System crashes occurring when accessing sites like youtube with Palemoon

[amethyst]

I've been experiencing system crashes lately when on the youtube channel using a later version of Palemoon. This seems to be happening quite frequently. Symptoms - Only happens after accessing the youtube site for quite a long time it seems. One of 2 things happens - Either the icons on the desktop vanishes completely or the icons change to the dreaded warning triangles making the items unaccessible. Restarting JWM nor restarting X fixes this. Need to reboot. Very annoying. Anyone else experiencing this?

[rockedge]

Sounds like the palemoon cache is overflowing after extended streaming. Which is causing system memory to be overwritten and leads to system crash and lockup.

Is there a swap file / partition in use?

[amethyst]

Sounds like the palemoon cache is overflowing after extended streaming. Which is causing system memory to be overwritten and leads to system crash and lockup.

Is there a swap file / partition in use?

Yes, there's a swap file. Does seem to be memory related as the machine is running at very high temp. I can't remember this happening when I had an older Palemoon running. The youtube site is extremely resource hungry, even when using its mobile site. I could watch youtube for hours from the DuckDuckGo site without having any issues (not accessing the youtube website).

[amethyst]

When accessing the youtube site my cpu temp quickly jumps to 80 degrees. When watching youtube from the DuckDuckGo site it stays around 55 degrees. Lots of crap running in the background when accessing the youtube site. Even if you are not actually watching a video but just reading comments.

[rockedge]

@amethyst I have exactly the same problem of really high CPU temps playing any YouTube video in palemoon for a few weeks now.

The problem seems to have appeared recently, but palemoon runs very hot and presents a heavy load. Almost unusable since the load can still be high with a just a few tabs open and certain web site pages loaded with bloat code and advertisment media URL's, that cause palemoon to struggle and can cause one machine to begin to run the 10 internal fans it has at full speed.

None of the other browsers I have available to run will show this behaviour.

[williams2]

Either the icons on the desktop vanishes completely or the icons change to the dreaded warning triangles making the items unaccessible. Restarting JWM nor restarting X fixes this. Need to reboot

JWM has nothing to do with the desktop wallpaper.
JWM has nothing to do with the icons on the desktop wallpaper.

It is ROX-Filer that is responsible for the wallpaper and the clickable icons.
If ROX-Filer crashes, the wallpaper will disappear and you see whatever was under the Rox wallpaper (the root window, which is often a solid black.)

If you see the yellow/orange warning triangles, those icons are pointing at something that is not there any more.
The items may have been deleted, or moved, or renamed, or a file system may have been unmounted.
If ROX-Filer is showing warning triangles, then ROX-Filer is still running. Clicking the Refresh button might bring them back, If one of the aufs layers is no longer mounted, rebooting might be that quickest and easiest way to fix the problem. You can type mount-FULL to see what is mounted.

You can see how much free ram memory you have by typing free.
I think for Xenial[/c] you would type free -m to see how much free ram you have.
For BionicPup you could type free -h

http://www.pixelbeat.org/scripts/ps_mem.py can show how much ram each application is using.

If JWM crashes, it will take down all of Xwindows (X, Xorg)

To restart the Rox filer, you can type something like rox -p /root/Choices/ROX-Filer/PuppyPin.

I have a script named pp to restart rox:

Code: Select all

#!/bin/sh
cd
killall -q ROX-Filer
rox -p /root/Choices/ROX-Filer/PuppyPin &>/dev/null

Running out of ram can cause strange behaviour. I run earlyoom (in the system section of Additional Software.
You may need to configure your browser's use of cache, or make it use some where outside of your save layer, like /mnt/home

Some versions of roxfiler will crash if it tries to create a thumbnail for a file that is empty, that is,a size of zero bytes.
You could create an empty file like this: touch zero.jpg to test Rox.
If you turn off showing thumbnails of icons by right clicking the eye icon in a rox window.
It should run faster and shouldn't crash if it sees a zero size file.

