Cinnamon overall laggy performance: video playback, scrolling etc.

[f7d1ed]

So i have a freshly installed Linux Mint Cinnamon 18.3 on AMD X4 860K and AMD R7 250X pc with a 60Hz monitor.

Here's my lshw output
https://pastebin.com/cN2mFFE3

The problem i'm experiencing is quite global (i've tried Kubuntu 17.10,18.04 and Ubuntu 16.04,17.10). When something is moving on my screen (i.e. video, scrolling in firefox) everything seems choppy or laggy, with no tearing tho. I just get these micro-lags, framedrops or whatever, i don't know how to call them exactly. They affect only visuals, audio is stable. I have turned on "disable composition for fullscreen windows" option so in fullscreen mode everything is fine and dandy. When i press F11 in Firefox, non-fullscreen videos on youtube play smoothly, and scrolling is smooth too. Same thing happens in all media players like vlc or mpv, while theyre windowed they lag, when they're fullscreen, they don't. Most frustrating part is using a browser with this type of lags. I'm using Firefox with F11 and browser.fullscreen.autohide=false as a temporary workaround, but it's not a solution, it's like treating diarrhea with a cork. I've tried so many things, none of them seems to work. I like linux and i'd like to solve this problem, because it's a major deal-breaker. Any suggestions/ideas?

[Pjotr]

Please generate an overview of your system like this:
- Launch a terminal window (this is how to launch a terminal window);
- make the terminal window full screen, to avoid chopped lines;
- Copy/paste this command into the terminal:

Code: Select all

inxi -Fxz

(if you type: the letter F is a capital letter)

Press Enter.

Copy/paste the output in your next message.

[f7d1ed]

Code: Select all

System:    Host: kobato-chan Kernel: 4.13.0-36-generic x86_64 (64 bit gcc: 5.4.0)
           Desktop: Cinnamon 3.6.7 (Gtk 3.18.9-1ubuntu3.3) Distro: Linux Mint 18.3 Sylvia
Machine:   System: Gigabyte product: N/A
           Mobo: Gigabyte model: F2A55M-HD2 Bios: American Megatrends v: FGa date: 05/06/2015
CPU:       Quad core AMD Athlon X4 860K (-MCP-) cache: 8192 KB
           flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm) bmips: 29543
           clock speeds: max: 3700 MHz 1: 1700 MHz 2: 1700 MHz 3: 1700 MHz 4: 3000 MHz
Graphics:  Card: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Cape Verde XT [Radeon HD 7770/8760 / R7 250X] bus-ID: 01:00.0
           Display Server: X.Org 1.18.4 drivers: ati,radeon (unloaded: fbdev,vesa) Resolution: 1920x1080@60.00hz
           GLX Renderer: AMD CAPE VERDE (DRM 2.50.0 / 4.13.0-36-generic, LLVM 6.0.0)
           GLX Version: 3.1 Mesa 18.1.0-devel Direct Rendering: Yes
Audio:     Card-1 Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] FCH Azalia Controller driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 00:14.2
           Card-2 Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Cape Verde/Pitcairn HDMI Audio [Radeon HD 7700/7800 Series]
           driver: snd_hda_intel bus-ID: 01:00.1
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture v: k4.13.0-36-generic
Network:   Card: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet Controller
           driver: r8169 v: 2.3LK-NAPI port: d000 bus-ID: 02:00.0
           IF: enp2s0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 3000.6GB (20.2% used) ID-1: /dev/sda model: ST2000DM001 size: 2000.4GB
           ID-2: USB /dev/sdb model: M3_Portable size: 1000.2GB
Partition: ID-1: / size: 96G used: 7.2G (8%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda5
           ID-2: /home size: 1.3T used: 174G (15%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda2
           ID-3: swap-1 size: 8.91GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap dev: /dev/sda3
RAID:      No RAID devices: /proc/mdstat, md_mod kernel module present
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 20.6C mobo: N/A gpu: 38.0
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: N/A
Info:      Processes: 192 Uptime: 2:09 Memory: 1961.6/7933.4MB Init: systemd runlevel: 5 Gcc sys: 5.4.0
           Client: Shell (bash 4.3.481) inxi: 2.2.35

[Pjotr]

Disable all visual effects in Cinnamon:
https://sites.google.com/site/easylinux ... n-Cinnamon
(item 7.1, right column)

.... and while you're at it, apply some other safe speed tweaks mentioned on that web page, as well.

[f7d1ed]

Disable all visual effects in Cinnamon:

As i said in my post, i've tried a lot of things before asking for help. Disabling effects in cinnamon did'nt work.

[f7d1ed]

Someone?! Anyone?! I'm angry and desperate and i'm about to give up.

[Cosmo.]

As you have the same problem with 4 quite different desktops (KDE, Unity, Gnome, Cinnamon) the problem must be on a place further "down". Either the graphics driver (but I have no idea about AMD) or the kernel. Try to use kernel 4.4.latest.

[f7d1ed]

As you have the same problem with 4 quite different desktops (KDE, Unity, Gnome, Cinnamon) the problem must be on a place further "down". Either the graphics driver (but I have no idea about AMD) or the kernel. Try to use kernel 4.4.latest.

Yeah using AMD on linux suxx. I've tried amdgpu and radeon, same result. Trying a different kernel seems like a good idea. I'll post update later.

[f7d1ed]

Nope, changing kernel didn't help. But

Code: Select all

compiz --replace

removed the problem almost (chromium still lags a bit, but much less, and firefox works perfectly) completely, alongside the cinnamon panel tho, but nonetheless everything is smooth and lag free. Now i'm stumped completely. Can anyone tell me, why is this happening on every wm except for compiz?!

[f7d1ed]

Found out that Marco (Compton GPU compositor) does the trick too. So what's this all about can anyone tell me? What's the reason that some wm's work properly on my system and some don't.

[f7d1ed]

So my progress so far :
I tried every possible DE and WM. The only ones that work properly are marco(compton gpu compositor) and compiz, all others(xfwm4, kwin, mutter, muffin etc.) aren't working. I tried every available stable kernel (4.4, 4.8, 4.10, 4.11, 4,13, 4,15), no luck. Since old proprietary drivers(fglrx) arent't supporeted on latest ubuntu distros, i tried radeon and amdgpu, both of them work pretty much the same with the exception that amdgpu gives 10-20 more fps in cs:go on my old but faithful R7 250X.

[f7d1ed]

So any thoughts on this?