Please help to troubleshoot (more findings in #11 #12)

[digimon04]

I am having problems installing Pyload+Transmission+AB-solution at any version newer than 380.59.

My router is AC68U now running 380.63_2. After the upgrade, I have performed a factory reset. I first install Entware-NG, AB-solution and then Pyload. When I tried to install transmission(
opkg install transmission-web transmission-daemon-openssl)
, I received an error : can't allocate memory. I checked in the router webui and found that only 132mb RAM is used. Below is the screenshot.

Scenario 1: Entware-NG + Pyload + Transmission, No AB-solution
I have done another test. If I install Entware-NG and Pyload only, I can install Transmission. However, Transmission will most likely become dead instantly after router bootup and its webui is not accessible. Sometimes, I can access to Transmission webui but it will show "lose connection with server" whenever I start a mission. In addition, Pyload have problems too. I can't start/restart Pyload in Putty as it will show "can't allocate memory" error.


Scenario 2: Entware-NG + AB-solution + Transmission, No Pyload
On the other hand, if I install Entware-NG, AB-solution and Transmission only, everything work smoothly. I reckon that Pyload is the one causing problems. Can anyone tell me how to troubleshoot the problems? I am very frustrated. Any help is appreciated.

P.S. I installed Entware-NG, AB-solution, Pyload and Transmission at 380.59. All works fine.

Update: attach with screenshot

 

[digimon04]

Bump. Need help desperately.

 

[thelonelycoder]

You likely run out of RAM during install and when it runs (cannot allocate Memory).
Do you have a working swap partition? Entware-NG has that option.

To test if AB has an influence, you could switch ad-blocking to off, this stops pixelserv and dnsmasq restarts, without loading the hosts file into memory.

 

[digimon04]

You likely run out of RAM during install and when it runs (cannot allocate Memory).
Do you have a working swap partition? Entware-NG has that option.

To test if AB has an influence, you could switch ad-blocking to off, this stops pixelserv and dnsmasq restarts, without loading the hosts file into memory.

Thank for the help.

With Ab-solution and Pyload, I tried to install Aria2. That also failed. I saw at router webUI and found that there is 13x MB free RAM. Later, I tried to install Transmission one more time. Still failed. It seems like the router prevents me from installing any packages. Does the installation require so much memory?

I also tried to switch off ad-blocking. That saved around 20MB RAM(observed in webUI). Then, I can install Transmission but it never run. Transmission becomes dead instantly whenever I turn it on.

And I don't have swap partition. The built-in installation script didn't have that option.

 

[thelonelycoder]

13MB free? How much RAM does your AC68U have? No wonder it crashes.

 

[digimon04]

13MB free? How much RAM does your AC68U have? No wonder it crashes.

No. I mean 130~132MB. It fluctuates between 130MB to 132MB so I said 13x MB.

Does the installation of Transmission require more than 130MB RAM?

 

[digimon04]

Bump. Attached with a screenshot to better illustrate.

As you can see in the screenshot, Transmission became dead seconds after I started it manually (
/opt/etc/init.d/S88transmission start). Entware-NG, AB-solution and Pyload was up and running at that moment. Free RAM is 140MB.

Any help?

 

[Zirescu]

Check the system log for any errors. I suspect that the transmission config is likely corrupt.

 

[digimon04]

Check the system log for any errors. I suspect that the transmission config is likely corrupt.

Transmission could run flawlessly if I turned off Pyload.

With Pyload running, I tried to turn on Transmisson and then checked the syslog. I found the following related to Transmission:

Dec 24 00:31:48 admin: Started transmission-daemon from .
Dec 23 16:31:48 transmission-daemon: transmission-daemon Failed to daemonize: pthread_create() failed (11): Resource temporarily unavailable (daemon.c:710)

It is strange that the date and time of the second entry is wrong while first one's is correct.

What does it mean by Resource temporarily unavailable? If the resource is referring to RAM, I would say there is at least 100MB free RAM at that time as shown in the screenshot at OP.

