System crash on USB file transfer

[Deleted member 9563]

I'm running FreeBSD 9.2-RELEASE with KDE. I have an external disk with a USB interface, as detailed in this earlier post. When I transfer a large file, I notice my keyboard and mouse start to fail, then become inactive. A short while later, the system crashes and reboots. The file size in question is about 34GB and it might get as far as 12GB or more before the crash.

I'm posting in this section because I don't know if the problem is with the OS or KDE. In fact, I have a suspicion that there could even be problem with Xorg. The machine seems to run well otherwise though. I'm not sure what to report to help diagnose this problem yet, but here are the recent dumps in my home directory. (I have nepomuk disable so I do believe it is normal for akonadiserver to crash whenever anything is started.)

-rw-------  1 ole  ole  18632704 Nov 12 22:29 kdeinit4.core
-rw-------  1 ole  ole  48558080 Nov 12 22:29 kactivitymanagerd.core
-rw-------  1 ole  ole   6856704 Nov 12 22:43 akonadiserver.core

 

[jb_fvwm2]

I use the rsync ... -bwlimit=1000 which may fix the issue. [Search the forum for the complete line... which has worked so long, so flawlessly, that I expect to never vary its usage here, ever... ]. In fact, it is running in the background right now in another xterm

 

[Deleted member 9563]

Thanks @jb_fvwm2. I generally just use cp since it's simple and straightforward. I can see that rsync does have some advantages though.

I've narrowed down my problem. As to exactly where the instability is coming from, and why KDE is effected as well, I don't know. However, the problem seems to be the USB. I can transfer large files with cp internally, and FTP externally, just fine. What is crashing is USB transfer.

I've tried a different cable as well as a computer running the same OS. Getting KDE automount to work with these things is a pain, which I've confirmed by trying a second external USB drive as well. I think it's just not worth playing around with this USB thing and I'm going to put the 1 TB drive right in my box and be done with it. From everything I've read since I first posted this thread, FreeBSD does not balk at large files and I shouldn't be having such a problem. As for trying USB 3.0, which both the external drive and my USB ports are capable of - forget it. I've wasted enough time already. I'm going back to the pre-USB technology which works.