Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by drivebyacct2 5481 days ago
Wait. You're using the nvidia driver, but are you using an accelerated window manager. Are you using mutter? Are you using compiz?

Ubuntu's 11.04 compiz is unstable, don't let me deceive you. BUT, it is far superior to plain old metacity with nvidia. Ugh, that shit tears and is awful.

1 comments

I'm using Awesome. http://awesome.naquadah.org/
The thing is, the composited window managers? They're actually smoother than without due to the graphics cards. Even with minimal features (for more stability, since ahem, shipping versions of compiz aren't always crazy stable, despite how much I admire where compiz is going).

Take the time to try a composited window manager. While you're at it, install vlc, and make sure you manually tell it to "Use Hardware Acceleration". It's amazing how small things can really show you the ability of Linux.

Most people that use window managers like Awesome have no need for a composited window manager. Yes, they make window moving smoother, but you don't move windows in Awesome, so it's just a waste of resources.

Similarly, I use VDPAU output for mplayer and full-screen it, taking the window manager and compositing manager out of the equation entirely.

Not everyone wants OS-X-style eye candy.

>Not everyone wants OS-X-style eye candy.

I think I pretty well acknowledged that even. I didn't know that you don't move windows in Awesome, especially since the comment was about tearing, and I merely mentioned that using a compositor helps with tearing...

Awesome is composited (well, has support for compositing). You just have to use an external compositor. xcompmgr and cairo-compmgr are two that I know of.