dgoddard1
November 14th, 2008, 12:16 PM
Problem:
Computer becomes unresponsive tothe mouse and keyboard on an intermittant basis.
Details:
About 5 to 15 % of the time the computer is unresponsive to the mouse and keyboard. Regardless of what application is currently being used or is open but not in active use, the computer will not respond to input for a period of time. The keystrokes or mouse clicks and movments are being stored up but there is no response until whatever is taking up the computer's resources gets through. Sometimes these excursions are short just 1 to 5 seconds, other times longer. Sometimes there is a period of unresponsiveness with interspersed bursts of responsiveness.
For example,during such a period 20 to 50 characters might be typed but rather than appearing on the screen as the keys are struck there will be a pause and suddenly 5 will appear then another pause and 10 will appear, etc.. Then, when the episode of unresponsiveness is over, the computer will go back to displaying characters as they are typed. In these circumstances, movement of the cursor on the screen either by key stroke or mouse movement or clicks gets really confusing.
It appears fairly obvious that the cpu is intermittantly busy with some other task that has higher priority than the keyboard or mouse.
The help that is needed:
For diagnostic purposes, it would be nice to have something like the MS Windows Task Manager ability to monitor all current processes in real time so I could see what the offending process was. If Ubuntu has such a feature I am unaware of it and how to access it.
If there is a simple way to increase the priority of the mouse and keyboard, I am not aware of how that is done.
Other Details:
-- The problem seems to equally affect the keyboard, the mouse pad and the USB mouse.
-- The USB mouse is a microsoft wheel mouse.
-- Disconnecting the USB mouse has no effect on the problem.
-- The degree to which the problem manifests is substantially variable sometimes going periods of 10 or 15 minutes between episodes and other times interrupting my work every minute or so.
-- The computer is a Dell studio 1535 laptop obtained about 2 months ago
-- The computer did not do this when I first got it
-- The process of getting it to work with a USB modem seems to have been responsible for disabling both the sound and the wirless capabilities and there is known to be a problem with Modem drivers and Ubuntu but the exact nature of that problem and what to do about it is beyond me.
-- Dell's promised "ubuntu support" has proven worthless as they now claim it is only for "hardware issues" and they somehow reason that does not include driver issues (this is based on my experience with several utterly inadequate Dell support personnel).
Computer becomes unresponsive tothe mouse and keyboard on an intermittant basis.
Details:
About 5 to 15 % of the time the computer is unresponsive to the mouse and keyboard. Regardless of what application is currently being used or is open but not in active use, the computer will not respond to input for a period of time. The keystrokes or mouse clicks and movments are being stored up but there is no response until whatever is taking up the computer's resources gets through. Sometimes these excursions are short just 1 to 5 seconds, other times longer. Sometimes there is a period of unresponsiveness with interspersed bursts of responsiveness.
For example,during such a period 20 to 50 characters might be typed but rather than appearing on the screen as the keys are struck there will be a pause and suddenly 5 will appear then another pause and 10 will appear, etc.. Then, when the episode of unresponsiveness is over, the computer will go back to displaying characters as they are typed. In these circumstances, movement of the cursor on the screen either by key stroke or mouse movement or clicks gets really confusing.
It appears fairly obvious that the cpu is intermittantly busy with some other task that has higher priority than the keyboard or mouse.
The help that is needed:
For diagnostic purposes, it would be nice to have something like the MS Windows Task Manager ability to monitor all current processes in real time so I could see what the offending process was. If Ubuntu has such a feature I am unaware of it and how to access it.
If there is a simple way to increase the priority of the mouse and keyboard, I am not aware of how that is done.
Other Details:
-- The problem seems to equally affect the keyboard, the mouse pad and the USB mouse.
-- The USB mouse is a microsoft wheel mouse.
-- Disconnecting the USB mouse has no effect on the problem.
-- The degree to which the problem manifests is substantially variable sometimes going periods of 10 or 15 minutes between episodes and other times interrupting my work every minute or so.
-- The computer is a Dell studio 1535 laptop obtained about 2 months ago
-- The computer did not do this when I first got it
-- The process of getting it to work with a USB modem seems to have been responsible for disabling both the sound and the wirless capabilities and there is known to be a problem with Modem drivers and Ubuntu but the exact nature of that problem and what to do about it is beyond me.
-- Dell's promised "ubuntu support" has proven worthless as they now claim it is only for "hardware issues" and they somehow reason that does not include driver issues (this is based on my experience with several utterly inadequate Dell support personnel).