Why KDE Plasma Makes Sense For Linux Gaming 152
sfcrazy writes "Martin Gräßlin, a lead KDE developer, addresses some queries around a topic bugging Gnome and Unity users — the fallback mode. In this post he says that 'having the non-composited mode around allows us to do things like turning compositing off when running games or heavy OpenGL based applications such as Blender. So if you want to get some of the now finally available games for Linux, KDE Plasma should be your primary choice to enjoy the game. I have also heard of users switching to KDE Plasma because we still provide non OpenGL based setups.'"
Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Interesting)
I switched to (Linux Mint 13) KDE precisely because I didn't want to learn a new interface (Unity). It's great. I used XFCE and LXDE previously, having read of their great suitability for lower end hardware, but..well, I don't have any low end hardware. I have nothing special but it runs KDE perfectly, and it looks great. I can't be bothered to learn all the ins and outs of it - I launch stuff via what I'll always call the 'start menu' or shortcuts or from the 'task bar' - but it's good to know that there's more to it if I could be bothered to learn it. The point is, nobodies forcing me to use it. There seem to be a rash of these Mac-like OSes these days (including the hilarious Windows 8) - I don't quite understand the appeal.
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Interesting)
There seem to be a rash of these Mac-like OSes these days (including the hilarious Windows 8) - I don't quite understand the appeal.
That's because you (like most of us here) learned about computers using devices with separate keyboard, mouse and screen. We are currently at the tipping point where more youth learn about computers through devices with only a touchscreen (phones, tablets) and have never used a laptop.
That tipping point is driving interfaces that cater to the touchscreen user experience, even though those interfaces don't allow for as much interaction as UIs driven by the keyboard/mouse/screen user experience.
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, but I had no problem picking up Android, whether on phone or tablet. It's just intuitive. I didn't have the first fucking clue how I was supposed to use Unity to do anything. Windows 8 is worse because you now have to learn two completely different interfaces instead of one. I need a 'normal' interface on a 'normal computer' because I develop software, edit photographs, tag/copy mp3 files between devices, use one device to control another etc. Sure, if I were a user and had no need to actually create anything I'd use a tablet. But these desktop OSes (Windows 8, unity etc) will mostly be running on regular computers without touch screens, so i'm not sure of the utility of making this change. I'm sure Microsoft and Canonical believe that their OSes will soon be on millions of touch-enabled devices; I find this unlikely.
(BTW: You're the first AC I've responded to in years. Why haven't you created an account here? I almost didn't see your reply as I filter ACs away).
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Interesting)
It's very likely, as interfaces evolve, that we will have specialized "developer" versions of these interfaces. These developer versions enable you to be creative, and to do all that you need to do to make an application that is primarily targeted at these newer interfaces, including having keyboard access, pen, 3d input mice, multiple monitors, system simulators, etc...
This is already the case with game consoles; There is always a developer version of the hardware.
In time, I expect the same from an OS targeted for end-users.
Re: (Score:2)
A sad day that will be if it comes to pass. One of the wonderful things about the internet is the way it's turning the "traditional" (for a couple centuries anyway) few->many publishing industry on its ear and letting everyone join the creative process. Sure, most of it's stuff that could readily be done from a dumbed-down tablet, but there's a nice smooth learning curve for those who want to take it to the next level - maybe you have to learn a new more powerful program, but the computing interface is
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, but I had no problem picking up Android, whether on phone or tablet. It's just intuitive.
I got an Android phone to try and was fuming most of the time I used it.
OK, so I have this new phone, I want to copy the call and SMS ringtones from my old phone (call ringtone is an mp3, SMS ringtone is a midi file). So, I transfer them over bluetooth and now they are sitting in the phones memory. OK.
On a few Nokia phones I had you selected a custom ringtone just like the builtin ones, except you selected "custom" and then browsed to where the file was. So I try this here, no "custom". OK, maybe I can sele
Re: (Score:2)
Didn't have a clue? Was it that the menu bar was vertical instead of horizontal that threw you? Other than that, everything else is nearly the same. The software is identical as the OS doesn't change that. The only other thing is the Dash instead of the Start button, but after 10 seconds you figure that out then will not enjoy going back to the old way of doing things.
Phillip.