[amethyst]

My browser cache is "out of" the system and located at /initrd/mnt/dev_save. I do specify the size though, maybe I should just change that back to automatically and see if there's an improvement. The desktop does keep its colour setting but the icons are either gone or triangled gibberish. You are right it's rox-filer crashing but most of the time the trays are also gone (that's JWM) and Xserver also conks in. So in many cases absolutely nothing can be done and the machine needs to be switched off. I'm going to check this scenario with Windows XP and see if it also crashes. I have my doubts over Puppys correct management of a swap file too.....
BTW - I have another strange thing happening. The icons in the right-hand tray dock flickers every now and then (the volume and firewall icons/buttons).

[amethyst]

Changed the topic title again. We do not know what is the cause of my crashes, changing the title topic to say it's Palemoon, is premature. We are still investigating. Anyways - I've checked now with Windows XP and running a slightly older version of Palemoon. Bingo, got the dreaded blue screen after a while. So it could be a Palemoon issue (need to run other browsers extensively to check) or my hardware just can't handle the resource hungry youtube site. The CPU usage seems to spike on that site no matter what operating system or browser is being used and the machine runs hot.

[amethyst]

Chromium does seem to work much better with youtube. CPU usage seems to be 3 to 4 times less which is huge. Perhaps time to let Palemoon go.

[bigpup]

Are you using the latest version of Pale Moon browser??

The last few updates had issues that got fixed in the latest version.

v31.0.0 (2022-05-10)
This is a new milestone release.

After our unacceptable and recalled release of v30.0.0 and 30.0.1 with the departure of one of the core devs from our team requiring us to rewind and re-do several months of work to exclude undesired code changes and what likely lay at the root of the plethora of stability and run-time issues of the recalled versions, we're back on track with a new milestone building on UXP and Goanna (v5.1) with many improvements and additional user-requested features.
To prevent user confusion, we're skipping from 29 to 31.

Pale Moons internal update should provide the latest version.

Who owns and controls YouTube and Chromium?
Google does.
Wonder why Chromium would work better on YouTube

[amethyst]

I've got the new version of Palemoon (well the 32-bit attempt). It seems to be getting worse with each later version. I never update stuff via the updatr mechanism, I always download the new release directly from the home site and then manually install it.

[xenial]

Youtube requires google webcomponents to function correctly and pale moon does not have this yet and it will be a long time before it is implemented.
I noticed high cpu usage with the recent versions and i reverted back to v.29 which i use mainly for the flash plugin.

Going to be a struggle now with only moonchild at the helm.

[amethyst]

Youtube requires google webcomponents to function correctly and pale moon does not have this yet and it will be a long time before it is implemented.
I noticed high cpu usage with the recent versions and i reverted back to v.29 which i use mainly for the flash plugin.

Going to be a struggle now with only moonchild at the helm.

I've moved to Chromium, seems good to me so far.....

[mikewalsh]

I've got the new version of Palemoon (well the 32-bit attempt). It seems to be getting worse with each later version. I never update stuff via the updatr mechanism, I always download the new release directly from the home site and then manually install it.

If you're able to download a 32-bit build direct from the "home site", you've learnt some magical trick that the rest of us don't know! They haven't built any 'official' 32-bit versions for quite some time.....and Steve Pusser doesn't include the updater with HIS builds, 'cos there wouldn't be any point.

Yes, that's the thing about Chromium and the 'clones'. They occupy more memory to install, but they use less RAM to actually run than 'zilla-based browsers do.

Mike.

[amethyst]

If you're able to download a 32-bit build direct from the "home site", you've learnt some magical trick that the rest of us don't know! They haven't built any 'official' 32-bit versions for quite some time.....and Steve Pusser doesn't include the updater with HIS builds, 'cos there wouldn't be any point.

What do you mean, I build it myself and download it from my google drive? No, I mean from Pusser's repository. But I'm finished with Palemoon now, seem to becoming more and more inadequate for use.
PS: I see there are some clones of Chromium around for Windows XP too.

[mikewalsh]

Are you using the latest version of Pale Moon browser??

The last few updates had issues that got fixed in the latest version.

Pale Moons internal update should provide the latest version.

