Hello,
I was wondering why my PC at work was running a bit slow. It's a P3 600MHz
with an 8Mb ATI Rage video card and 256Mb of RAM.
I was using the 2.2.17 kernel, XF 3.3.6 and KDE 1.1. A few hdparm refinements
etc and the system flew ! I've now gone to using kernel-2.4.0-0.12mdk,
XFree86-4.0.1z-1mdk and KDE 2.1-0.20001204.2mdk and the system is begining to
run like a old dog !
KDE 2 takes an age to launch. The kernel / initscripts carry on doing things
while you are logging in resulting in messages flashing up on the display
while you are logging in. If you manage to log in before any messages appear
and do a startx then X is halted in its tracks waiting for the startup
process to cease. X now pauses like Window$ does (you know, little
unexplained pauses during which time the mouse is unresponsive). The kumppa
screensaver used to fly along like anything. Now, not only does it run
slower, but it keeps stopping altogether for seconds at a time !
I just about started to assume that this is just the future for Linux ;-)
when I happen to run gtop.
Something called kapm-idled was consuming 50-86% CPU usage !
I happen to have a copy of Red Hat's 4.0.1-37 kernel, so I gave that a try.
gtop revealed that kapm-idled was still there, but now using a far healthier
0%. So what is kapm-idled ? and why does it use so much CPU resource ?
Owen
P.S. My work PC still runs like an old dog ! Maybe my first assumption was
the correct one after all !
