[RV280] Degraded performance after some minutes of use

[Emmanuel Pacaud]

Binary package hint: xorg

When I log into my session, everything works fine and fast.

But after a while, suddenly, performances are degraded severely. It's particularly obvious on window content scrolling (a firefox page for example), or when playing with the nautilus selection rectangle on the desktop (the one you get when you click on the desktop, then move the mouse around). The mouse cursor movement is choppy.

When the system is idle, there's no abnormal cpu use. When I move things, cpu use goes up to 100%.

It happens with either metacity or compiz.

I've played with the agpmode setting, with no effect.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: xorg 1:7.5+5ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-21.32-generic 2.6.32.11+drm33.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-21-generic i686
Architecture: i386
Date: Tue Apr 27 23:29:31 2010
DkmsStatus:

InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx" - Alpha i386 (20100119)
MachineType: System Manufacturer System Name
ProcCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.32-21-generic root=UUID=cad49b82-547e-477f-a13d-c5f825c88e3c ro quiet splash
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=fr_FR.utf8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: xorg
Symptom: display
dmi.bios.date: 09/02/2004
dmi.bios.vendor: Award Software, Inc.
dmi.bios.version: ASUS A7V8X-X ACPI BIOS Revision 1013
dmi.board.name: A7V8X-X
dmi.board.vendor: ASUSTeK Computer INC.
dmi.board.version: REV 1.xx
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: Asset-1234567890
dmi.chassis.type: 7
dmi.chassis.vendor: Chassis Manufacture
dmi.chassis.version: Chassis Version
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAwardSoftware,Inc.:bvrASUSA7V8X-XACPIBIOSRevision1013:bd09/02/2004:svnSystemManufacturer:pnSystemName:pvrSystemVersion:rvnASUSTeKComputerINC.:rnA7V8X-X:rvrREV1.xx:cvnChassisManufacture:ct7:cvrChassisVersion:
dmi.product.name: System Name
dmi.product.version: System Version
dmi.sys.vendor: System Manufacturer
glxinfo: Error: [Errno 2] Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
system:
 distro: Ubuntu
 codename: lucid
 architecture: i686
 kernel: 2.6.32-21-generic
xkbcomp:
 Error: command ['xkbcomp', ':0', '-w0', '-'] failed with exit code 1: No protocol specified
 Error: Cannot open display ":0"
                   Exiting

[Emmanuel Pacaud (emmanuel-pacaud)]

But after a while, suddenly, performances are degraded severely. It's particularly obvious on window content scrolling (a firefox page for example), or when playing with the nautilus selection rectangle on the desktop (the one you get when you click on the desktop, then move the mouse around). The mouse cursor movement is choppy.

When the system is idle, there's no anormal cpu use. When I move things, cpu use goes up to 100%.

I've tried to get an oprofile report done when playing with the nautilus selection rectangle. Here's the result:

CPU: Athlon, speed 1822.4 MHz (estimated)
Counted CPU_CLK_UNHALTED events (Cycles outside of halt state) with a unit mask of 0x00 (No unit mask) count 100000
samples % image name app name symbol name
470250 34.1294 vmlinux-2.6.32-21-generic vmlinux-2.6.32-21-generic __purge_vmap_area_lazy
441755 32.0613 vmlinux-2.6.32-21-generic vmlinux-2.6.32-21-generic native_wbinvd
29352 2.1303 libc-2.11.1.so libc-2.11.1.so /lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc-2.11.1.so
26870 1.9501 Xorg Xorg /usr/bin/Xorg
22234 1.6137 agpgart agpgart /agpgart
19673 1.4278 libcrypto.so.0.9.8 libcrypto.so.0.9.8 /lib/i686/cmov/libcrypto.so.0.9.8
16454 1.1942 opreport opreport /usr/bin/opreport
14938 1.0842 libglib-2.0.so.0.2400.0 libglib-2.0.so.0.2400.0 /lib/libglib-2.0.so.0.2400.0
12351 0.8964 oprofile oprofile /oprofile
11790 0.8557 vmlinux-2.6.32-21-generic vmlinux-2.6.32-21-generic flush_all_zero_pkmaps
10955 0.7951 python2.6 python2.6 /usr/bin/python2.6
9729 0.7061 libexa.so libexa.so /usr/lib/xorg/modules/libexa.so
9422 0.6838 libgobject-2.0.so.0.2400.0 libgobject-2.0.so.0.2400.0 /usr/lib/libgobject-2.0.so.0.2400.0

[Emmanuel Pacaud (emmanuel-pacaud)]

It happens with either metacity or compiz.

I've played with the agpmode setting, with no effect.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Is this a regression? I.e., did it work previously on Lucid and only occurred after a recent update? If so, about when did you first notice it?

[Emmanuel Pacaud (emmanuel-pacaud)]

It used to works fine when I've started to test lucid. But I can't exactly remember when the issue appeared. May be a month or two ago.

[Emmanuel Pacaud (emmanuel-pacaud)]

I've updated my kernel to 2.6.34, from http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v2.6.34-lucid/.

So far, it seems it fixed this issue.

[Emmanuel Pacaud (emmanuel-pacaud)]

After 3 weeks of use, I can confirm the kernel upgrade fixed this issue.

[Bryce Harrington (bryce)]

Thanks for letting us know the issue is resolved.