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    Please do not post a support request without first reading and following the advice in https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/3/read-this-first

    Emulation station freezing

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    4.7.1emultionstationfreeze issues
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    • M
      mahoneyt944
      last edited by mahoneyt944

      Revisiting this issue, while updating from 4.6.8 to the latest 4.7.11 now available I experience random freezing in emulationstation like before. I have a backup of 4.6.8 that does not freeze. I have this installed in my arcade cabinet that's always on. Sometimes it freezes while navigating the es menu and other times during the screen saver (slideshow). I use the default theme.

      This feels like a setting or maybe theme issue? I've been experimenting with other options. Haven't found anything yet.

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      • mituM
        mitu Global Moderator
        last edited by

        Can you try and build from source (with debugging info enabled) and run EmulationStation through gdb to see where it freezes ?

        # create a sources folder
        mkdir src && cd src
        
        # get the stable branch
        git clone --depth 1 --branch stable --recursive https://github.com/retropie/emulationstation
        
        # generate build files
        cd emulationstation && mkdir build
        CXXFLAGS="-g" cmake -B build -DRPI=On -DUSE_GLES1=On -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug .
        
        # build it
        make -C build -j2
        
        # run through gdb
        gdb -q ./emulationstation
        
        # at the gdb prompt, start emulationstation with debug
        (gdb) run --debug
        

        When it freezes, see if gdb has any messages shown (perhaps ES crashed or encountered an exception). If nothing is shown, press Ctrl + C and type where. gdb should show the location - in the source - where emulationstation is running.

        You can run the above from a SSH session. If you don't want to keep a session open until EmulationStation freezes, you can use screen to run the commands and detach from the running session without stopping gdb.

        Can you also post your es_settings.cfg (from $HOME/.emulationstation) to pastebin.com ? I may try to run it with these settings and see if something happens.

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        • M
          mahoneyt944 @mitu
          last edited by mahoneyt944

          @mitu ok I ran gdb and it just froze. How do I check what gdb has? I'm sitting on a emulationstation "arcade" screen frozen right now.

          Keyboard not responsive, networking still working over filezilla from another computer

          M mituM 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
          • M
            mahoneyt944 @mahoneyt944
            last edited by

            https://pastebin.com/4qWMgeJY

            mituM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
            • mituM
              mitu Global Moderator @mahoneyt944
              last edited by

              @mahoneyt944 Did you start gdb via SSH ? Otherwise you won't have access to it if ES freezes.

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              • mituM
                mitu Global Moderator @mahoneyt944
                last edited by

                @mahoneyt944 I added the config file to my Pi3 and left it running. Let's see if something comes up. For a moment there I was confused why I couldn't scrape, until I realized your config has Kiosk mode turned on.

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                • M
                  mahoneyt944 @mitu
                  last edited by mahoneyt944

                  @mitu I don't have ssh setup. It might be easier for me just to give you a private copy of my image to test out. It's not all that big. 4.5gb

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                  • mituM
                    mitu Global Moderator
                    last edited by

                    I've left ES staying idle with the config you sent and it hasn't freezed so far. I'll leave it on longer, but I don't think it's the configuration that's causing the issue.

                    It might be easier for me just to give you a private copy of my image to test out. It's not all that big. 4.5gb

                    That might help, but it would be easier to just use the RetroPie latest image (4.7.1) and see if you can reproduce the issue with it. You can transfer your configs over (see here) after you run a full update of RetroPie-Setup and the OS.

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                    • M
                      mahoneyt944 @mitu
                      last edited by

                      @mitu sure I'll try reimaging and report back. Though, it's irritating to not know why exactly. I have another rpi3 build using 4.6.8 as well I can try updating on too to see if it bugs out.

                      What gets me is I use the 4.6.8 image 24/7 in my arcade cabinet build with no issues.

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                      • M
                        mahoneyt944
                        last edited by mahoneyt944

                        just an update,

                        I reimaged then updated to 4.7.11 then copied over my stuff. Seemed to work well at first but then I got a freeze. So I started reverting stuff.