Re: (Score:2)
But these desktop OSes (Windows 8, unity etc) will mostly be running on regular computers without touch screens
The impression I have is that people are slightly missing the point on the proper way to interact with this new generation of OSes. It isn't that they're touch-screen-focused, but actually only touch-focused, meaning you need some form of touch to use them as they're meant to be properly used, but not that you're limited to screens for that purpose. Replacing your standard mouse for either a touch pad or a touch mouse will provide the required input interface. For instance, last time I passed in front of an
Re: (Score:2)
The whining about Gnome shouldn't really be lumped in with the whining about Unity. It's two seperate whinings even though Unity works as a shell of sorts for Gnome. Even though they sound inextricably linked, the thing to be whined about is different. It's "Whaaah, Unity doesn't do this!, and they say its because they are aming at a certain class of hardware - that is, netbooks and other places where the screen size is rather limited", vrs. "Whaaah, Gnome doesn't let me do this, says they could explain why
Re: (Score:2)
And I appologise for writing the contraction of "it is" without a "'".
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree with what you are saying, to a point. I have been using computers of one sort or another since the early 80's and have always had a keyboard at minimum, and a mouse and possibly other HID devices later.
Recently (past ~3yrs) I have used several tablets/smartphones. While I am continuously impressed with what can be done on these devices, I am always cognizant of what *can't* be done on these devices.
Tablets/Smartphones are great for instant satisfaction, but are quite weak compared to a desktop, unless you have great eyesight and you only do a few minimal things. Even browsing the web becomes cumbersome quickly when you need to *type* anything. Forget about doing any actual work on one of these things such as replying to emails or anything that is enhanced by more than one 10" screen.
I realize that the hardware/software manufacturers love the idea of these portable devices and all of the restrictions (hardware/software locks) contained within, but I like to think that people will not always be content with the lowest common denominator.
I agree that these devices have a place , however they will never fully displace desktops/laptops.
Mod parent up. (Score:3)
Exactly. The interface for a less complicated device (a car) should be different from the interface for a more complicated device (jet airplane).
You hope that you are in a place where you can use Siri and that Siri understands what you are saying.
And don't forget the web sites that just suck
Re: (Score:2)
And don't forget the web sites that just suck on a mobile device. Like when you have to scroll and scroll and scroll left to read something.
We had the same with normal web sites on the desktop for a while, where they were designed fixed for 800x600 and IE only. Looked awful 1600x1200 on Firefox. With the current move to rewriting all the sites as 'responsive' the web will clean itself up for mobile.
They are designed for consumption of media. Not for production of anything.
Not true for real estate any more.
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:5, Insightful)
There seem to be a rash of these Mac-like OSes these days (including the hilarious Windows 8) - I don't quite understand the appeal.
That's because you (like most of us here) learned about computers using devices with separate keyboard, mouse and screen. We are currently at the tipping point where more youth learn about computers through devices with only a touchscreen (phones, tablets) and have never used a laptop.
That tipping point is driving interfaces that cater to the touchscreen user experience, even though those interfaces don't allow for as much interaction as UIs driven by the keyboard/mouse/screen user experience.
Your statement is not that far removed from "Most youth learned about computers through devices with only a gamepad. It's true, but it doesn't mean much. The thing that makes what we call a "computer" a "computer" is that it's general purpose, and designed to empower creative work. Barring radical developments, tablets and phones are not going to displace the traditional computer any more than game consoles did.
Re: (Score:2)
"The thing that makes what we call a "computer" a "computer" is that it's general purpose, and designed to empower creative work. Barring radical developments, tablets and phones are not going to displace the traditional computer any more than game consoles did."
I have a problem with your definition of "computer". The first computers weren't general purpose in any modern sense, simply because they were too low-powered to be anything other than glorified adding machines, or primitive calculators.
Even a smart
Re: (Score:2)
Note how I specifically mentioned "alphanumeric data" above. A hardware keyboard has definite advantages for programmers and users of alphabetic writing systems. But for users of writing systems that require up to thousands of unique symbols, a hardware keyboard with its fixed set of keys isn't that more efficient than having the on-screen ability to summon different sets of virtual keyboards.