 

[Zirescu]

You can fix the time displayed in the system log by adding the following line before the $PRECMD line in start() function inside rc.func

export TZ=$(cat /etc/TZ)

rc.func is located under /opt/etc/init.d/

I'm guessing that Transmission and pyload are both trying to use the same port number for something, possibly the rpc port for transmission?

 

[digimon04]

I've found another issue that may be related to Pyload.

Recently, I found that all of my devices (e.g. phones, tablets, PC) lost internet connection when I wake up in the morning. There is no problem before I go on bed at night. Wifi signal is still there and connected. Every device basically can't connect to internet if I type the URL in the browser. However, I discovered that I can still surf the web if I type the IP directly. I thought the problem may be related to DNS. Things become clear when I found there is no internet problem in the morning one day and at the same time I noticed that Pyload isn't running.

Therefore, I spent 2 nights to test:
Pyload ON, problem exists in the next morning
Pyload OFF, no problem in the next morning

I have posted this problem early in another thread:
http://www.snbforums.com/threads/da...-63_2-and-earlier-versions.36016/#post-295968

Don't know if this issue is correlated with the one in the OP.

 

[digimon04]

One more finding today. If I turn off ab-blocking in ab-solution and later turn back on, the DNS just stops functioning. I can't go to any website by typing their URL but I can still go there by typing their IP address. One of my software can also connect to internet (that is a stock quoting app which connects to a external server with IP address). During the time, only Pyload is ON (Transmission could not be turned ON in this case)

I have to first stop Pyload. Then turn off and on the ab-blocking to restore the DNS.

 

[Zirescu]

Seems most of your issues are being caused by Pyload, I'd uninstall it and see if things settle down for you.

 

[digimon04]

Seems most of your issues are being caused by Pyload, I'd uninstall it and see if things settle down for you.

It seems Pyload is problematic. Without it, all other things are running smoothly. However, Pyload is also very important to me.

I couldn't find out the root cause of the issue. Don't know where to report the issue. I tried to ask for help in Pyload github but the developers there seems not familiar with router platform. I tried to ask for help in Entware-NG github but there is only for package request. I also suspect there is incompatibility between Pyload and firmware but I can't prove it.

Thanks Zirescu. I think I will upgrade to the latest firmware and try once more.

 

[RASG]

I've found another issue that may be related to Pyload.

Recently, I found that all of my devices (e.g. phones, tablets, PC) lost internet connection when I wake up in the morning. There is no problem before I go on bed at night. Wifi signal is still there and connected. Every device basically can't connect to internet if I type the URL in the browser. However, I discovered that I can still surf the web if I type the IP directly. I thought the problem may be related to DNS. Things become clear when I found there is no internet problem in the morning one day and at the same time I noticed that Pyload isn't running.

This happened to me when i increased the dnsmasq cache to a very big number.
The router started swapping and name resolution didnt work anymore, because it timed out.
So, in your case, probably something related to memory.

 

[digimon04]

This happened to me when i increased the dnsmasq cache to a very big number.
The router started swapping and name resolution didnt work anymore, because it timed out.
So, in your case, probably something related to memory.

All those symptoms (e.g. can't install extra package, Transmission being killed, DNS didn't restore) are referring to memory. However, I see there are more than 100MB free memory in Router's WebUI as well as running "free" in Putty. No way to prove it is running out of RAM. Even if it is running out of memory, I don't know the cause of it and where to report to.

Anyway, Thanks for your, RASG.

 

[RASG]

All those symptoms (e.g. can't install extra package, Transmission being killed, DNS didn't restore) are referring to memory. However, I see there are more than 100MB free memory in Router's WebUI as well as running "free" in Putty. No way to prove it is running out of RAM. Even if it is running out of memory, I don't know the cause of it and where to report to.

Anyway, Thanks for your, RASG.

yeap. sounds like OOM Killer is in action.
add a swap file or partition and you should be fine.