Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

BruceJohnJennerLawso · 2014-11-12 18:42:28

Okay,

So I am creating a game in SFML that requires reasonably high frame rate, but the version compiled on #! seems to have its frame rate locked in at 60 FPS, which upon further digging appears to be caused by vsync being forced on by the graphics card, and it cant be turned off by SFML calls. The windows version of this program on the same machine does not do this, which apparently makes the issue related to graphics settings in my #! install?

How exactly can I configure my graphics card settings in #! to set this vsync setting off?

Last edited by BruceJohnJennerLawso (2014-11-13 17:09:07)

Head_on_a_Stick · 2014-11-12 18:50:32

What card & drivers are you using?

lspci -knn|grep -iA3 vga

In #! I think the vsync is set by compton -- have you tried killing it?

twoion · 2014-11-12 19:43:50

If you use to FOSS radeon driver, it will by default enable vsync. See here on how to disable vsync.

BruceJohnJennerLawso · 2014-11-12 20:12:37

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:

What card & drivers are you using?
lspci -knn|grep -iA3 vga
In #! I think the vsync is set by compton -- have you tried killing it?

output for that was

bruce@bruce:~$ lspci -knn|grep -iA3 vga
00:02.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: Intel Corporation 2nd Generation Core Processor Family Integrated Graphics Controller [8086:0116] (rev 09)
	Subsystem: Lenovo Device [17aa:21ed]
	Kernel driver in use: i915
00:16.0 Communication controller [0780]: Intel Corporation 6 Series/C200 Series Chipset Family MEI Controller #1 [8086:1c3a] (rev 04)

Ill check for compton. What exactly is it? (safe to kill?)

Last edited by BruceJohnJennerLawso (2014-11-12 20:13:55)

Head_on_a_Stick · 2014-11-12 20:15:58

BruceJohnJennerLawso wrote:

Ill check for compton. What exactly is it? (safe to kill?)

It's a compositor -- used to allow genuine transparency & suchlike.

I think it's called "cb-compositor" in the openbox autostart script if you want to remove it.

I use that driver & vsync is a nightmare in wheezy hmm

EDIT: if you want to keep using transpareny, check the flags used in the cb-compositor script -- I know from htop that one of them is a very basic vsync option.

Last edited by Head_on_a_Stick (2014-11-12 20:17:51)

ohnonot · 2014-11-13 10:32:13

disabling compton (cb-compositor) can take some load off your graphic card, but i don't it's causing your problem.

simply remove it from ~/.config/openbox/autostart.

pvsage · 2014-11-13 15:43:50

Ohnonot is correct; I'm pretty sure it is xserver-xorg-video-intel (specifically the i915 driver) that pins your video performance to the monitor refresh rate. Don't know if there is a proprietary Intel driver or if there's a workaround to get a faster video frame rate. (For what little it's worth, most users experience tearing if video isn't locked to the monitor's refresh rate.)

BruceJohnJennerLawso · 2014-11-13 15:54:49

ohnonot wrote:

disabling compton (cb-compositor) can take some load off your graphic card, but i don't it's causing your problem.
simply remove it from ~/.config/openbox/autostart.

Killing compton did not solve the problem, running

cb-compositor --edit

gave me this contents of compton.conf

compton.conf wrote:

# Shadow
shadow = true;
no-dnd-shadow = true;
no-dock-shadow = true;
#clear-shadow = true;
#shadow-radius = 7;
#shadow-offset-x = -7;
#shadow-offset-y = -7;
shadow-opacity = 0.4;
# shadow-red = 0.0;
# shadow-green = 0.0;
# shadow-blue = 0.0;
shadow-exclude = [ "n:e:xfce4-notifyd" ];
#shadow-ignore-shaped = false;
# Opacity
menu-opacity = 0.9;
#inactive-opacity = 0.8;
#frame-opacity = 0.7;
inactive-opacity-override = false;
alpha-step = 0.06;
# Fading
fading = false;
# fade-delta = 30;
fade-in-step = 0.03;
fade-out-step = 0.03;
# no-fading-openclose = true;
# Other
mark-wmwin-focused = true;
mark-ovredir-focused = true;
detect-rounded-corners = true;
detect-client-opacity = true;
#refresh-rate = 0;
#vsync = "none";
dbe = false;
paint-on-overlay = false;
sw-opti = false;
# Window type settings
wintypes:
{
tooltip = { fade = true; shadow = false; opacity = 0.85; };
};

BruceJohnJennerLawso · 2014-11-13 15:59:16

pvsage wrote:

Ohnonot is correct; I'm pretty sure it is xserver-xorg-video-intel (specifically the i915 driver) that pins your video performance to the monitor refresh rate. Don't know if there is a proprietary Intel driver or if there's a workaround to get a faster video frame rate. (For what little it's worth, most users experience tearing if video isn't locked to the monitor's refresh rate.)

Yaaa hmmm.

Problem is, Im developing this engine to be cross platform, and driver installation on Linux sounds like a lot of work to ask end users to do for just one application. Im suspecting that this might be better solved by multithreading the SFML window and the internal physics into separate threads so that the physics can run at a rate independent of the windows update.

Last edited by BruceJohnJennerLawso (2014-11-13 15:59:47)

BruceJohnJennerLawso · 2014-11-13 16:44:03

twoion wrote:

If you use to FOSS radeon driver, it will by default enable vsync. See here on how to disable vsync.

Ah, that worked, thankyou. No idea what the heck it does, but it does work.

Still hasnt fixed the problem with the engine sadly, but thats not a problem on this end, thanks for the help

Head_on_a_Stick · 2014-11-13 17:48:29

If you need to fiddle with your Intel card options, run:

driconf

The first tab ("Performance") has an option to disable vsync wink

ohnonot · 2014-11-14 23:18:05

BruceJohnJennerLawso wrote:

driver installation on Linux sounds like a lot of work to ask end users to do for just one application.

i think most linux users are used to it.
even those that use such unspeakables as zorin and ubuntu and mint.

CrunchBang Linux

SEARCH

#1 2014-11-12 18:42:28

Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#2 2014-11-12 18:50:32

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#3 2014-11-12 19:43:50

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#4 2014-11-12 20:12:37

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#5 2014-11-12 20:15:58

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#6 2014-11-13 10:32:13

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#7 2014-11-13 15:43:50

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#8 2014-11-13 15:54:49

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#9 2014-11-13 15:59:16

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#10 2014-11-13 16:44:03

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#11 2014-11-13 17:48:29

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

#12 2014-11-14 23:18:05

Re: Graphics card seems to be forcing vsync on in #! [solved]

Board footer