Desktop Lag

Hey,
During multitasking in desktop sometimes I experience lag even when just switching into different applications.
Could this be due to my CPU?
Currently running Intel Core i3-2100.
RAM - 4ghz.
Nvidia 550 Ti GTX
Would running an AMD cpu fix the problem?

Which Desktop are you running?
With only 4GB, if the User is doing moderately heavy multi-tasking I generally recommend a lighter Desktop like LXDE or XFCE.

If you want to add another Desktop to what you already have installed, just “zypper install nameofdesktop” for example the following

zypper install lxde

Then, go to YAST > /etc/sysconfig editor, and disable auto-login (assuming you have it enabled)

  • search login
  • select auto-login
  • remove any name displayed and leave the field blank
  • Save your settings

Then, reboot.
When the screen displays to enter your Username/Password, you’ll also see selections for various other options including your desired Desktop.

HTH,
TSU

Currently running openSUSE Leap 42.1 KDE.
Thank you for the help.
lol!

Well then again I’m fine with Plasma 5 desktop for KDE.
As far as hardware, which cpu is more suitable for Linux openSUSE Intel or AMD?
Is it the same thing within the processors or is there a difference?

Besides using another desktop is there a way to use tweaks with in the operating system to reduce lag?

Check if your system is swapping. But with 4GB (if that 4hgz is a typo?) and “normal” usage, that should not rea;y happen.

4GB of ram*
How would I find out If it’s swaping?

Several possibilities.

You could e.g. run

top

There is a heading line there about swap. Look at the ‘used’ item (it is 0 at my system at the moment, only having 2GB of memeory, on openSUSE 31.1 and 1 KDE user active).

Or

/usr/sbin/swapon -s

which also has a usage column.

One of the machines (notebook) i use with openSUSE 42.1 x86_64 and KDE (Plasma 5.4.3) is based on an Intel Core2 Duo T9400 @2.53GHz and 4 GB memory. With just one KDE user and /tmp and browser cache placed in memory still 2.29GB of RAM and 100% of SWAP are unused. And i can see no desktop lag
:wink: although the system performs not as fast as my desktop system (Intel 4790K with 32GB memory) does ;).

Currently i do not have any systems with AMD CPUs so i can’t tell whether they would give an even better performance.

Best regards

susejunky

Should not matter about brand of CPU the clock speed and number of cores is what is most important. I prefer AMD but that is just a personal choice and my current CPU is a AMD black addition 6core I choose it basically because it had no GPU I hate CPU’s with on-board GPU. It is was because I add a good GPU anyway and a on-board GPU is just a waste.

:~> /usr/sbin/swapon -s
Filename Type Size Used Priority
/dev/sda1 partition 2103292 0 -1

According to everything in this thread so far, including your original post, you should not be experiencing any lag: Your machine is powerfull enough, and you obviously have plenty of swap but are not using any, according to your post just prior to this.

You need to run top when you are experiencing the lag to see if you can spot a cause. There are other sleuthing methods, as well, that others should be able to help you with.

:~> /usr/sbin/swapon -s
Filename Type Size Used Priority
/dev/sda1 partition 2103292 98040 -1

That’s when I’m lagging when switching applications or looking through files.
what could It be?
In a lighter desktop It’s perfect with no lag.
In system monitor my memory is 3.1 of 3.8.
When It’s lagging the CPU history jumps to 100% and and lags.

So, as someone advised earlier, at that time you should run top to see what is hogging the CPU at that time.

It is swapping then (and the lag is in all the disk I/O). Indeed bettr run top and see what is using so much memory.