Arch Linux

emil12543

Member

Registered: 2016-05-05

Posts: 15

From XFCE4 to GNOME3

Hello! I am new in the forum and I am not sure that the topic doesn't exists yet. I have installed Arch Linux with XFCE4 as Desktop Environment but I noticed that the system with enabled Desktop Environment spends a lot of RAM. So I considered to move from XFCE4 to Gnome3. I've tried to stop slim.service and enable gdm.service but when I did this the desktop was dark blank. I've checked the status of the gdm.service but nothing was wrong. Also I changed .xinitrc file to start gnome session but nothing had happened. Is it possible to do it or I need a new installation? Thanks in advance!

FlowIt

Member

Registered: 2014-10-25

Posts: 239

Re: From XFCE4 to GNOME3

First of all: Switching to Gnome3 will only increase your RAM consumption. If you want a DE even lighter than Xfce you could look at lxde, enlightenment or something individually built on openbox etc.
You can install xfce and Gnome in parallel and use the display manager to switch between them. In this case you do not even need an xinitrc. Disabling/stopping your current display manager will kill the X session, so you better do this from another tty. It should be enough to do

systemctl disable slim.service && systemctl enable gdm.service

Last edited by FlowIt (2016-05-05 15:25:57)

emil12543

Member

Registered: 2016-05-05

Posts: 15

Re: From XFCE4 to GNOME3

Again the desktop is only black blank.

May 05 18:29:23 yemt systemd[1]: Started GNOME Display Manager.
May 05 18:29:30 yemt gdm[381]: Child process -591 was already dead.
May 05 18:29:30 yemt gdm[381]: Child process 580 was already dead.
May 05 18:29:30 yemt gdm[381]: Unable to kill session worker process
May 05 18:29:31 yemt gdm[381]: GdmDisplay: display lasted 0.324879 seconds
May 05 18:29:31 yemt gdm[381]: Child process -626 was already dead.
May 05 18:29:31 yemt gdm[381]: Child process 611 was already dead.
May 05 18:29:31 yemt gdm[381]: Unable to kill session worker process

Last edited by emil12543 (2016-05-05 15:38:56)

FlowIt

Member

Registered: 2014-10-25

Posts: 239

Re: From XFCE4 to GNOME3

There are quite a few threads here that describe similar problems/error messages.
Good starting points are: Which graphics driver(s) are you using? Are you trying to start an X or Wayland session? Have you tried disabling both slim and gdm and startx manually? Was slim working? Then you could start gnome from slim until the problems with gdm are resolved.