage for as long as Showeq is running.

[sturge24]

Tanner's site was down all weekend. It's up again though, and his instructions work great with a far more minimal package installation than trying it with Synaptic. Also far faster!

I tried both 6.10 and 6.06 (both desktop ISO's) and both are chewing up processor cycles like that giant worm in Dune when SEQ is running. 6.06 and SEQ ran great on my old mobo, until 70% of it's capacitors started leaking and it just wouldn't even POST anymore =(

Incidentally, I find Dapper more stable than Edgy.

[SinginSam]

Think I figured it out. Purple was correct in diagnosing it as a video driver. I looked at ubuntu's support section, and there is a moderator there that links his own website

http://albertomilone.com/nvidia_scripts1.html

and shows you how to update the nvidia drivers.

it was a night and day difference and took all of 10 mins with the script he made.

Proc% was pegged at 100% if the map occupied more than 25% of teh screen area before the update. now it's fullscreen and using less than 10%.

hope it helps.