Are you aware of how those systems with unique symbols operate? The fastest method by far is converting "alphabet" to symbol then using an autocomplete (or button on the keyboard) to compound the "word". The claim, that hunt n peck is not that less efficient than 10 fingers, is not based in reality. Lookups by radical or brushtroke are slow, and so is your solution with different sets of virtual keyboards which cater to this proposed solution.
Re: (Score:2)
What the hell? How many writing systems with unique symbols are there? Just say Chinese Glyphs...
Re: (Score:2)
Mathematics
Re: (Score:2)
Within the context of their times, the first computers were definitely general purpose. The two major alternatives were the abacus (and various geared adding machines that basically worked the same way), and the sliderule. Neither type could easily do the work the other was designed for, and neither type had a mechanism for accurately repeating a series of operations.
Young'uns today have no sense of history.
With regard to the future, the first tablet that is delivered with bluetooth peripheral connectivit
Re: (Score:1)
This.
We should move away from the 'y' will replace 'x', because what we always end up with is y in the y-usecase and x in the x-usecase.
I play L4D2 on Wine on my Fedora PC, because any self-respecting FPS require Keyboard and Mouse. I play Skyrim on ps3 because it's a kick-back and relax enjoying the great outdoors type of exploration, for which the couch provides the perfect seating. The scenario for laptops (work), PCs (gaming), tablets/phones (communicating and commuting) and consoles (relaxation) are wh
Re: (Score:3)
You miss the fact that the vast majority of the population does not use computers to empower creative work. They use it to facebook and watch cat videos. They can do that just fine on a tablet or phone, perhaps even better. Those people really will be displaced from general purpose computers, and general purpose computers will become a niche item.
Touch screens - the early years (Score:2)
even though those interfaces don't allow for as much interaction as UIs driven by the keyboard/mouse/screen user experience.
I'm not sure that's fundamentally true - we're currently looking at the early steps of touch-based interfaces, it might be better to compare them to the early pre-unix years of the command line interfaces, or the early Apple and Amiga GUIs - functional, but horribly anemic by today's standards because we've had decades to refine the user experience. Give touch interfaces a few decades to mature and they may we'll exceed the capability and versatility of keyboard & mouse. I can already think of a few t
Re: (Score:2)
The next generation of students will not even know how to type. SIRI will convert text to words. Now we need a C and a C++ version of SIRI. Even better, lets include a dynamic translator with SIRI.
Bye bye spelling and handwriting.
Brave New World
Re: (Score:3)
Not only is LM13 KDE a great distro, it's very turnkey. Audio, second monitor, wifi, usb, mice, touchpads ... all just work. I tried it in August - my first Linux install - and have only visited the previous OS once a month since. WIth dozens of apps added (and some Office grunge uninstalled) takes up a whole 6GB.
XFCE is better (Score:2)
Last time i tried, KDE4 just took too long to boot, AND would easily eat 1g of ram for itself. XFCE (and LXDE) on the other hand, are instant and provide anything needed to quickly launch apps and stay out of the way.
As a gamer, i wouldn't want that memory hog lying around, but i can see its appeal to windows vista users; unlike gnome which makes no sense whatsoever.
I'm not a fan of unity but it gets the job done, albeit slowly and bug prone (and its a dependency nightmare). Unity just mimics a bit of the M
Re: (Score:1)
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Alternative: XFCE (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, you might want to skip MS-Windows 8 too, then. I messed with it for a few hours on my new touchscreen ultrabook Lenovo Twist before blowing it away to install Fedora.
All I can say is that Win8 is absolutely hideous. It is pretty at first, until you have to actually try and DO something, then it quickly throws up dozens of barriers. I can't imagine being forced to have to use such a monster on a regular basis.
The Twist only comes with 128MB SDD and almost *HALF* of it was completely consumed by the Win8 *BEAST*. And that is with almost no crapware and very few useful things installed at all.
In contrast, Fedora 17 just *FLIES* on the machine, everything worked out of the box (even the touchscreen) except the card reader (which I had to compile a driver). After installing thousands of packages- KDE, LXDE, games, browsers, test editors, multi-media tools and editors, graphics manipulation, several productivity apps, full dev system, etc, it used 5GB.
I am curious to see if KDE can incorporate a tablet-like interface that can co-exist with a real desktop-like interface with auto-switching on the fly (kind of the whole point of the Twist). They have all the components and probably the best environment to make it happen....
