stability issues of PogoPlug Pro

Hi all,

I have been running a PogoPlug Pro with internal SSD with pi-hole for quite some time now. Running pi-hole 5 with an older kernel (latest 4.something provided by bodhi) I did not experience any issues. Running pi-hole 6 after a re-install all of the sudden is sometimes losing its network connection.
So, the observation is after some time (a week for example) working without any problem ... and then all of a sudden I cannot ping the device anymore. There is no easy way to attach a serial console at that time, so I am a bit clueless as to what has happened. The more recent 5.something kernel shows the same issue.
Anybody here seeing something similar?
I'm about to give up on these devices and move the pi-hole to my proxmox ... but I still somehow like these old devices, so I'm willing to give it one more chance ;)

kennywest,

My rootfs has busybox-syslogd running and logging to a RAM circular buffer.

Look in /etc/default/busybox-syslogd. There is an option that sets the logging to 128KB buffer. Comment out that and the syslog will go to /var/log/messages.

When the freeze happens again, you can power down the Pogoplug. And then power up again, log in and look at /var/log/messages to see if you can find any error occured in the last running system before the current boot up.

-bodhi
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Thank you for your reply. I already changed busybox to log to files instead of mem when I set this plug up. So attached you can find the resulting file. Nothing out of the ordinary here ... only logs about rotating logs :/

kennywest,

> Thank you for your reply. I already changed
> busybox to log to files instead of mem when I set
> this plug up. So attached you can find the
> resulting file. Nothing out of the ordinary here
> ... only logs about rotating logs :/

I guess the only way to find out for sure is to connect serial console and run with it for a while.

-bodhi
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Thanks. This will require some soldering on my end, so might take some time before I report back ;)

kennywest Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Thanks. This will require some soldering on my
> end, so might take some time before I report back
> ;)


The Pogoplug E02 and Pogoplug Pro already have what's needed, no soldering required. Plug n play, so to speak. There are quite a few threads on here showing how to do it and what to use. Also, the following link has been invaluable for me:

Pogoplug Serial Connection

Hope that helps.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/20/2025 07:34AM by bluzfanmr1.

Indeed. I know how to attach the serial console, but to be able to attach it I need to open the pogoblug. If it's sitting there in the rack and became unresponsive, there's no way for me to open it and attach the cable.
So the only solutions I see are:
- leave the plug open for a month or so with serial attached and hope it happens again
- or mount a 2.5'' jack in the plug (which requires some soldering and is fairly easy to mount) so I can get access to the serial console whenever I want, when it happens again, just plug in the serial console

Either way the soundblaster cable with the white end is "unfindable" in my region. I live in Belgium.

kennywest,

> - or mount a 2.5'' jack in the plug (which
> requires some soldering and is fairly easy to
> mount) so I can get access to the serial console
> whenever I want, when it happens again, just plug
> in the serial console

I usually drill a hole on the back of the plastic case. And thread the wires through it.

>
> Either way the soundblaster cable with the white
> end is "unfindable" in my region. I live in
> Belgium.

You should be able to find this microJST header on eBay (is there eBay Europe?). They come in a bunch, with wires attached. No need to use Soundblaster cable.

-bodhi
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Aha, interesting. So something like this -> https://www.otronic.nl/nl/micro-jst-ph-4-pins-pigtail-connector-setje-male-f.html
should work?

> Aha, interesting. So something like this ->
> https://www.otronic.nl/nl/micro-jst-ph-4-pins-pigtail-connector-setje-male-f.html
> should work?

That one looks too big.

Basically, there are cables with just the small female white header (of the Soundblaster cable) and 4 wires attached. I think it is also called mini micro JST header. Like this:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/225564848994

But I am not sure about the pitch size, I vaguely recall it is 1.25 mm. You can find out for sure what size from the Soundblaster cable spec.

-bodhi
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/26/2025 03:07AM by bodhi.

Thank you for your valuable help. Just opened the plug and took a ruler ... are you sure about the 1.25mm pitch. Seems more like 2mm (or I am measuring the wrong thing). Please see attachment.

> Seems more like 2mm (or I am
> measuring the wrong thing). Please see attachment.

I think you're right. Below was my post, and even though it's no longer available on eBay, the name seems to confirm that 2.0mm

https://forum.doozan.com/read.php?8,13263,13264#msg-13264

Quote

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Micro-Mini-JST-2-0-PH-4-Pin-Connector-w-Wire-x-10-Sets-/171042546645

-bodhi
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So I bought this -> https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B09LHG5C1Z
Which seems to work. Added a 2,5mm audio jack to expose the serial connection to the outside.
Now lets wait till it crashes again ... ;)

After running for quite some time, the plug crashed on me this morning :(
Luckily I managed to attach the console cable and this is what I could see:

