system freeze older iMac Debian 11

[Robert F. Crochelt]

Hi
Older iMac, recently installed Debian 11. Having system freezes even
when running light weight environment like fvwm. Starts with slow
video, progresses over a few minutes to complete freeze. Can't even
shift to a different console with ctrl-F_. Nothing in top (when it
starts) to suggest excessive memory or cpu usage. Tried to install
nvidia drivers, but apparently not available for my GPU in Debian 11.
Output from lscpu and nvdia-detect in attached file.
I would be grateful for any suggestions.
Thanks
Bob Crochelt

[Felix Miata]

Robert F. Crochelt composed on 2022-01-26 16:52 (UTC-0800):

As your attachment reports, the proprietary NVidia driver for your G92M [GeForce
8800M GTS] (rev a2) had its support terminated before Bullseye.

Is the behavior the same if you use Wayland instead of Xorg?

What does inxi -SMGayz report (run from any terminal emulator in X)?
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Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata

[Felix Miata]

Bob Crochelt composed on 2022-01-26 17:25 (UTC-0800):

> inxi output attached.

Your iMac's BIOS date is about a month earlier than mine. Likely the only
difference between ours is you have G92M [GeForce 8800M GTS] while I have
RV630/M76 [Mobility Radeon HD 2600 XT/2700]. If yours is anything like mine, it
generates a lot of heat. Has yours ever had an internal cleaning? It may need its
heat sink compound on CPU and/or GPU replaced. System freezes are a common symptom
of overheating. Also, RAM is subject to failure with age and overheating. Have you
tried running memtest86?

[Charles Curley]

On Wed, 26 Jan 2022 16:52:55 -0800
"Robert F. Crochelt" <rf...@fastmail.com> wrote:

> Can't even
> shift to a different console with ctrl-F_.

Try ctl-alt-F_.

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[Bob Crochelt]

Thanks Charles.  I miss-typed.  ctl-alt-F_ doesn't work.

Bob Crochelt

[Bob Crochelt]

Hi again Felix,

I've thought about cleaning the machine, and watched videos of opening one of these up, and am intimidated by it.  Looks beyond my abilities.  Redoing the heat sink compound probably is.  I've lived in small rural communities that don't have computer services readily available.  I could look for an apple place or take it to the nearest apple store, since that is closer to where I live now.  hard drive is old too so would probably change that out too. 

Machine ran without difficulty overnight, and got through a teams meeting this morning without problem, running gnome on Wayland.  Perhaps that is the way forward.

Tried to run memtest86 from the grub menu but it just seemed to sit there, will try that again today. 

thanks

Bob Crochelt

[Felix Miata]

Bob Crochelt composed on 2022-01-27 08:24 (UTC-0800):

> Felix Miata wrote:

>> overheating. Have you tried running memtest86?

> Tried to run memtest86 from the grub menu but it just seemed to
> sit there, will try that again today.

Your Grub menu has memtest86+. That's quite different than memtest86. I quit
trying to use memtest86+ years ago. http://www.memtest86.com/

[Bob Crochelt]

Also, running teams and assorted other programs, CPU temps were 102-103 C.

Bob

[Robert F. Crochelt]

Hi Felix,
thought you might like a little more followup.
I wound up trying:
apt remove nvidia*
and I still have graphics, and the system is running much cooler. No freezes with fvwm, though gnome is still buggy for me, and I have trouble with it coming back to life after the screen blanks.
I know your system has different graphics than mine.
Best,
Bob Crochelt