Can't say as I've noticed a scrap of difference with v31.1.0. Still OTT on the RAM usage, CPU threads going through the roof, temps heading north at a steady rate.....

You DO actually run the thing, I take it?

I wouldn't take too much notice of the blurb Moonchild puts out on the site. He's always been more of a marketing & media guy than a developer.

(*shrug*)

Mike.

[amethyst]

Now I get error messages on the youtube site running chromium. They don't like it when you stop a video before all the other crap on the site are loaded (in fact the page exits with an error message). Bastards.....

[mikewalsh]

Now I get error messages on the youtube site running chromium. They don't like it when you stop a video before all the other crap on the site are loaded (in fact the page exits with an error message). Bastards.....

^^^ Lololol!

If they don't get ya one way, they'll get you another. You can't win with Big Brother!

Mike.

[wizard]

@amethyst

Youtube is always a resource pig for my Firefox browser, especially when just browsing the site, runs the cpu temp up. You might try running the Ublock Origin extension which kills the ads.

I know you've been in on some of the discussions on swap files, on my systems I found that having a swap file prevented or at least greatly reduced the number of out of memory crashes/lockups.

wizard

[rockedge]

I've mentioned this in other threads.....I am having lots of problems with system loads and CPU temps...especially with YouTube, on palemoon.

It's become almost not usable and this is on a powerhouse DELL blade server machine with 12 internal fans.

[xenial]

There is a mobile version of youtube available which is a basic version but is lighter.However for the majority of youtube videos i tend to use the DDG search engine built in player.

[Feek]

I use Freetube as an alternative to playing videos on YT.
The use of computer resources is also not exactly low, but on my machine it seems to be a little better than a browser+YT.

[mikewalsh]

@Feek :-

I use Freetube as an alternative to playing videos on YT.
The use of computer resources is also not exactly low, but on my machine it seems to be a little better than a browser+YT.

Me too. I agree with you about using FreeTube, but I don't think it's a suggestion that will appeal to Nic.....because its bundled Electron framework uses a second, albeit "stripped-back" Chromium browser. I doubt he wants to overload his machine with a ton of duplicated items like that.

Aside from something like FreeTube, the only thing I can think of is the YT-downloader app and play stuff offline.....and I don't even know what the 'state-of-play' is with that any more.

(*shrug*)

Mike.

[mikewalsh]

@rockedge :-

I've mentioned this in other threads.....I am having lots of problems with system loads and CPU temps...especially with YouTube, on palemoon.

It's become almost not usable and this is on a powerhouse DELL blade server machine with 12 internal fans.

I don't think there's anything anyone can do about it, Erik. The core-part of the code needs re-writing from the ground up, I suspect, because thread-handling just doesn't seem to be properly implemented ATM.

Tobin's getting all the blame for leaving Moonchild "in the lurch", but from what I understand, Moonchild's got to shoulder his own fair share of the blame; he kept changing his mind about what he wanted, without informing the actual 'coders' till the last moment, and every change necessitated a complete re-write, followed by a re-compile. You get half-dozen of those dumped on you in as many days, I think anyone would have got pissed-off.

Consequently, with Tobin's departure, Moonchild's got an absolute mess of a code-base dumped in his lap which he alone has now got to "sort out"....and, like Xenial, I think it's gonna take a long time to unearth all the gremlins.

Essentially, we can "write-off" Pale Moon as a Puppy browser for the foreseeable future.

(*shrug*)

Mike.

[xenial]

Just to add,
I find that seamonkey is a better performer than pale moon at the moment and i know the old seamonkey is an acquired taste for some but it runs incredibly well on puppy and is quite reliable.

Yeah personally i feel pale moon is on a slow boat to nowhere unless some of the community chips in to help but it's a monumental task and even when/if google webcomponents are implemented the technology will no doubt have moved on.

Don't get me wrong,it's a great browser for those who want the look and feel of times gone by but they need some serious technical help to get them in the right direction and judging by some of the posts on the PM forum users are encountering sites not working and jumping ship to other browsers..Not moonchild's fault and one man can only do so much.

