Ubuntu 20.04 Freezes randomly and media loops the last 1-2 seconds clip
After a few days of installation of Ubuntu 20.04 on my Desktop system, I am facing this issue of my OS freezing at random intervals. Happening 2-3 times a day.
The question may be similar to this one but the those answers are not applicable because I already have 16 GB of SWAP and a recent kernel version.
I also checked many other similar questions but could not find the specific solution.
The picture of the htop, the last time it happened.
I checked the /var/log/syslog file and could not find anything relevant.
Screenshot of syslog file.
All the time it froze, I was using two browsers: Firefox(2-3 tabs) and Chrome(4-5 tabs, youtube in on of them) and a few other applications like Vscode, Terminal etc. I was not doing any heavy(memory-wise) work.
I am not sure what is causing this. One possible culprit I am guessing is 'may be', the dconf-editor. The issue started the day I installed dconf-editor because I had to add Byobu to the favorites in the dock. So, I followed some of the steps from this answer. But it didn't work as expected and showed some weird results. So I reverted all the changes done to it.
Adding here the relevant system information.
sudo lshw -short
H/W path Device Class Description
=====================================================
system All Series (All)
/0 bus H81M-K
/0/0 memory 64KiB BIOS
/0/1 memory 16GiB System memory
/0/1/0 memory 8GiB DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1333 MHz (0.8 ns)
/0/1/1 memory 8GiB DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1067 MHz (0.9 ns)
/0/3d memory 256KiB L1 cache
/0/3e memory 1MiB L2 cache
/0/3f memory 6MiB L3 cache
/0/43 processor Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4460 CPU @ 3.20GHz
/0/100 bridge 4th Gen Core Processor DRAM Controller
/0/100/1 bridge Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor PCI Express x16 Controller
/0/100/2 display Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller
/0/100/14 bus 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family USB xHCI
/0/100/14/0 usb3 bus xHCI Host Controller
/0/100/14/0/2 input Rapoo 2.4G Wireless Device
/0/100/14/1 usb4 bus xHCI Host Controller
/0/100/16 communication 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family MEI Controller #1
/0/100/1a bus 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family USB EHCI #2
/0/100/1a/1 usb1 bus EHCI Host Controller
/0/100/1a/1/1 bus USB hub
/0/100/1b multimedia 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset High Definition Audio Controller
/0/100/1c bridge 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #1
/0/100/1c.2 bridge 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port #3
/0/100/1c.2/0 enp3s0 network RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller
/0/100/1d bus 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family USB EHCI #1
/0/100/1d/1 usb2 bus EHCI Host Controller
/0/100/1d/1/1 bus USB hub
/0/100/1f bridge H81 Express LPC Controller
/0/100/1f.2 storage 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family 6-port SATA Controller 1 [AHCI mode]
/0/100/1f.3 bus 8 Series/C220 Series Chipset Family SMBus Controller
/0/2 system PnP device PNP0c01
/0/3 system PnP device PNP0c02
/0/4 system PnP device PNP0b00
/0/5 generic PnP device INT3f0d
/0/6 system PnP device PNP0c02
/0/7 system PnP device PNP0c02
/0/8 system PnP device PNP0c02
/0/9 scsi0 storage
/0/9/0.0.0 /dev/sda disk 480GB WDC WDS480G2G0A-
/0/9/0.0.0/1 /dev/sda1 volume 476MiB Windows FAT volume
/0/9/0.0.0/2 /dev/sda2 volume 15GiB Extended partition
/0/9/0.0.0/2/5 /dev/sda5 volume 15GiB Linux swap volume
/0/9/0.0.0/3 /dev/sda3 volume 114GiB EXT4 volume
/0/9/0.0.0/4 /dev/sda4 volume 316GiB EXT4 volume
/0/a scsi4 storage
/0/a/0.0.0 /dev/sdb disk 1TB WDC WD10EZEX-60M
/0/a/0.0.0/1 /dev/sdb1 volume 931GiB EXT4 volume
/1 power To Be Filled By O.E.M.
swapon -s
Filename Type Size Used Priority
/dev/sda5 partition 15999996 0 -2
sudo dmidecode -t 2
# dmidecode 3.2
Getting SMBIOS data from sysfs.
