System Freeze On Low Memory

[Gökhan]

System freeze occurs when memory is almost full and there is no chance to kill processes. Everything is unresponsive, hdd is trashing, even ssh connection does not show any reaction. I set vm.swappiness = 1 to minimize swapping but those lock ups are still there. I think this could be related to disk caching. Few times I observed in iotop that several processes use %90+ disk I/O while memory is close to its limit. I increased vm.min_free_kbytes (default value was 65536) but not tested yet. Current disk scheduler is set to deadline.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 15.04
Package: linux-image-3.19.0-18-generic 3.19.0-18.18
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.19.0-18.18-generic 3.19.6
Uname: Linux 3.19.0-18-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.17.2-0ubuntu1.1
Architecture: amd64
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: user 2571 F.... pulseaudio
CurrentDesktop: LXDE
Date: Sun May 31 16:29:04 2015
InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-11-15 (197 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Release amd64 (20140722.2)
MachineType: Packard Bell ENNS44HR
ProcFB: 0 inteldrmfb
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.19.0-18-generic root=UUID=88ea410e-70cc-49a6-b2b3-326fc63a4e7d ro quiet splash elevator=deadline
RelatedPackageVersions:
 linux-restricted-modules-3.19.0-18-generic N/A
 linux-backports-modules-3.19.0-18-generic N/A
 linux-firmware 1.143.1
SourcePackage: linux
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to vivid on 2015-05-04 (27 days ago)
dmi.bios.date: 04/28/2011
dmi.bios.vendor: Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
dmi.bios.version: V1.23
dmi.board.asset.tag: No Asset Tag
dmi.board.name: ENNS44HR
dmi.board.vendor: Packard Bell
dmi.board.version: V1.23
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: No Asset Tag
dmi.chassis.type: 9
dmi.chassis.vendor: Packard Bell
dmi.chassis.version: V1.23
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnPhoenixTechnologiesLtd.:bvrV1.23:bd04/28/2011:svnPackardBell:pnENNS44HR:pvrV1.23:rvnPackardBell:rnENNS44HR:rvrV1.23:cvnPackardBell:ct9:cvrV1.23:
dmi.product.name: ENNS44HR
dmi.product.version: V1.23
dmi.sys.vendor: Packard Bell

[Brad Figg (brad-figg)]

This change was made by a bot.

[Alberto Salvia Novella (es20490446e)]

Please:
  1. Test if this bug still happens after installing the upper Linux kernel from <https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Kernel/MainlineBuilds>.
  2. Tell the result here.
  3. Set this report status to "confirmed".

Thank you.

[Gökhan (thracian)]

Problem persists after installing kernel v4.1-rc2-vivid. System shows the same behavior when free memory goes under ~170 mb. System becomes stable after killing few processes before it completely freezes and having ~200 mb of free memory stops hdd trashing. The test was performed when swapping is disabled.

[Brad Figg (brad-figg)]

Thank you for taking the time to file a bug report on this issue.

However, given the number of bugs that the Kernel Team receives during any development cycle it is impossible for us to review them all. Therefore, we occasionally resort to using automated bots to request further testing. This is such a request.

We have noted that there is a newer version of the development kernel than the one you last tested when this issue was found. Please test again with the newer kernel and indicate in the bug if this issue still exists or not.

You can update to the latest development kernel by simply running the following commands in a terminal window:

    sudo apt-get update
    sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

If the bug still exists, change the bug status from Incomplete to Confirmed. If the bug no longer exists, change the bug status from Incomplete to Fix Released.

If you want this bot to quit automatically requesting kernel tests, add a tag named: bot-stop-nagging.

 Thank you for your help, we really do appreciate it.

[Joseph Salisbury (jsalisbury)]

Did this issue start happening after an update/upgrade? Was there a kernel version where you were not having this particular problem? This will help determine if the problem you are seeing is the result of a regression, and when this regression was introduced. If this is a regression, we can perform a kernel bisect to identify the commit that introduced the problem.

[Gökhan (thracian)]

I had the same issue before upgrade. I tested latest kernel (v4.1-rc6-unstable) today. Problem still exists. I wrote simple test program to occupy some memory. It allocates bytes increasingly +50 MB at a time. I can never see that unused memory goes under 200 MB and whole machine gets almost fully blocked until I kill test program.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for linux (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]

[Eric O'Connor (oconnore)]

I have this happen to me as well on Ubuntu 15.10.

[Eric O'Connor (oconnore)]

Should I re-report the bug, or can this be re-activated? It's exactly the same behavior. High memory -> system freeze, with the UI not being response. I would expect the oom-killer to terminate one of the processes, but instead my system became unresponsive indefinitely.