[wellylug] High load averages but no apparent cause

Daniel Reurich daniel at centurion.net.nz
Mon Mar 22 17:02:33 NZDT 2010


On Mon, 2010-03-22 at 16:49 +1300, David Harrison wrote:
> Hi,
> Has anyone experienced high-load averages but haven't been able to see
> processes that are causing it?
> 
> 
> I've got an Ubuntu Server 9.10 instance who's load average ranges
> between 1.0 and 3.0 for most of the day, yet tools like top and iostat
> don't reveal any issues.
> i.e. The load averages can be up around 1.5 whilst the maximum process
> viewed in top is sitting at 5% of the CPU.
> 
> 
> Anyone know of any other good tools for identifying the cause of
> server load if the obvious ones fail?
> 
What's the wait state like (in top it's the %wa value).  

Chances are that you have some serious I/O blocking going on which could
be a slow or failing harddisk or something like that.



-- 
Daniel Reurich.

Centurion Computer Technology (2005) Ltd
Mobile 021 797 722





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