Posted: 7/16/2014 11:44:22 AM EDT
| I'm having problems with Steam not updating the games I have while using Linux Mint 17. I have to keep moving the mouse in order to continue downloading updates, otherwise if there's no activity from me then the downloads stop. The same issue happens if I'm streaming videos. I have to keep moving the mouse just to get it to continue streaming. Does anyone have these same issues? |
|
Quoted:
That's pretty strange. The only thing I can think of is possibly the hard drive spindown time is set really low. You could try checking the settings with hdparm. Does it still respond to ping from another machine when the downloads fail? I'm still learning how to use Linux but what's hdparm do? It still does respond. However in order to continue downloading the updates I have to keep moving the mouse around. |
|
Quoted:
I'm still learning how to use Linux but what's hdparm do? It still does respond. However in order to continue downloading the updates I have to keep moving the mouse around. Quoted:
Quoted:
That's pretty strange. The only thing I can think of is possibly the hard drive spindown time is set really low. You could try checking the settings with hdparm. Does it still respond to ping from another machine when the downloads fail? I'm still learning how to use Linux but what's hdparm do? It still does respond. However in order to continue downloading the updates I have to keep moving the mouse around. It's a utility to check disk parameters: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hdparm |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
That's pretty strange. The only thing I can think of is possibly the hard drive spindown time is set really low. You could try checking the settings with hdparm. Does it still respond to ping from another machine when the downloads fail? I'm still learning how to use Linux but what's hdparm do? It still does respond. However in order to continue downloading the updates I have to keep moving the mouse around. It's a utility to check disk parameters: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hdparm I checked the drive settings and it appears that the timeout feature isn't on. |
|
I just played a quick but incomplete game of Civilization 5 and what I noticed was if I remain idle for about 10 seconds, the game freezes momentarily until I move the mouse. Once I do the game functions normally.
If the hdparm command is the solution, what commands should I use to prevent this frequent freezing from happening? |
|
Quoted:
I just played a quick but incomplete game of Civilization 5 and what I noticed was if I remain idle for about 10 seconds, the game freezes momentarily until I move the mouse. Once I do the game functions normally. If the hdparm command is the solution, what commands should I use to prevent this frequent freezing from happening? this command should completely disable idle spindown on your hard drive: hdparm -S 0 -B 255 /dev/sda It needs to be run as root and the settings will be reset back to default after a reboot, so if it doesn't solve the issue just reboot to set it back the way it was. Also, I would recommend disabling all power save settings in the power management utility and be sure you're running latest linux kernel. |
|
Quoted:
this command should completely disable idle spindown on your hard drive: hdparm -S 0 -B 255 /dev/sda It needs to be run as root and the settings will be reset back to default after a reboot, so if it doesn't solve the issue just reboot to set it back the way it was. Also, I would recommend disabling all power save settings in the power management utility and be sure you're running latest linux kernel. Quoted:
Quoted:
I just played a quick but incomplete game of Civilization 5 and what I noticed was if I remain idle for about 10 seconds, the game freezes momentarily until I move the mouse. Once I do the game functions normally. If the hdparm command is the solution, what commands should I use to prevent this frequent freezing from happening? this command should completely disable idle spindown on your hard drive: hdparm -S 0 -B 255 /dev/sda It needs to be run as root and the settings will be reset back to default after a reboot, so if it doesn't solve the issue just reboot to set it back the way it was. Also, I would recommend disabling all power save settings in the power management utility and be sure you're running latest linux kernel. Ok I'll give it a shot. |
|
I tried everything I could including the hdparm command but the game still continues to freeze if I do nothing for about 10 secs. The same freezing happens even at the desktop when nothing is running.
The power management settings looked almost exactly like this, minus the Battery Status and Screen Brightness settings. 
The kernel and other drivers is up to date and I'm using either Xfce or Cinnamon as my desktop environment. If nothing else works then I'll just have to tolerate it for now. I do however appreciate all the help you've given me. |