                        Right now I believe the issue is related to my config.txt I started reverting each custom setting I had one by one and it seems the freeze is caused by gpu_freq=500. Haven't had much testing on this yet but if this is it, that means for some reason this setting no longer work for me on 4.7.11 like it was on 4.6.8 running 24/7.

                        mituM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                        • mituM
                          mitu Global Moderator @mahoneyt944
                          last edited by mitu

                          @mahoneyt944 It's possible that's a side effect of an updated kernel/firmware.

                          EDIT: do you have the same overclock settings in your other systems ? You can keep the kernel/firmware version and just upgrade RetroPie (i.e. say no to updating OS/kernel packages).

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                          • M
                            mahoneyt944 @mitu
                            last edited by mahoneyt944

                            @mitu I've tried updating without doing the underlying kernal before but that didn't work either. I'll know after a few days or less if that was the setting or not that made a fuss with the system left on.

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                            • T
                              triforcexp @mahoneyt944
                              last edited by

                              I'm experiencing the same issue on a rpi3b. Just upgraded from got knows which ancient version to latest yesterday and it freezes in a few seconds.

                              In my case I had
                              gpu_freq=500
                              v3d_freq=525

                              After commenting both those seems that is working ok, though I would like to keep them as they certainly help with N64 emulation.

                              I remember having issues like that about two years ago when updating and I ended up adding more gpu_mem, but that didn't help this time.

                              I'm curious which EmulationStation version comes with the 4.6.8 image so I could try to downgrade to it?

                              mituM M 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                              • mituM
                                mitu Global Moderator @triforcexp
                                last edited by

                                @triforcexp said in Emulation station freezing:

                                I'm curious which EmulationStation version comes with the 4.6.8 image so I could try to downgrade to it?

                                Referenced in a post above - 2.9.1 (see the change list).

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                                • M
                                  mahoneyt944 @triforcexp
                                  last edited by

                                  @triforcexp unfortunately for me when I updated, even without the kernal update, it still freezes. For some reason the gpu_freq is effected after the update. I commented mine out as well but I'd be interested to know if a lower value will work at all without freezing. This needs dug into a bit more to figure out why this setting is problematic now.

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                                  • T
                                    triforcexp @mitu
                                    last edited by

                                    @mitu Just installed 2.9.1 and still getting the same result if I leave the gpu overclock.

                                    I'll try to bisect this. Sadly idk which version I had before but was on Stretch so...

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                                    • M
                                      mahoneyt944 @triforcexp
                                      last edited by

                                      @triforcexp I think mine was originally 4.6 updated to 4.6.8 if that helps anything.

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                                      • T
                                        triforcexp @mahoneyt944
                                        last edited by

                                        @mahoneyt944 I'm checking directly over the EmulationStation version.
                                        I went all the way back to 2.7.6 with the same result, so I'm not completely sure the problem is the ES version itself or some other component of the distro.

                                        BTW, I thought that I could try playing around with the GL version and, albeit it didn't fix, I believe the RetroPie script is setting the GLES 1.0 define wrongly, and hence would always use GLES2 (?)

                                        See https://github.com/RetroPie/EmulationStation/blob/064a1818ead9dce730ecf928f27860edddc8e745/es-core/src/renderers/Renderer_GLES10.cpp#L1

                                        and

                                        https://github.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/blob/0212b0249c96b5b355c1d180f24cff1ae9937518/scriptmodules/supplementary/emulationstation.sh#L168

                                        mituM 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                        • T
                                          triforcexp @mahoneyt944
                                          last edited by

                                          @mahoneyt944 I just went all the way down to 450 mhz with the same result, maybe staying alive just a bit longer.

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                                          • mituM
                                            mitu Global Moderator @triforcexp
                                            last edited by

                                            @triforcexp said in Emulation station freezing:

                                            BTW, I thought that I could try playing around with the GL version and, albeit it didn't fix, I believe the RetroPie script is setting the GLES 1.0 define wrongly, and hence would always use GLES2 (?)

                                            You're confusing the CMake's option (USE_GLES1) with the C++ macro with a similar name. EmulationStation didn't have a GLES2 renderer until version 2.9.1 and it's specifically disabled on VC4 because of the poor performance.

                                            Can you post the config.txt you have ? What version of kernel/firmware do you have ?

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