SMBIOS 2.7 present.
Handle 0x0002, DMI type 2, 15 bytes
Base Board Information
Manufacturer: ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.
Product Name: H81M-K
Version: Rev X.0x
Serial Number: 191059533403458
Asset Tag: To be filled by O.E.M.
Features:
Board is a hosting board
Board is replaceable
Location In Chassis: To be filled by O.E.M.
Chassis Handle: 0x0003
Type: Motherboard
Contained Object Handles: 0
free -h
total used free shared buff/cache available
Mem: 15Gi 4.5Gi 6.7Gi 1.0Gi 4.2Gi 9.7Gi
Swap: 15Gi 0B 15Gi
sudo lshw -c video
*-display
description: VGA compatible controller
product: Xeon E3-1200 v3/4th Gen Core Processor Integrated Graphics Controller
vendor: Intel Corporation
physical id: 2
bus info: pci@0000:00:02.0
version: 06
width: 64 bits
clock: 33MHz
capabilities: msi pm vga_controller bus_master cap_list rom
configuration: driver=i915 latency=0
resources: irq:31 memory:f7800000-f7bfffff memory:e0000000-efffffff ioport:f000(size=64) memory:c0000-dffff
ls -al /usr/share/gnome-shell/extensions
total 20
drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 अगस्त 19 16:20 .
drwxr-xr-x 7 root root 4096 अगस्त 19 16:25 ..
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 नवम्बर 3 16:50 desktop-icons@csoriano
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 अगस्त 19 16:20 [email protected]
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 अगस्त 19 16:20 [email protected]
sudo ls -al ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/
total 12
drwx------ 2 sand sand 4096 नवम्बर 6 22:00 .
drwxr-xr-x 23 sand sand 4096 नवम्बर 6 17:03 ..
-rw-rw-r-- 1 sand sand 1770 नवम्बर 6 22:00 application_state
-rw-rw-r-- 1 sand sand 0 नवम्बर 3 16:13 gnome-overrides-migrated
uname -r
5.11.0-38-generic
Solution 1:
You have two different 8G memory DIMMs installed, and they're at different clock speed rates.
/0/1/0 memory 8GiB DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1333 MHz (0.8 ns)
/0/1/1 memory 8GiB DIMM DDR3 Synchronous 1067 MHz (0.9 ns)
When installed in pairs, memory interleaving calls out that both DIMMs should be exactly the same size, access, and clock rates.
The memory spec for your ASUS H81M-K motherboard is:
2 x DIMM, Max. 16GB, DDR3 1600/1333/1066 MHz Non-ECC, Un-buffered Memory
Dual Channel Memory Architecture
Source: https://www.asus.com/Motherboards-Components/Motherboards/Business/H81MK/techspec/
Note: See https://www.crucial.com/compatible-upgrade-for/asus/h81m-k#memory for compatible memory DIMMs.
Go to https://www.memtest86.com/ and download/run their free memtest to test your memory. Get at least one complete pass of all the 4/4 tests to confirm good memory. This may take a few hours to complete.
Update #1:
Regarding different memory DIMMs, it may slow down to the slowest speed (which in your case is almost 1/2 speed), or it might get confused, but for memory interleaving to work, the DIMMs must be exactly the same. Removing the slowest DIMM, for testing purposes, would tell you if the freezing problems went away.
Update #2:
Check your BIOS with sudo dmidecode -s bios-version... it should be 3604. Get it at https://www.asus.com/Motherboards-Components/Motherboards/Business/H81MK/HelpDesk_BIOS/