Xfce Forum

briandc

Member

Registered: 2012-01-12

Posts: 9

Xfce misbehaving since Wine installed

Hi everyone,
I've installed Xubuntu 11.04 recently on my desktop PC, and things seemed normal until I installed Wine. (I only wanted to test Wine to see if I could get iTunes to work, which I was able to do.) But now there are problems:

1) According to the RAM meter on my panel, RAM usage hovers constantly at about 256, even though I have 1.5GB available.
2) Video clients like VLC can play, but if I even move the mouse while it plays, the screen blanks and I have to log in again. (a type of crash?)

Anyone have any thoughts?
I do plan to remove Wine in the next few days, but that doesn't seem like a "solution" to the problems.

Thanks in advance,
brian

stqn

Member

Registered: 2010-10-11

Posts: 174

Re: Xfce misbehaving since Wine installed

1) Why is it a problem? Does "free -m" in a terminal report otherwise? (Look at the second line.) Did it behave differently before you installed Wine? If yes, did you install something at the same time (dependencies...)?
System Load Monitor works fine here.

2) Kinda looks like XScreenSaver locking the screen... Does the login screen show an ugly 1980-styled red flame? Did you mean that it happens if you _don't_ move the mouse? Are your open applications restarted when you login or are they still there?
If not, then it's probably as you wrote and X actually crashes for some reason. Maybe there is some error output on TTY1? (Press ctrl-alt-F1 to see, ctrl-alt-F7 (or F5...) to return to X.) I would check the web for known problems with VLC, Xubuntu, and your hardware/drivers. You could also try a different video output in VLC.

Removing Wine looks like the easiest thing to do, just to see if that has any relevance. Seems unlikely to me though...

Oh and BTW, are you saying you can use iTunes to sync your iThing via USB too?

briandc

Member

Registered: 2012-01-12

Posts: 9

Re: Xfce misbehaving since Wine installed

1) Why is it a problem? Does "free -m" in a terminal report otherwise? (Look at the second line.) Did it behave differently before you installed Wine? If yes, did you install something at the same time (dependencies...)?
System Load Monitor works fine here.

2) Kinda looks like XScreenSaver locking the screen... Does the login screen show an ugly 1980-styled red flame? Did you mean that it happens if you _don't_ move the mouse? Are your open applications restarted when you login or are they still there?
If not, then it's probably as you wrote and X actually crashes for some reason. Maybe there is some error output on TTY1? (Press ctrl-alt-F1 to see, ctrl-alt-F7 (or F5...) to return to X.) I would check the web for known problems with VLC, Xubuntu, and your hardware/drivers. You could also try a different video output in VLC.

Removing Wine looks like the easiest thing to do, just to see if that has any relevance. Seems unlikely to me though...

Oh and BTW, are you saying you can use iTunes to sync your iThing via USB too?

Hi stqn,

the problem (I think) is that RAM should change as apps are opened and closed. But it doesn't. Only CPU fluctuates.
Here is the result of free -m:

             total       used       free     shared    buffers     cached
Mem:          1443        750        692          0         53        407
-/+ buffers/cache:        289       1153
Swap:         1474          0       1474

In the meantime, I've uninstalled Wine and Itunes/QuickTime. (I didn't use it for iphone stuff, since I don't have one and will probably never use one.)

But the VLC video "crashing" still happens. And not only in VLC.

It's as though the computer can't handle the graphics (but always has in the past..)

brian

briandc

Member

Registered: 2012-01-12

Posts: 9

Re: Xfce misbehaving since Wine installed

At this point, I re-installed Xubuntu completely. But the session "crashes" nonetheless when I open a video player. The RAM is steady at about 300MB, even though it recognizes 1.5GB.
I ran some memory tests and CPU tests. Some CPU stress tests didn't work.

So, I'm thinking it's the CPU that's failing. I'll have to take it to a technician, I guess..

So maybe it's not Xubuntu, nor xfce, nor VLC or other video player, but the CPU that's not utilizing the RAM available...?

brian

stqn

Member

Registered: 2010-10-11

Posts: 174

Re: Xfce misbehaving since Wine installed

I guess if you've ruled out defective RAM chips it might be the CPU or the motherboard, yes... I've never seen or heard about this kind of memory problem before. Have you checked the temperatures?

briandc

Member

Registered: 2012-01-12

Posts: 9

Re: Xfce misbehaving since Wine installed

I guess if you've ruled out defective RAM chips it might be the CPU or the motherboard, yes... I've never seen or heard about this kind of memory problem before. Have you checked the temperatures?

I didn't check the temperatures, maybe because the "crash" happens as soon as the video is started. Watching the level of RAM remain low no matter what processes were running, it got me thinking that whatever it is that controls the RAM isn't doing its job..   And since the CPU stress tests also caused a type of crash (message regarding kernel panic), I tend to think that it's a hardware problem. (Also because I haven't heard of any "bug" of this type in Xubuntu 11.04.

brian