Flash fullscreen playback choppy, with screen tearing

[Giggity]

So I just installed Mint 11 64bit, on my compaq cq60-228us laptop, 2.00 GHz AMD Athlon X2 QL-62 Dual-Core Processor, NVIDIA GeForce 8200M, 4 gigs of ram. I love it so far except flash videos are not playing well, they are choppy and I have screen tearing in fast scenes during full screen playing. I have tried many different sites like hulu and youtube but it's all the same. I also tried opera, firefox, and chrome, but they are all the same. I also tried a DVD and the video play back was perfect on that, so it seems to be a problem only in flash. I have flash 11.0.1.152 installed, i originally had the mint flash plugin but some sites were not working with it so I installed the adobe-flashplugin, in the software manager. I tried to uninstall the mint flash plugin to see if that would fix it but it didn't help. I have also tried to disable hardware acceleration by right clicking the video but that also didn't help. I also tried switching to ver. 173 of the nvidia drivers, from the current version, and that didn't help either. Can anyone here help me, I tried searching but none of the fixes I found worked, I know the computer is fast enough to play flash full screen and I don't want to have to use windows for streaming videos. I also really don't want to have to download videos to watch them in another player.

[richyrich]

Question : Are you still using the buggy version of compiz that came with Mint 11 / Natty ? If so, you may want to consider the Mint 11 downgrade compiz tutorial.

Source : Release Notes for Linux Mint 11

[Giggity]

I tried the downgrade, and I think it helped with the choppiness, I am still having the screen tearing problems though.

[richyrich]

Hmm, what kernel are you running ? please copy/paste back here the output from this terminal command:

Code: Select all

inxi -v1

[Giggity]

System: Host john-Compaq-Presario-CQ60-Notebook-PC Kernel 2.6.38-8-generic x86_64 (64 bit) Distro Linux Mint 11 Katya
CPU: Dual core AMD Athlon QL-62 (-MCP-) clocked at 1000.00 MHz
Graphics: Card nVidia C77 [GeForce 8200M G] X.Org 1.10.1 Res: 1366x768@50.0hz
GLX Renderer GeForce 8200M G/PCI/SSE2 GLX Version 3.3.0 NVIDIA 270.41.06
Disks: HDD Total Size: 320.1GB (1.9% used)
Info: Processes 149 Uptime 2:06 Memory 517.9/3709.0MB Client Shell inxi 1.4.23

[richyrich]

This is only a suggestion, and can and is able to sometimes cause big problems. So please weigh your choices carefully. (and a fresh backup of your stuff)
The 38.8 kernel has been a known problem for many, including me personally. Upgrades are available. There is a 38.10 or higher available for a proper and easy install through Mint Update.

Log in to Mint Update, go to Edit -> Preferences -> Levels tab, and check the Visible box only for levels 4 and 5. Close the Preferences window, and be sure to hit the Refresh button. You should now see new updates available, go through them, the latest available kernel should also be in the list. I suggest that you use the Select All button (same as a dist-upgrade), and then the Install button. Close when completed.
Since the kernel has changed, and possibly some important xorg updates, I suggest a cold reboot. (complete shut down, wait a few minutes, then start up again)

Warning : When being installed, the new kernel is compiled with your required modules and drivers. Some times you will need to use the Hardware Drivers app to re-install the proprietary nvidia drivers. (I am confident you will not need to do this). But you have been warned.

Good luck whatever you decide, and keep us informed of your progress, or if you have a question.
regards, richy

[Giggity]

I upgraded the kernel to 2.6.38-12 and rebooted but I still have the same problem with the screen tearing...

[richyrich]

last suggestion I have, is that you try turning off hardware acceleration in the Flash settings. Might help ?

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Flash

[Giggity]

Disable it by right clicking on a video and unchecking hardware acceleration? I have tried that and it didn't help...

[Giggity]

Anyone have any other ideas, this is really getting annoying, and I hate to go back to windows. I have heard that there are less problems with the 32bit version of linux and flash, should I just start from a fresh install of mint 11 32bit? How much of a performance loss would I have with everything else using a 32bit version?

[richyrich]

Your nvidia card, 8200M or 8200M G ?

Code: Select all

inxi -Gx

[Giggity]

Looks like it is a 8200M G;
Graphics: Card nVidia C77 [GeForce 8200M G] X.Org 1.10.1 Res: 1366x768@50.0hz
GLX Renderer GeForce 8200M G/PCI/SSE2 GLX Version 3.3.0 NVIDIA 270.41.06 Direct Rendering Yes

[richyrich]

Your decision . . good luck whatever you decide.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/linux-display-amd64-285.05.09-driver.html

Installation instructions: Once you have downloaded the driver, * change to the directory containing the driver package and install the driver by running, as root, sh ./NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-285.05.09.run

One of the last installation steps will offer to update your X configuration file. Either accept that offer, edit your X configuration file manually so that the NVIDIA X driver will be used, or run nvidia-xconfig

* - I suggest you reboot , hold down the Shift key at startup to show the grub menu, choose Recovery Mode, and choose root console, log in with your sudo password, then you can cd (change directories) to where the run file is located.