Greetings,

Recently cpu usage began showing 15-30 percent when idle. I really haven't made any major changes except for normal updates. I checked and the process causing the spike is /usr/bin/X , so I'm assuming this is xorg?

Any ideas?

are you using intel graphics. for some users, the latest xorg update is causing a problem. you can try the solution in this thread at the mx forums:


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you basically just downgrade to the version of xorg in debian stable instead of the version in the backports repo.

ooops....sorry I always forget to check the mepis forums __{{emoticon}}__
Not Intel here but Radeon Mobility ugghh, which has enough problems in itself. Thanks I check out that thread.

~regards

Ok....please don't slap me for this one...but how do I get a command line at boot...there is not option in the grub menu...or do I have to add one?

Scrap that last post I figured it out.
Intel doesn't apply but the fglrx does...which of course sgfxi reports an error since Radeon is no longer supported.
So I'm assuming I have to roll back the Xorg driver since that's what I'm using.

yes, I think so.

I performed some interesting tests because this situation has become critical for me...the excessive cpu usage has driven up temps on my laptop to critical stage. I also have some good folks helping on the mepis mx-14 forum, trying to determine what driver I should be using. I really think this is an ati radeon issue, all my desktops have nvidia hardware and I have never run in to this.

I have tested some other distros live off of usb sticks and here are the results:

Sparky 3.5 (debian testing)
xfce desktop with conky & wbar (so very similar to my mx-14 setup)
idle cpu usage: 2-4 percent
cpu temp 89 deg c

bodhi 2.4.0 (i believe ubuntu 12.04 which I think is debian testing with newer kernel)
e17 desktop
idle cpu usage: 0.5-3 percent
cpu temp 87 deg c

mx14
xfce desktop
idle cpu usage 15-25 percent
cpu temp 95 deg c
with iceweasel open cpu 35-50 percent sometimes spiking to 100 percent and cpu temps up to 101 c

I'm currently downloading anti-x to test that.

thanks again

Per a suggestion by Anticapitalista in the MX forums I installed kernel 3.14. Can someone give me a quick primer on setting that up to boot. I tried to edit the grub menu but I can't find the new kernel files.

Thanks

if you run"update-grub" from the command line, the grub menus should be automatically updated with the available kernel entries. They will show up as"Debian Kernel ....."

Thanks dolphin_oracle...that worked, however I need to clarify one thing...should I only be using 32 bit kernels?

with MX you should stick to 32 bit kernels. if your system can use them, the PAE versions can access more the 3.5 gb of ram.

Well thanks everyone for your help...now running the 3.14 kernel. Seems like the desktop is peppier...xorg using about 15 percent idle, so it's still about the same. I guess this is where I'll be with this laptop. I'm still thinking about switching to regular Anti-x for this laptop. I downloaded the 64 bit 13.2 and tested it off a usb stick and it's blazingly fast!

It seems that even switching to the 3.14 kernel hasn't helped the situation...cpu usage still too high for my taste and the laptop runs way too hot. I have switched to anti-x 13.2 64 bit with excellant results. 2-5 percent cpu when idle, xorg usually around 2 percent. Laptop running cool now!! I just wish I knew why MX-14 ran like this in the beginning...then the performance went downhill.I'd like to thank everyone for their help.

did you ever try downgrading xorg? one big difference in the repos between MX and antiX is that MX uses the wheezy-backports system by default, and xorg did see an upgrade that you won't see on antix 13.2 (at least if you are using the stable repo option).

hmmm...I don't believe I tried that, possibly because someone had mentioned that xorg hadn't been updated since this version of mx-14 was released. Since I didn't have his problem with the fresh mx-14 install, I didn't bother pushing back the xorg version. Thanks again