[HD 3650] poor performance when using compositing window manager

[Charles Lowell]

Binary package hint: xserver-xorg-video-ati

I had been using composity metacity in Intrepid with no problems at all, however, when I upgraded to Jaunty, the desktop became unuseably slow. Turning of compositing fixes that. (trying to use compiz is also equally slow)

Except for the desktop effects, graphics performance is just as good as ever. Still, it's seems like a very unfortunate regression.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: amd64
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.04
NonfreeKernelModules: fglrx
Package: xserver-xorg-video-ati 1:6.12.1-0ubuntu2
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersion: Linux version 2.6.28-11-generic (buildd@crested) (gcc version 4.3.3 (Ubuntu 4.3.3-5ubuntu4) ) #42-Ubuntu SMP Fri Apr 17 01:58:03 UTC 2009
SourcePackage: xserver-xorg-video-ati
Uname: Linux 2.6.28-11-generic x86_64

[lspci]
00:00.0 Host bridge [0600]: Intel Corporation Mobile 4 Series Chipset Memory Controller Hub [8086:2a40] (rev 07)
     Subsystem: Lenovo Device [17aa:20e0]
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: ATI Technologies Inc Mobility Radeon HD 3650 [1002:9591]
     Subsystem: Lenovo Device [17aa:2117]

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

You could test if the mesa in my PPA helps. It has a patch that fixes a performance regression with radeon in Jaunty:
https://edge.launchpad.net/~bryceharrington/+archive/ppa

[krona (krona-krona-deactivatedaccount)]

I'd like to raise this importance to high - tried the fix from ppa - installed all packages tagged with this bug number, didn't seem to fix it. Want to show off my system to Windows users but can't yet ;-)

[krona (krona-krona-deactivatedaccount)]

I'm using Linux as my main operating system on my laptop for the first time, though I've used Linux on and off in various ways since 1997. So I was wondering how I can understand in greater detail the status of certain defects. To me this defect is quite high. I am a software engineer so I understand that performance issues will always take a back seat, but can we know that this defect is likely to be fixed in version X of the xserver-xorg-video-ati package even though it's a kind of limbo state. My best guess it that the fix will be incorporated at some point but I don't want the bug to 'expire' in 50 days.

[Robert Hooker (sarvatt)]

The reporter is using fglrx, bypassing mesa. xserver-xorg-video-ati and mesa dont support dri on a HD3650 (pci id 1002:9591) so I think reports are getting crossed here.

[krona (krona-krona-deactivatedaccount)]

Hi Robert,

thanks for responding. Since I'm new to using Linux(Ubuntu) as my main desktop I don't understand the relationship between the various runtime libraries especially with regards to free and non-free components. You are saying that my configuration is basically not supported, since I'm using HD3650 and that depends on fglrx?

[Robert Hooker (sarvatt)]

the binary drivers (nvidia and fglrx) use their own gl libraries (not mesa), and HD2400 and up aren't supported under mesa at all right now for 3d acceleration so the responses in here asking people to try different versions of mesa and xserver-xorg-video-ati don't apply. What you want to do if you haven't already is install fglrx if you want to have any kind of accelerated 3D support. The original bug reporter's situation could have been a regression in compiz performance with the drivers they were using that might have been fixed.

[krona (krona-krona-deactivatedaccount)]

Unfortunately I seem to already have the latest fglrx driver (2:8.600) so I suppose I will just wait until there's a new version available and hope it fixes the issue, I can live with the issue actually, still prefer it to switching off compositing ;-)

[Robert Hooker (sarvatt)]

Please try the updated fglrx drivers available in this PPA in that case, updated fglrx drivers wont ever hit jaunty as they are binary only and require the whole package to be updated instead of being able to patch specific problems like you can with an open source ones.

https://launchpad.net/~ubuntu-x-swat/+archive/x-updates

[krona (krona-krona-deactivatedaccount)]

Same problem still exists in the fglrx driver in that PPA.

[krona (krona-krona-deactivatedaccount)]

I hope this issue has a good chance of being fixed in the next release of Ubuntu, so I shall wait till beta versions are available for testing.