Re: (Score:1)
Well, you might want to skip MS-Windows 8 too, then.
It seems Windows follows a Star Trek like release schedule -- you should skip every other version. 98 was good, ME was bad, XP was good, Vista was bad, 7 was good... waiting for 9/Blue/whatever...
Re: (Score:2)
It enables you to have radically different desktop layouts at the click of the mouse, swipe of a finger.
Re: (Score:2)
What, 45 floppies? Software isn't that small since the 90's. That's 10% of a CD-ROM!
Re: (Score:2)
>"What, 45 floppies? Software isn't that small since the 90's. That's 10% of a CD-ROM!"
When the drive size is only 115GB, having half of it consumed by the OS install is pretty dramatic, if you ask me (and many others in Twist forums who were shocked when they saw their "free space"). Even if you delete the recovery partition and long-term hibernate, it is still huge... about 700% larger than a Linux installation with the same functionality.
It is a bit strange that Lenovo didn't offer a 256GB SSD option
Re: (Score:2)
That was a joke. You made a typo at your original post.
Re: (Score:2)
Yep, I completely missed it- both the typo (MB instead of GB) and the meaning of his reply.
Re: (Score:2)
THANK YOU! Yes, I completely missed that. Duh!
Re: (Score:3)
0 unallocated -- 1MB
1 ntfs WINRE_DRV 1000MB 474MB hidden
2 fat32 SYSTEM_DRV 260MB 55MB boot
3 unknown
Re: (Score:2)
When did 36% become "almost half"? Wait excuse me, "almost *HALF*". I forgot to include the needless hyperbole which looks even more ridiculous in light of your own numbers. Especially since a good portion of that is taken up by Lenovo's recovery partition. You know, that thing which has nothing at all to do with any decision on MS's part concerning their OS.
Re: (Score:2)
I suppose it depends on what one considers part of the MS-Windows install and what one doesn't. Unless you suppose that your definition (whatever that might be) is the only correct one.
Personally, I count all the space that was not available to the user for storage to be part of the installation. And based on that, about half the drive was consumed and unavailable as it came to me.
Even if you were to blow away the recovery partition and even the hibernate one, that still leaves 27GB of "stuff"; about 700%
Re: (Score:2)
So if you bought a Hello Kitty laptop filled with gigabytes of Hello Kitty videos and programs that would all be part of the Windows installation? I can see your definition totally makes as much sense as mine does. Those tools you are complaining about also let you burn a windows install disc from the recovery partition so you can blow it away if you want. Official Windows .iso files are also available online. Whenever I've installed windows from an official disc there was no recovery partition. Lenovo
Re: (Score:3)
Win7 gets better battery life with composition because it offloads to the GPU instead of using the CPU. Vista had a lot of issues with RTM, not sure how SP3 is doing, but most people I know skipped Vista anyway.
that's not true, the dwm in both vista and 7 uses gpu acceleration, that's why you couldn't enable it on older version of vmware
Options (Score:5, Insightful)
I just switched to KDE because the developers aren't against the idea of me configuring and theming it as I please. It's also faster. Games are now an added bonus.
Re:Options (Score:4)
Strange behavior with LXDE (Score:4, Interesting)
A week or two ago I tested LXDE and KDE to see which one would run the best with the new Serious Sam and Unigine. With the Nvidia 304 driver, LXDE was always slower than KDE with or without compositing. This issue went away with the Nvidia 310 driver, LXDE and KDE without compositing were just about the same speed.
I have no idea what caused the slowdown, however it shows that the game's FPS does not necessarily improve with a "light" DE. Compositing however made a difference.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Compositing shouldn't case any problems with LXDE and game performance unless the GPU has issues. Are we by random chance talking about a Intel laptop of a earlier chipset?
Re: (Score:2)
Or, you know... (Score:2, Informative)
There are other DEs/WMs out there. XFCE, LXDE if you want a somewhat complete DE, WindowLab [nickgravgaard.com] if you want something minimal but like your mouse, i3 [i3wm.org] if you like tiling (or xmonad if you swing that way).
KDE's sure to use more memory than some of the other competition, and if you're like me and only have 2GB of RAM in your primary machine, that's important.
