Compositing problems

English Applications
1

A recent update broke KWin compositing. I can’t remember exactly what packages were updated(kernel and pulseaudio are certain). I have an nvidia card. I update-ed the nvidia packages in yast, and still nothing.
When I try to enable compositing in System Settings I get the following:

Failed to activate desktop effects using the given configuration options. Settings will be reverted to their previous values.

Check your X configuration. You may also consider changing advanced options, especially changing the compositing type.

How do I fix this?

2

Have you logged out and back in since re-installing nvidia?

3

Of course…

4

Hi,

Would you please post a copy of your xorg.conf located at /etc/X11

Take Care,

Ian

5 
# nvidia-xconfig: X configuration file generated by nvidia-xconfig
# nvidia-xconfig:  version 1.0  (buildmeister@builder63)  Wed May 27 03:15:36 PDT 2009                                                                              

# /.../
# SaX generated X11 config file
# Created on: 2009-05-06T04:30:48+0300.
#                                      
# Version: 8.1                         
# Contact: Marcus Schaefer <sax@suse.de>, 2005
# Contact: SaX-User list <https://lists.berlios.de/mailman/listinfo/sax-users>
#                                                                             
# Automatically generated by [ISaX] (8.1)                                     
# PLEASE DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE!                                               
#                                                                             

Section "ServerLayout"
    Identifier     "Layout[all]"
    Screen         "Screen[0]" 0 0
    InputDevice    "Keyboard[0]" "CoreKeyboard"
    InputDevice    "Mouse[1]" "CorePointer"    
    InputDevice    "Mouse[3]" "SendCoreEvents" 
    Option         "Clone" "off"               
    Option         "Xinerama" "off"            
EndSection                                     

Section "Files"
    InputDevices      "/dev/gpmdata"
    InputDevices      "/dev/input/mice"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/misc:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/local"        
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/75dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/100dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/Type1"          
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/URW"            
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/Speedo"         
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/PEX"            
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/cyrillic"       
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/latin2/misc:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/latin2/75dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/latin2/100dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/latin2/Type1"          
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/latin7/75dpi:unscaled" 
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/baekmuk:unscaled"      
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/japanese:unscaled"     
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/kwintv"                
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/truetype"              
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/uni:unscaled"          
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/CID"                   
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/ucs/misc:unscaled"     
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/ucs/75dpi:unscaled"    
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/ucs/100dpi:unscaled"   
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/hellas/misc:unscaled"  
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/hellas/75dpi:unscaled" 
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/hellas/100dpi:unscaled"
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/hellas/Type1"          
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/misc/sgi:unscaled"     
    FontPath        "/usr/share/fonts/xtest"                 
    FontPath        "/opt/kde3/share/fonts"                  
EndSection                                                   

Section "Module"
    Load           "dbe"
    Load           "freetype"
    Load           "extmod"  
    Load           "glx"     
EndSection                   

Section "ServerFlags"
    Option         "AllowMouseOpenFail" "on"
    Option         "ZapWarning" "on"        
EndSection                                  

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier     "Keyboard[0]"
    Driver         "kbd"        
    Option         "Protocol" "Standard"
    Option         "XkbLayout" "us"     
    Option         "XkbModel" "microsoftpro"
    Option         "XkbRules" "xfree86"     
EndSection                                  

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier     "Mouse[1]"
    Driver         "mouse"   
    Option         "Buttons" "7"
    Option         "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
    Option         "Name" "KYE Wireless Mouse"
    Option         "Protocol" "explorerps/2"  
    Option         "Vendor" "Sysp"            
    Option         "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"       
EndSection                                    

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier     "Mouse[3]"
    Driver         "synaptics"
    Option         "Buttons" "5"
    Option         "Device" "/dev/input/mice"
    Option         "Emulate3Buttons" "on"    
    Option         "HorizScrollDelta" "0"    
    Option         "InputFashion" "Mouse"    
    Option         "Name" "Synaptics;Touchpad"
    Option         "Protocol" "explorerps/2"  
    Option         "SHMConfig" "on"           
    Option         "Vendor" "Sysp"            
    Option         "ZAxisMapping" "4 5"       
EndSection                                    

