On Mon, Jun 16, 2008 at 06:43:49PM +0200, Dag Wieers wrote: > On Sun, 15 Jun 2008, fred smith wrote: > > >I finally tried enabling the desktop effects yesterday. I'm using an old > >Nvidia card (GeForce 4 MX440) with, of course, Nvidia's drivers. this is > >on a fully updated Centos 5 system. > > > >Enabling from the gnome menu doesn't exactly work compltely, one needs to > >google around a bit to find out the remaining magic incantations to make > >it fully work. So, I've done that and it's working. > > > >Issues: > >1. I notice that the text in the bar at the top of each window appears to > >be > >a different font, and it is outlined in black. Is there any way to tweak > >that setting? > >2. If I have a window that is slid partially off the edge of an individual > >desktop it now oveerlaps the edge of the one "next" to it, when it never > >did before. Not sure if I like that or not, is there any way to change > >that behavior should I decide I don't like it? > >3. I have (and always have had) the panel settings set to "autohide". I > >now notice that it sometimes does not hide itself until I explicitly > >click in an empty part of the panel, then somewhere else on the desktop. > >Anyone know if there's a way to resovle this? > > > >Question: > >Should I decide I want to revert to the way it was before I enabled these > >effects, how would I go about that? there is no "disable" button on the > >gnome menu, only the "enable" button. I know how to un-do the changes I > >made manually in the xorg.conf file, but no idea how to undo whatever it > >is that the "enable desktop effects" button does. Clues would be > >appreciated. > Dag, thanks for the reply! > Not sure if this is helpful to you, but here is my experience: > > I have an older/cheaper onboard nvidia in my mediacenter. It was hooked up > to a 1920x1200 TFT screen. compiz was terribly slow and play video's did > not work with some error message. > > I tried both the nvidia drivers as well as the Open Source nv driver and > was disappointed, blamed the old/cheap nvidia and the high resolution as > the cause for not being able to use compiz. > > Initially I also had problems with display-errors that were attributed to > a very simple fix described here: > > http://wiki.centos.org/TipsAndTricks/Compiz > > I finally found that by increasing the video memory size in the BIOS from > 32MB to 128MB (system was upgraded from 512MB to 1536MB) compiz worked > very fast and the video-overlay/XV problems were gone. > > My advice would be: > > - Use the nvidia driver (we have dkms-enabled packages in RPMforge) I'm using a driver I got directly from Nvidia. Are you saying that some of the re-packaged nvidia drivers are better (in other ways than that they make use of the distro's packaging, I mean)? > - Look at the tips in the wiki for compiz I think I already did but I'll go check again in case I missed something. I assume you mean the Centos wiki... > - Increase the Video memory size in the BIOS to at least 128MB Sorry, no can do. It's a dedicated card with 64MB. I'm thinking of picking up something less obsolete, though. I probably ought to do it soon, as it looks like AGP cards are now being relegated to the low-end and it's probably getting worse as time moves on. My display is "only" 1280x1024, so that 64 megs may not be too terrible a limitation. performance isn't a big issue (except for resizing windows which sometimes is fairly painful--I read somewhere else (possibly on compiz' own site) that this is due to something other than compiz but right now I don't remember the details.) I can rotate the cube quickly and easily, and the jello windows jiggle nicely, assuming one likes jiggly windows. > > And let me add that last point to the wiki, so people can find it there. > -- > -- dag wieers, dag at centos.org, http://dag.wieers.com/ -- > [Any errors in spelling, tact or fact are transmission errors] -- ---- Fred Smith -- fredex at fcshome.stoneham.ma.us ----------------------------- "For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart." ---------------------------- Hebrews 4:12 (niv) ------------------------------ -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 189 bytes Desc: not available URL: <http://lists.centos.org/pipermail/centos/attachments/20080616/bc38d140/attachment-0004.sig>