Re: (Score:3)
Only 2 Gigs? KDE runs fine on half that. I only have 2 Gigs and even with the visual effects it runs great. Sure, you can run a Window Manager that runs on a Pentium 1 with 256 Megs, but don't do it just because you think KDE requires some monster machine with like 64 Gigs and an i7 processor.
Re: (Score:2)
I only have 1 GB of RAM on my netbook and KDE runs fine on it.
Re: (Score:2)
Thinkpad R32 - 11 years old - 512 M of RAM
Now running Kubuntu 12.4 (with KDE). 30 second boot time if I type the password fast.
SVG icons (Score:1)
That article a few days ago about scaleable icons sent it over the edge for me. We equate high resolution with small icons, it doesn't have to be that way. I hate squinting at my screen just because I want high res graphics.
Re:SVG icons (Score:5, Informative)
>Last time I looked they were transparently rendered and cached as bitmaps anyway.
When was this, in the 3x days?
Open dolphin. Grab the slider. Watch as the icons in Dolphin magically resize as you move the slider back and forth at to completely arbitrary sizes that aren't limited to powers of 2.
Go back to 4chan /g/.
--
BMO
Re: (Score:3)
of course they're "transparently rendered and cached as bitmaps", in different sizes. doing it any other way makes no sense, directly keeping rendering the svg to screen makes no sense at all as aproach to blitting something that doesn't change to the screen.
Re:SVG icons- the guy that does them (Score:1)
Svg is great but... if you go and see the sources- svg's for the icons uyou will see that there are multiple svg's for each size.. usualy 16x16 22x22 32x32 48x48 and then 128x128 and hidef wich is 256x256 - this are fully scalable and look good enough up untill 2560x2560.
As I usualy say SVG is scalabe but your screen is not, aka pixels are still there and thge small icons need to maintain their meningfull elements visible in the small icons, also those elements needs to be aligned with the rendering grid so
Uses RAM, bad at running games (Score:2)
Games frequently require large amounts of RAM, so the fact that the desktop uses a lot makes it somewhat bad for games.
Somehow the game makers got stuck in the 32 bit era though, which means that if you have more than 4GB of ram, you won't have a problem.
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds like you just killed your own argument. As you said, games hardly ever use more than 4GB of RAM. 4GB of RAM is not "large amounts of RAM". Ram is so cheap now, and even insanely cheap and small machines like the Zotac Zbox computers will support up to 8GB. I really don't see how this could possibly be a problem for anybody who would want to play games enough to even care that it's a problem.
Re: (Score:1)
That's what swapping is for.
Re: (Score:2)
That will not help you if you run a 32-bit non-PAE kernel, like many people still do. (Apparently, Ubuntu still recommends the 32-bit version)
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds like another great reason not to use Ubuntu.
KDE still not required.... (Score:4, Informative)
Xfce allows the user to switch off compositing in the settings GUI or, more usefully for scripts and launchers, with a command:
Compositing off: "xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p /general/use_compositing -t bool -s false" /general/use_compositing -t bool -s true"
Compositing on: "xfconf-query -c xfwm4 -p
A KDE dev pretending that Gnome 3 or Unity are the only other options makes him seem slightly desperate way.
Re: (Score:2)
A KDE dev pretending that Gnome 3 or Unity are the only other options makes him seem slightly desperate way.
There are dozens of desktop alternatives for GNU/Linux/*BSD/etc. That a fan of one of the dozens of minor ones is complaining that a KDE dev only mentioned the major alternatives and didn't mention his favorite of the dozens of others makes him seem slightly butthurt...
Re: (Score:1)
I don't care because I have good hardware..
What is that crazy idea Linux should only be run on old, slow and memory low systems?
KDE is more than fast enough on a i3-2100 with 4Gb memory, and gaming is fast enough even with my old and trusty GTX285..
If you do not like the plasma desktop it is easy to switch to a more "classic" desktop, by simply right-click in the desktop anywhere, choose "desktop settings", and set the "activities" to "folder view". Simple and effective..
You can switch off compositing bling
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
1. He pretends nothing of the sort.
2. KDE requires no such modification.
3. A complete gentleman, Graesslin devotes an entire closing paragraph to not criticizing other projects for their choices.
Ride your strawman outta here.
