[mythtv-users] 23.1 backend sockets not listening

[Ross Camm]

ubuntu 10.10

upon a reboot, and a normal command line restart of mythbackend 23.1
master, all listening sockets are created and all is good

netstat -na | grep 654[3-4]
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:6543            0.0.0.0:*              LISTEN
tcp        0      0 0.0.0.0:6544            0.0.0.0:*              LISTEN

but mythbackend stops responding after a day or so...and all is bad

and a command line restart of mythbackend does not result in the  
listening sockets being created.

the mythbackend logs dont offer any clues, and I have tried using the
verbose levels without success of discovering a pointer to the issue.

-v socket

does not help.

How can I diagnose why mythbackend cant open the sockets ?
What logging/diagnostics can I enable to assist ?

thanks in advance