Section "Modes"
    Identifier         "Modes[0]"
EndSection                       

Section "Monitor"
    Identifier     "Monitor[0]"
    VendorName     "--> LCD"   
    ModelName      "1024X768@60HZ"
    UseModes       "Modes[0]"     
    HorizSync       31.0 - 60.0   
    VertRefresh     30.0 - 60.0   
    Option         "CalcAlgorithm" "XServerPool"
    Option         "DPMS"                       
    Option         "PreferredMode" "1280x800"   
EndSection                                      

Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Device[0]"
    Driver         "nvidia"   
    VendorName     "NVidia"   
    BoardName      "GeForce 8400M G"
EndSection                          

Section "Screen"
    Identifier     "Screen[0]"
    Device         "Device[0]"
    Monitor        "Monitor[0]"
    DefaultDepth    24         
    SubSection     "Display"   
        Depth       15         
        Modes      "1280x800" "1280x768" "1280x720" "1024x768" "1280x600" "1024x600" "800x600" "768x576" "640x480"                                                  
    EndSubSection                                                                 
    SubSection     "Display"                                                      
        Depth       16                                                            
        Modes      "1280x800" "1280x768" "1280x720" "1024x768" "1280x600" "1024x600" "800x600" "768x576" "640x480"                                                  
    EndSubSection                                                                 
    SubSection     "Display"                                                      
        Depth       24                                                            
        Modes      "1280x800" "1280x768" "1280x720" "1024x768" "1280x600" "1024x600" "800x600" "768x576" "640x480"                                                  
    EndSubSection                                                                 
    SubSection     "Display"                                                      
        Depth       32
        Modes      "1280x800" "1280x768" "1280x720" "1024x768" "1280x600" "1024x600" "800x600" "768x576" "640x480"
    EndSubSection
    SubSection     "Display"
        Depth       8
        Modes      "1280x800" "1280x768" "1280x720" "1024x768" "1280x600" "1024x600" "800x600" "768x576" "640x480"
    EndSubSection
EndSection

Section "Extensions"
    Option         "Composite" "on"
EndSection
6

Try enabling aiglx

In your xorg.conf file under Section “ServerLayout” add

Option "aiglx" "true"

Then open a terminal and run these commands.

su

root password

nvidia-xconfig --composite
nvidia-xconfig --render-accel
nvidia-xconfig --add-argb-glx-visuals -d 24Try

Try that then restart (I think a simple logout then login might work but restart to be safe), and see where that gets you.

Good Luck,

Ian

7

Please, open a terminal and post output of:

rpm -qa | grep kernel-
rpm -qa | grep nvidia
glxinfo | grep direct

You should be able to get it working without AIGLX. If not through the repos, than the manual way. That seems hard, but I can provide you with the steps to take.

8

Thanks man! This fixed it.

9

@zolistir87
Glad I could help out!

@Knurpht

I only have one old NVIDIA card (see my sig) so this is the only way I could ever get it to work with both the repository and manually compiling ways. Is it bad to be telling users to enable AIGLX and run those commands? I remember reading that they’re not really necessary but it seems to work sometimes as in this case.

Take Care,

Ian

10

My impression it will default to it with the newer drivers as for bad no superfluous maybe.

I suspect it may be one of the other ones.

To be honest I’ve not even got composite on in mine :wink: Xorg went to a hotplugging model recently. In theory you don’t need an xorg.conf but practise is a litte different.

If you look at the modules loaded for your keyboard you’ll notice that it doesn’t load kbd but evdev.

grep evdev /var/log/Xorg.0.log

How the auto config tools are dealing with it I’m not sure and having a problem with my keyboard I can’t begin to unravel it.

Yast uses some system variables for certain bits. Still not quite worked out whether sax2 is actually being honoured. I have managed to force xorg to use kbd but can no longer remember how.

11

OK here’s another one. Suppose I have same sympthoms with an Intel card(a friend of mine has the problem so I can’t really give you xorg.conf). I figure that running those commands don’t really help…