Re: (Score:1)
Kde: shift + alt + f12
And you can switch between a plain wm behavior good for intensive games, or fancy but configurable effects.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I think that makes a good point: appeal to self/other developers being prioritized to the detriment of actual or potential users is a failing that is quite common, and those who do it are naturally enough completely blind to the issue.
Years ago I did use KDE. It could run nicely on the kind of normal hardware most of us have at home, the stuff we buy with our own money and don't throw out after a year. It was also OK on medium and small screens. But KDE4 made it painfully obvious that it was developed by
Re: (Score:2)
This made me smile. : ) I encounter that sort of thing in software too much!
Re: (Score:3)
Other solutions:
http://linux.koolsolutions.com/2009/01/07/howto-tell-apt-get-not-to-install-recommends-packages-in-debian-linux/ [koolsolutions.com]
Compositing is slow? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
With nvidia, any compositing at all halves framerate.
Without nvidia, forget gaming on linux.
Re: (Score:2)
Separate X > any of the above (Score:1)
IMO, the best "Linux gaming solution" is: any desktop environment you like + separate X server for games. This solution may be very handy in situations such as game hang, and it can compensate lack of Alt+Tab functionality.
Re:Separate X any of the above (Score:2)
Is there an easy way to start a new X server in a separate control-alt-F*?
Re: (Score:3)
startx -- :1
Assuming you're happy to use the locally connected display, and your local X server isn't running on :1. startx -- makes all the opts on the right-hand-side of the -- get passed on to X binary verbatim. See man X
Re: (Score:2)
The easy way was previously replied, the robust way is this:
change etc/init/tty4.conf to something like this:
start on runlevel [2345] /bin/openvt -f -w -c 4 -- su - -- username -l -c "/usr/bin/startx -- :4 -config xorg.conf -layout DefaultLayout -depth 24 -dpi 96 -nolisten tcp vt10"
stop on runlevel [!2345]
emits starting-tty4
script
# startx -- -logverbose 6
exec
end script
Above will start X using a specific conf, layout, dpi, ... Then use home/username/.xinitrc to launch and manipulate the desired app:
aTTY=`
Actually the problem is already fixed in compiz (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
But only in fullscreen? In KDE I have my games or whatever, let's say Minecraft, and a few extra windows, and it runs very well. In anything else with compositing, it almost halves its FPS. Even if I am playing a game I might need to not be isolated from my system or IM windows. And I think I am not the only one doing that.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Never tried on W8, but surely you're aware of http://windows.kde.org/ [kde.org]?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
And I fail at reading the original post. Sorry.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
heh yea, I rather spend time using my computer rather than configuring it
And the flamewar continues (Score:2)
That's why I use a distro that doesn't relocate config files and won't automaticaly replace them once I make a change.
Re:0.1% of users know what "Compositing" is (Score:5, Funny)
For those who don't know, compositing is when you throw your food scraps and lawn clippings in the green bin.
Re: (Score:2)
But 99.9% of game developers know what "Composting" is, and the users never have to know what it is. This will not be one of the reasons if 2013 is not the Year of Linux Desktop.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, sadly this is one of those things that work much better on Windows than OS X or any Linux setup I've tried (Sure, if you want to get picky about it you could write your own patches to deal with this, perhaps even introducing a new abstraction layer, but for an average user this is hardly an option).
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly. If the ability to play games requires you to use a certain desktop, or switch off features of your OS, something is terribly wrong. I haven't done anything like that since I used to kill explorer.exe to free enough RAM for Half-Life, nearly 15 years ago.
Fortunately, compositing provides no useful features whatsoever and so nothing of value is lost by using a window manager that simply does not support it.
Re: (Score:2)
It makes my DE faster, and saves battery power at my laptop. But it makes no difference while running a full-screen game, so turning it off at this time won't be a problem at all.
Also, turning compositing off doesn't cripple multitasking. It just changes the way the DE draws the screen.
Re: (Score:2)
Why is your DE so slow that it needs to be faster? I can switch between windows, and desktops full of windows, faster than my eyes can react.
Re: (Score:2)
Somehow, without hardware acceleration my laptop takes a few ms to show, resize or move a window. It's not a long time, it doesn't slow me down, but it's noticeable.
That may be because the laptop is old (I'm planning to upgrade into a faster tablet + keyboard), because I'm using too many effects, or maybe even because there are too many thing running in it.
Re: (Score:2)