[SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

Toxcity · 2012-02-26 12:33:12

Good afternoon everyone!

Been trying to tackle this problem for a while. Basically, I get screen tearing under Openbox and while watching videos/movies in VLC.
I'm running the latest CK edition of the Nvidia drivers on a GTX 460.

I use compton (fork of xcompmgr) for composition but still get tearing without it. There seems to be a few posts about this but not a single one helps.

I would love smooth video and desktop.

Thanks in advance!

Last edited by Toxcity (2012-02-26 14:33:01)

Gusar · 2012-02-26 12:52:56

You won't get rid of tearing with compton. It's just how it is, it's a downside of xrender-based compositors. Too bad, compton would be quite awesome otherwise.

You should not get tearing without compton, so it's possible VLC is doing something screwy. Check with nvidia-settings that vsync is turned on for xv. Then try a different player and/or a different output method in VLC.

Last edited by Gusar (2012-02-26 12:54:43)

Toxcity · 2012-02-26 13:01:04

Where's the option to turn on vsync for xv? I have every "sync to vblank" enabled. What should I turn the VLC video output to so it takes advantage of that option?

So there is no way to have composition without tearing under Openbox? Hmmm

Edit: Compton is the issue. This is getting silly, there seems to be no way to get simple eye candy without compromise somewhere. There should not be compromise!! How do I take advantage of my hardware supply pretty composition on my Openbox desktop? Windows can do it why can't Openbox?!

Edit2: Doesn't seem to be a way to use composition and not get tearing so I have decided to sacrifice the eye candy for smooth video. Thanks for the help mate!

Last edited by Toxcity (2012-02-26 14:32:46)

David Batson · 2012-02-26 15:40:18

I use Compiz to eliminate tearing in XFCE and KDE. I get tearing when I don't use Compiz.

Gusar · 2012-02-26 15:45:23

Yeah, Compiz is an opengl compositor, it can properly vsync. But if you go with Compiz, you lose the lightness of Openbox and it's awesome features (pipe menus FTW! ). I know there's compiz-boxmenu, but if I look at it's dependencies, and combined with the whole Compiz...

Toxcity · 2012-02-26 15:54:18

It's a pain. Do you think one day we will have some sort of Opengl option for Openbox? Would be nice.

PReP · 2012-02-27 16:27:50

mplayer or vlc --> opengl output (1 or 2 or such) renderer -> nvidia option sync to vblank.

or; have you tried how vdpau output works with your card?

Otherwize, there should be synchro-settings in the video player, i know mplayer has them atleast,
if going XV or such. (because it believe the nvidia sync to vblank is for GL)

Gusar · 2012-02-27 16:50:45

@PReP, no matter how much you play with those settings, you won't get rid of tearing. xrender simply doesn't provide vsync. An opengl compositor is the only way. But there is no simple, standalone opengl compositor. There's just Compiz, Kwin and Mutter, which are combined compositor/window manager. Ok, there's dcompmgr, but it hasn't seen development since 2008, and when I tried it, it didn't work very well.

David Batson · 2012-02-27 18:00:56

On the same hardware, even kwin did not eliminate video tearing for me in Mageia KDE. Perhaps a configuration issue?

I did get mutter vsync to work in Fedora 16 Gnome 3 by putting the following environment variable in /etc/environment

CLUTTER_PAINT=disable-clipped-redraws:disable-culling

https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=657071#c2

Toxcity · 2012-02-27 21:23:29

For now I have just left composition off. Not only has tearing stopped in all my videos but the screen seems far clearer. Text is sharper and icons are crisp.

It's a real shame that a stand alone Opengl rendered composite manager hasn't been developed yet, also kinda surprising! Hardware is getting better and better, we have huge amounts of memory so it's quite easy to spare a little for composition even on a netbook.

DSpider · 2012-02-28 08:05:15

Well, there's wayland, which supposedly comes with true transparency and compositing, but AFAIK it's under heavy development right now, and it needs KMS (meaning you'll have to use nouveau). According to wikipedia, "This is a simpler and more efficient approach than using a compositing window manager with the X Window System."

Edit: It also says there the stable version was released 16 days ago (9 February 2012). Hmm, interesting.
ArchWiki article here: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Wayland

Last edited by DSpider (2012-02-28 08:08:34)

PReP · 2012-02-28 10:43:54

Gusar wrote:

@PReP, no matter how much you play with those settings, you won't get rid of tearing. xrender simply doesn't provide vsync. An opengl compositor is the only way. But there is no simple, standalone opengl compositor. There's just Compiz, Kwin and Mutter, which are combined compositor/window manager. Ok, there's dcompmgr, but it hasn't seen development since 2008, and when I tried it, it didn't work very well.

That might be true for xrender, but i were aiming at the nvidia driver vsync for GL, and setting OpenGL as output renderer in the video player.

But, anyways, it's nice that the poster got his problem solved in any fashion.

Arch Linux

#1 2012-02-26 12:33:12

[SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#2 2012-02-26 12:52:56

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#3 2012-02-26 13:01:04

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#4 2012-02-26 15:40:18

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#5 2012-02-26 15:45:23

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#6 2012-02-26 15:54:18

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#7 2012-02-27 16:27:50

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#8 2012-02-27 16:50:45

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#9 2012-02-27 18:00:56

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#10 2012-02-27 21:23:29

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#11 2012-02-28 08:05:15

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

#12 2012-02-28 10:43:54

Re: [SOLVED] Screen tearing - Openbox

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