system monitor (ubuntu 9.10) display scrambled (Needs EXA)

[Tufty]

Binary package hint: gnome-system-monitor

system monitor display appears as random green or blue or other colours you cant see anything, looks a bit like a bad tartan. worked fine with 9.04 went scrambled after updated to 9.10 - all else is just fine. same for any notifications that appear, used to work but scrambled now.

OS version: ubuntu 9.10
system monitor version : 2.28.0-0ubuntu1

graphics : "lspci | grep VGA" reports "VGA compatible controller: ATI Technologies Inc Radeon RV100 QY [Radeon 7000/VE]", resolution @ 1024X768, 75HZ refresh rate - doesnt make a difference changing the resolution.

pc: dell precision 340, 512MB RAM

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

that's a video issue, could you attach your Xorg.0.log to the report? thanks.

[Tufty (iainmacintyre)]

Xorg.0.log attached

[Tufty (iainmacintyre)]

This appears to be same as Bugs #462498, #460055 something must have changed between 9.04 and 9.10 that the notification area and gnome system monitor share for display purposes.

[RPTor (jnk)]

After first installing Ubuntu 9.10 'monitor' worked fine.

After a few boots and attempting to download web software "monitor" gave scrambled display.

Initially rebooting fixed this but problem temporarily but seems to have recurred permanently. I've tried re-installing 'gnome-system-monitor', but no change.

Screen shot looks just like Tufty's.

[feci (feci1024)]

I have the same issue here, also using Ubuntu 9.10.
The only additional information that I can provide is that the screen problems disappear once compiz is enabled.
Beside the gnome-system-monitor I've noticed the same problem with Ubuntu One's notification popups (for example when it says that client and server versions differ) and also in the popups which appear if you change the volume from the laptops hard buttons.

[feci (feci1024)]

This is the screenshot of gnome-system-monitor. The colors vary, sometimes they are usually more colored, definitely not greyscale.

[feci (feci1024)]

Ubuntu One's notification message.

[Tufty (iainmacintyre)]

Fix: Worked for me anyway. Found this somewhere on the internet cant remember where so jist was

The xorg accelmethod defaults to xaa instead of exa in 9.10

display runs under the xserver which used to use a file called xorg.conf for config info, but there isnt an xorg by defualt in 9.10 it does other things. but it will use it if its there rather than defaulting to its new settings.

press
 CTRL ALT F1

need to stop x server type
 sudo service gdm stop

 get prompted for user and password, enter them

to create a default xorg type
sudo Xorg -configure

creates a file in home dir, called xorg.conf.new

start x server again
sudo service gdm start

need to edit the xorg now. i did it in a terminal doing sudo nautilus then renaming xorg.conf.new to xorg.conf and using gedit to edit it.

need to add to the device section the EXA line ...

Section "Device"
        Option "AccelMethod" "EXA"
        [...]
EndSection

copy the file to /etc/x11/

you can restart or sudo service stop then start again. if it all goes wrong you can delete the xorg from there with a live cd i guess. its supposed to default to a failsafe xorg if it cant run from the existing xorg but dont know if that works or not. worked for me. alls back the way it was. im sure its a bit jumper now though not sure if im going to keep it this way or put it back the way it was (delete the xorg from etc/x11) ...

maybe not a cure all but it worked for me.

[Chris Halse Rogers (raof)]

This should be fixed in Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid) & the upcoming Maverick (10.10) release. Could you please retest against one of these two releases? Just a live cd should be OK for testing.

[Tufty (iainmacintyre)]

It is fixed in 10.04 ubuntu ... as the person to report it i am happy to mark it as fixed.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for xserver-xorg-video-ati (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]