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#1 2020-07-15 16:44:49

scippie
Member
Registered: 2019-06-07
Posts: 129

Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

It took me a while to realize it, but it seems that Steam has issues with the i3 window manager: sometimes, even when simply running in the background (icon in the tray only), it will stall my system, not using CPU or IO or things like that, but just making it hang for a while and making other applications (including i3 workspace switching) slow and lag. Stopping Steam and starting it again will solve this. It probably depends on what I have been doing in the Steam client, but I have made myself accustomed with starting games from the tray because by not using the client as much, I notice less troubles.

There's a game called Ultimate Racing 2D on Steam and I bought it. It worked fine yesterday but today there doesn't seem to be a way to get it started. After several tries and reboots I managed to start it once but no more after that.

Today I installed Cinnamon to see if there's a difference, and WHAT a big difference. Steam feels smoother, Ultimate Racing 2D starts without issues, ...

I am using the NVidia GPU with the proprietary drivers in both environments. I have an Intel GPU too, but I disabled it.

I really love i3 however, so I would like to find out if there is a way to fix it. I have already looked at https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/St … leshooting but didn't really find anything that helped, although I may have missed something of course.

Any ideas?

Last edited by scippie (2020-07-15 17:57:16)

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#2 2020-07-16 10:48:57

Lone_Wolf
Member
From: Netherlands, Europe
Registered: 2005-10-04
Posts: 11,868

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

Cinnamon uses a compositing window manager (muffin) , i3 doesn't .

I suggest you try with openbox (also a non-compositing WM ) to verify whether compositing does play a role.

Last edited by Lone_Wolf (2020-07-16 10:49:34)


Disliking systemd intensely, but not satisfied with alternatives so focusing on taming systemd.


(A works at time B)  && (time C > time B ) ≠  (A works at time C)

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#3 2020-07-17 08:48:08

scippie
Member
Registered: 2019-06-07
Posts: 129

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

Lone_Wolf wrote:

Cinnamon uses a compositing window manager (muffin) , i3 doesn't .
I suggest you try with openbox (also a non-compositing WM ) to verify whether compositing does play a role.

I seem to have the same issues with openbox, indeed.

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#4 2020-07-17 10:47:53

Skunky
Member
Registered: 2018-01-25
Posts: 230

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

Did you click the "X" in the steam window?

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#5 2020-07-17 11:12:42

scippie
Member
Registered: 2019-06-07
Posts: 129

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

Skunky wrote:

Did you click the "X" in the steam window?

I will certainly have done that from time to time, why?
I know that doesn't really exit Steam but keeps it in the background, which is what I want so I have the chat with my friends.
And even if that would be the solution... I have noticed that Steam may also start lagging and using lots of CPU while playing a game.

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#6 2020-07-17 11:42:17

scippie
Member
Registered: 2019-06-07
Posts: 129

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

To add: I even noticed sometimes that having used (or during use of) the client and not closing it, will suddenly make it use up to 2 CPU cores at 100% making my fan go wild. Clicking the "X" will make that stop, and then I can open it again to continue with whatever I was doing. Video's in the store are terribly choppy too, always, while they play flawlessly in Firefox.
Those are things I can deal with, but when it starts halting my system, that's terrible.

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#7 2020-07-17 11:44:47

Lone_Wolf
Member
From: Netherlands, Europe
Registered: 2005-10-04
Posts: 11,868

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Xorg#Composite


Try installing/configuring picom .


Disliking systemd intensely, but not satisfied with alternatives so focusing on taming systemd.


(A works at time B)  && (time C > time B ) ≠  (A works at time C)

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#8 2020-07-17 18:35:21

scippie
Member
Registered: 2019-06-07
Posts: 129

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

Lone_Wolf wrote:

Try installing/configuring picom .

I used picom a couple of months ago to add some fading effect between the workspaces. It gave terrible performance (frameskips), with and without the --vsync setting (without it also gave jagged video output when watching video).
I just tried it again without any effects enabled, it still gave the same bad performance...

I do have a very performant computer however, so I don't get why it runs so badly.
It's a BTO laptop with a 8-core threaded 5Ghz intel i9 processor and an nvidia rtx 2070 mobile video card on a 4K OLED screen, 32GB memory (and nvidia is enabled, glxinfo says so and the difference is huge if it is disabled).

Last edited by scippie (2020-07-18 10:54:58)

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#9 2020-07-17 18:38:10

scippie
Member
Registered: 2019-06-07
Posts: 129

Re: Issues with Steam, some games on Steam and the i3 window manager

By the way, I am not saying that it's not my fault of course. I haven't been using Arch and Linux in general that long. If there are things I could share with you guys so that you may pinpoint why my system is performing like this, please say so!

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