[amethyst]

Watching just the videos is not a problem because I normally watch youtube via DuckDuckGo (or Bing or Yahoo). Very cool and you avoid the heavy youtube site. But I also like to read the user's comments sometimes and for that you need to access the youtube site itself.

[mikewalsh]

@xenial :-

Strange you should say that.

SeaMonkey has never been a favourite of mine, but I've begun using it more and more myself recently.....especially in the 32-bitzers, like Tahrpup & Xenialpup.

The e-mail client is an absolute PITA to set up if you're only used to Thunderbird, as I am. T-Bird auto-sets most things up FOR you, and manages to guess a lot of the port & connection information from almost zero data supplied by the user. With SeaMonkey, it's all manual.....and unlike T-Bird, where you supply an e-mail address and it then sets-up the account information FOR you, in SeaMonkey you have to supply all the port & connection information and create the account BEFORE you can set the user up!

But once that's all working, everything's as smooth as silk. Unlike T-Bird, of course, where you have to specify the app for handling links, with SeaMonkey it's seamless, because of the browser and email client being interconnected. And RAM/CPU usage is actually very good.

I can see why Barry picked it as the default browser/mail client for all those years. And with it finally having a built-in updater, that's the icing on the cake really. It'll never supplant the 'clones'; I'm too invested in Chrome, Brave, Slimjet, Iron, etc, etc.....but it'll replace Palemoon (AND Firefox) as a decent, secondary browser. I actually find myself spending all day with it sometimes.....even switching between Pups, because 32-bit and 64-bit versions share a 'common' profile. So I can just carry straight on from what I was doing.....

It's NOT bad.

Mike.

[xenial]

@mike walsh
I will have to confess i have never in my life used an email client,i have always entered the email account via the browser.

I have firefox esr on fossapup but it's a tad heavy for my ageing laptop and vivaldi is my chromium browser of choice purely because it runs a damn sight better. .I do have chrome as well but i rarely use it and this is down to pure cosmetics and my bizarre sense of aesthetics ,i find as strange as it seems the loading throbber in the tabs extremely irritating..(old age creeping up perhaps?).

Seamonkey is lacking in some of the finer cosmetic surgery but the themes are adequate and is a solid browser as a whole.it displays every website i can throw at it except for the main youtube site ..it's basic but it works.

[mikewalsh]

@xenial :-

.....and with that 32GB RAM and a decently powerful 9th-gen quad-core Intel CPU, I don't have any issues even with YT itself. The Dell, however.....ah, that's a completely different story. I've got so used to this HP desktop that I tend to forget just how SLOW the Dell really is, and YT? Wouldn't even attempt it.

I can just about get by with the DDG built-in player.....but even that can struggle. Trying to run any video in a media player is hopeless, too. And to think we used to consider Pentium 4's as "cutting-edge" at one point..? How times change.....and I'll never understand how Intel had the nerve to advertise them as multimedia-ready, because they very obviously were NOT.

Heigh-ho. It's ancient history.

(I agree about the SeaMonkey themes. I've found a rather "cheeky" little gold & black number. It sounds a bit iffy, but it actually looks rather good..!)

Mike.

[bigpup]

Well, I am not really sure why or how to fix it.

You know there is always that one person.
Not sure why it is me in this issue.

I am using the latest 64bit version of Pale Moon browser 31.0.0

I can look at all kinds of videos on YouTube.

I am not having these issues others report.

Temp may go up a few degrees, but not that much. (5 degree change range)
I have one tab on this forum, and one tab on YouTube with a running video.
If I go to the YouTube tab and watch the video that is still running. Temp goes up 4 to 5 degrees.
If I go to the forum tab. Temp goes back down 3 to 4 degrees. (the video is still running in the other tab, but not being shown on the screen, because I am looking at the forum).
RAM usage is normal to me for what it is trying to do.

I do run videos at not very high quality levels.
Usually 720p or lower.
I only have one tab open to YouTube that is playing a video.

Maybe there is something specific in the Pale Moon preferences settings that I am using.