Re: Web browser gets slow and blocks the system

[Camaleón <noelamac@gmail.com>]

On Wed, 30 May 2012 16:45:15 +0000, Rodolfo Medina wrote:

> Camaleón <noelamac@gmail.com> writes:

>> 1/ Have you experienced the problem when running another applications
>> (different than the browser)
> 
> No, never: it only happens with the web browser.

Okay.

>> 2/ Can you still login to the system when it freezes, I mean, from ssh?
> 
> I haven't tried, I wouldn't well know how.

You need a second computer connected over the local network and ssh 
setup, running and configured which is not the default in Debian.

>> 3/ Have you updated yet your Iceweasel? :-)
> 
> No, I haven't: but why is this important?

For this problem, no. For your system's security, yes.
 
>> 4/ Is there something at the logs?
> 
> I woudn't know how to check that.

System logs are placed under "/var/log/syslog", you can start by reading 
from there, maybe there's a kernel oops or oom error printed.

>> 5/ What VGA driver are you using and what's your VGA card?
> 
> I wouldn't know how to check that, but the problem didn't use to occur
> in the past, at least not so often and regularly, every day.

"lspci -vv" will tell.

>> 6/ How much RAM has your system and what says "free -m" when you launch
>> the browser?
> 
> Before launching the browser, the command `free -m' gives something
> like:
> 
> $ free -m
>              total       used       free     shared    buffers   cached 
> Mem:           216        154         62          0          6      61 
> -/+ buffers/cache:         85        130 
> Swap:            0          0          0

Wow... 216 MB of ram and you have _no swap_? That's suicide...

And 130 MB of available ram. It looks too low.

> , whereas, when `mozilla' is running, it gives:
> 
> $ free -m
>              total       used       free     shared    buffers    cached
> Mem:           216        208          8          0          0     20 
> -/+ buffers/cache:        187         28 
> Swap:            0          0          0

What the...!!! >:-O

How can you pretend to run your system with as little as 28 MB of 
available ram? You are likey running out of memory, so either add 
more ram (this is highly recommended) or use a ligthweight desktop/
window manager with programs that are not as resource and memory 
hungry as iceweasel is.

Greetings,

-- 
Camaleón