[SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

wang0109 · 2012-05-15 07:21:15

Hi,

I recently did a full upgrade with pacman -Syu and now my Xorg process has some strange high CPU usage, making my terminal typing quite laggy.

At first I thought was the video driver, I am using xf86-video-intel. I tried re-install the driver and it doesn't work.

So I borrowed a Nvidia card from another machine and switched to Nvidia drivers. I can successfully boot it up. But the CPU usage for Xorg is still very high.

Then I accidentally discovered that when I change my terminal font ( gnome-terminal -> profiles ) to "Monospace", the Xorg CPU usage is down to normal !

A few tests later, I concluded that whenever I use a bitmap font like "Terminus", "Fixed", the Xorg will go up its CPU dramatically.

Here's how I do test:

In Gnome-terminal, do a "top", and keep pressing the "enter" key to refresh. With "Monospace" it's very fast, with "Fixed" it's very laggy and can show the CPU usage of "Xorg" from 90% to even above 100%.

Any ideas ?!!

Last edited by wang0109 (2012-05-15 09:28:08)

wang0109 · 2012-05-15 07:48:54

Sorry guys, I was using xfce-terminal, not gnome-terminal. I guess I finally found what could be the issue:
https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/29262

wang0109 · 2012-05-15 08:05:14

Strange that xfce-terminal and terminator both have the same issue, I am switching to gnome-terminal for now.

hyperreal_logic · 2012-05-15 09:08:30

Hello. I am running Fluxbox and using lxterminal. The other night, I "trans-graded" my Arch into Parabola GNU/Linux, installing all the libre software and what not. Shortly thereafter, Conky was showing an unusually high CPU usage for X. I restart Fluxbox, but then it became very laggy. So I wondered if it could be fbautostart in my .fluxbox/startup file, so I went and disabled it, rebooted my machine, and found that the Fluxbox style I was using was broken and caused Fluxbox to not load properly at startup. I changed the style and now everything is back to normal. So it may have been either the fbautostart program, the Fluxbox style I was using (tron_blue), or both that caused the high CPU usage. Are you by any chance running Fluxbox on your Arch system? Most interesting is that it seemed to happen for both of us after upgrading (or "trans-grading") software.

EDIT: By the way, I was also using Terminus as my lxterminal font. In fact, I am still using it with no CPU usage issues. It seems that my issue is not really the same as yours, though they may be remotely related.

Last edited by hyperreal_logic (2012-05-15 09:10:35)

wang0109 · 2012-05-15 09:24:11

Thanks for the reply, I am running xfce default and not Fluxbox.

I've resolved the problem ( at least on my machine ) and allow me to a little summary ( and correct myself ):

1. I run an intel i3 machine with intel integrated graphics using xf86-video-intel. Every is fine and I was using xrandr to do a dual monitor setup.
2. I upgraded using pacman -Syu which I have put in a daily cronjob. The kernel updated, and a bunch of others.
3. Today I rebooted the machine to refresh the kernel, and noticed that my terminal ( using terminator ) is very very slow ( in a 1920x1080 monitor with vim editing a lot of code ).
4. The X process is strangely taking a lot more of CPU than expected.
5. Reinstalled intel driver, doesn't work. *Borrowed a Nvidia card GT240* Tried extra/nvidia , doesn't work.
6. Found that terminal with the bitmap font is slow, but not others.
7. *Mistakenly* thought it was xfce-terminal issue after reading https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/29262
8. The "gnome-terminal" suffers the same problem, which I overlooked because I launched a small window of it,not fullscreen. The refresh of top in it is faster than a full screen terminal.
9. I begin looking at the cairo bug mentioned in the bug report, and eventually notices the nvidia driver version. Current stock version is 295, but AUR version is 302
10. http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux-disp … river.html specificially says: "Improved rendering performance for RENDER bitmap text."
11. I installed nvidia-beta from AUR using packer, and reboot.
12. I used nvidia-settings "TwinView" to setup the dual monitor again.

Works ! yeah!

Last edited by wang0109 (2012-05-15 09:26:19)

zen_guerrilla · 2012-05-15 12:00:53

I can confirm that too. Using gvim & urxvt with Terminus. nvidia-beta solved the problem.

Miblo · 2012-05-29 21:29:21

hyperreal_logic wrote:

…found that the Fluxbox style I was using was broken and caused Fluxbox to not load properly at startup. I changed the style and now everything is back to normal. So it may have been either the fbautostart program, the Fluxbox style I was using (tron_blue), or both that caused the high CPU usage.

Good catch, hyperreal! I've just checked my ~/.fluxbox/log and found that fluxbox is failing to read a number of theme items. Our issue is different from wang0109's, but I just wanted to thank you (in advance, hoping that it does actually solve my problem).

shining_grin · 2012-06-02 04:42:30

Many many thanks guys! I had the same problem (I use xfce, xfce-terminal and awesome and I noticed that scrolling text on vim was taking 60-80% of my cpu).
I tried and solved the problem installing cairo-ubuntu-xcb from aur which is at version 1.10 as noted in the bug report.
Thank you!!

Arch Linux

#1 2012-05-15 07:21:15

[SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#2 2012-05-15 07:48:54

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#3 2012-05-15 08:05:14

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#4 2012-05-15 09:08:30

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#5 2012-05-15 09:24:11

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#6 2012-05-15 12:00:53

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#7 2012-05-29 21:29:21

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

#8 2012-06-02 04:42:30

Re: [SOLVED] Strange Xorg high CPU usage

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