Compiz refresh rate gets choppy and Compiz cannot be re-initialized

[larko320]

Hi, I am using Linux Mint 20.3 XFCE. After I have had the Mint session running for too many days (about a week) Compiz starts skipping frames. All the animations, 3D and 2D are drawn at very low fps. I tried using compiz --replace & disown in the terminal and the it appears to do something by blanking out momentarily and then returning to the session, but none of the bindkeys work--keyboard or mouse.

Regarding the choppy fps, I am using an old i3 with on-board GPU and 16G RAM that can barely handle high definition. Are there any particular settings in Compiz I should try, such as any under the OpenGL General tab or Composite General tab? To be clear, the fps is normally okay. It's just after so long it becomes choppy. If something is hogging the GPU I have no idea what, because there are no videos playing or 3D engines running. The refresh rate per Composite General tab is 60fps. I know I need a newer and more powerful machine but it does perform well most of the time and I run the same programs consistently whether or not it's performing. It seems like its state of operation somehow gets corrupted at some point.

Regarding compiz --replace & disown not working and losing the bindkeys, how can we begin to debug this? I am not interested in workarounds or adding buttons or going to another menu. I need this command to work from the terminal or script and would prefer to be able to run a Linux session indefinitely with no corruption of Compiz's state of operation.

Thanks.

[Hoser Rob]

Well, first be warned that Compiz is a notorious bug fest. No desktop environment has used it as a default window manager for years, which should tell you something. You may have noticed that many compiz articles on the web are pretty old, and Linux lacks backwards compatibility so a lot of old solutions don't work now.

If you're wondering what OpenGL etc settings should be used you need to post more system info. Copy/paste the complete text output of

Code: Select all

inxi -Fxxxpmrz

run in the terminal and wrap it in <code> tags. An old GPU that has problems with HD video may not have great OpenGL etc support that may be needed in this application.

Myself, I always use the default window manager of whatever desktop environment I'm using. When I used Xfce that was Xfwm. If I don't think the default WM is good enough why should I be using the DE?