[4457860.041533] INFO: rcu_preempt detected stalls on CPUs/tasks:
[4457860.047354]        1-...: (4 GPs behind) idle=c2e/140000000000000/0 softirq                                                                                                                                                             =24997322/24997322 fqs=45
[4457860.056179]        (detected by 0, t=241692 jiffies, g=20026329, c=20026328                                                                                                                                                             , q=1)
[4457860.063285] Sending NMI from CPU 0 to CPUs 1:
[4457870.043297] rcu_preempt kthread starved for 241602 jiffies! g20026329 c2002                                                                                                                                                             6328 f0x2 RCU_GP_WAIT_FQS(3) ->state=0x0 ->cpu=0
[4457870.054538] rcu_preempt     R  running task        0     8      2 0x0000000                                                                                                                                                             0
[4457870.061747] [<c075059c>] (__schedule) from [<c0750ab8>] (schedule+0x44/0xb0                                                                                                                                                             )
[4457870.068945] [<c0750ab8>] (schedule) from [<c07544f0>] (schedule_timeout+0x1                                                                                                                                                             58/0x290)
[4457870.076833] [<c07544f0>] (schedule_timeout) from [<c0165bc8>] (rcu_gp_kthre                                                                                                                                                             ad+0x400/0x958)
[4457870.085240] [<c0165bc8>] (rcu_gp_kthread) from [<c012dac4>] (kthread+0x134/                                                                                                                                                             0x14c)
[4457870.092866] [<c012dac4>] (kthread) from [<c01029b8>] (ret_from_fork+0x14/0x                                                                                                                                                             3c)
[4457923.091532] INFO: rcu_preempt detected stalls on CPUs/tasks:
[4457923.097356]        1-...: (4 GPs behind) idle=c2e/140000000000000/0 softirq=24997322/24997322 fqs=45
[4457923.106181]        (detected by 0, t=247997 jiffies, g=20026329, c=20026328, q=1)
[4457923.113292] Sending NMI from CPU 0 to CPUs 1:

[4457933.093304] rcu_preempt kthread starved for 247907 jiffies! g20026329 c20026328 f0x2 RCU_GP_WAIT_FQS(3) ->state=0x0 ->cpu=0
[4457933.104545] rcu_preempt     R  running task        0     8      2 0x00000000
[4457933.111754] [<c075059c>] (__schedule) from [<c0750ab8>] (schedule+0x44/0xb0)
[4457933.118950] [<c0750ab8>] (schedule) from [<c07544f0>] (schedule_timeout+0x158/0x290)
[4457933.126835] [<c07544f0>] (schedule_timeout) from [<c0165bc8>] (rcu_gp_kthread+0x400/0x958)
[4457933.135237] [<c0165bc8>] (rcu_gp_kthread) from [<c012dac4>] (kthread+0x134/0x14c)
[4457933.142868] [<c012dac4>] (kthread) from [<c01029b8>] (ret_from_fork+0x14/0x3c)

[4458238.341532] INFO: rcu_preempt detected stalls on CPUs/tasks:
[4458238.347353]        1-...: (4 GPs behind) idle=c2e/140000000000000/0 softirq=24997322/24997322 fqs=45
[4458238.356180]        (detected by 0, t=279522 jiffies, g=20026329, c=20026328, q=1)
[4458238.363292] Sending NMI from CPU 0 to CPUs 1:
[4458248.343303] rcu_preempt kthread starved for 279432 jiffies! g20026329 c20026328 f0x2 RCU_GP_WAIT_FQS(3) ->state=0x0 ->cpu=0
[4458248.354549] rcu_preempt     R  running task        0     8      2 0x00000000
[4458248.361763] [<c075059c>] (__schedule) from [<c0750ab8>] (schedule+0x44/0xb0)
[4458248.368962] [<c0750ab8>] (schedule) from [<c07544f0>] (schedule_timeout+0x158/0x290)
[4458248.376847] [<c07544f0>] (schedule_timeout) from [<c0165bc8>] (rcu_gp_kthread+0x400/0x958)
[4458248.385254] [<c0165bc8>] (rcu_gp_kthread) from [<c012dac4>] (kthread+0x134/0x14c)
[4458248.392883] [<c012dac4>] (kthread) from [<c01029b8>] (ret_from_fork+0x14/0x3c)

The plug is still running 4.14.198 kernel on bookworm:

Pogoplug V3 Pro
Linux version 4.14.198-oxnas-tld-1 (root@tldDebian) (gcc version 8.3.0 (Debian 8.3.0-6)) #1 SMP PREEMPT Sun Sep 20 22:15:05 PDT 2020
Debian 12.11

It is only used to run pihole v6 together with a cloudflare tunnel serving DNS over Https.
I am not a kernel developer, so no idea what the things I found in the console mean. So if someone more knowledgeable could shed a light on this it would be very appreciated.

kennywest,

As I recall, the old kernel has this issue (that showed up once in a while). Try running linux-5.15.158-oxnas-tld-2.bodhi.tar.bz2 (14 May 2024).

-bodhi
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Thanks for this. Re-installed the newer kernel. Let's see if this proves to be more stable ...