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Is ubuntu's windowing/redrawing slower than windows? Is this X, or Gnome?

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urlwolf:
I find the following on the ubuntu 9.10 default install:


* changing tabs in FF takes 1 second (!). I posted about it here
*
* alt-tab takes about a second. I'm running with the minimum 'special effects' possible.
*
* Dragging windows around is less snappy than in windows. More like osX (i.e., perceptible delay in some operations)
Is ubuntu's windowing/redrawing slower than windows? Is this X, or Gnome?
Granted, this is a 2yr old laptop (Dell 1720) but still. Somehow, I was expecting more?

Innuendo:
Your problem(s) might be something as simple as you having crummy Linux video card drivers. To compound the problem laptops, especially older ones, are infamous for having craptacular video chipsets.

f0dder:
Your problems sounds most like crummy video drivers - I do find linux applications in general to feel more "laggy" than Windows, though. Not sure if it's because of X itself or the particular graphics toolkits used, but it's been noticeable on all linux distros I've tried (gnome, KDE as well as XFCE based).

40hz:
X has a huge amount to do with it. It's client/server design and overhead makes it intrinsically slower.

DRI/DRI2 has the potential improve things bypassing the server model and allowing for direct access to video hardware. But it will be a while before it's fully worked out and a bigger selection of drivers becomes available.

urlwolf:
Interesting... I have the latest nvidia drivers and the card is an ok one GForce 8400M GS, 128 mb. I have used linux/other unixes (even old ones, like irix) and I don't remember performance being this laggy. I've read that nvidia drivers should be faster/moer fine-tuned than the FOSS ones.

Yes, X doesn't sound like the fastest way of doing things, but it's being around for years now, and it was usable. Which alt+tab taking a second is not! This might be gnome trying to do thumbnails of the windows in alt+tab...

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