Performance issue with X11

[Patrick O'Callaghan]

On Mon, 2008-10-20 at 18:40 -0430, Patrick O'Callaghan wrote: 
> I've recently noted that window behaviour is sluggish, particularly
> noticeable in scrolling, drawing dialog alerts and switching desktops.
> 
> A couple of months ago I ran glxgears and got an average of 750 fps. Now
> it's 150, i.e. 20% of what it was. The same result occurs under KDE and
> Gnome.
> 
> I'm on F9 with KDE 4.1.2 and Xorg-xll-* updated from
> updates-testing-newkey. The machine is a 64-bit Core 2 Duo with 2GB RAM
> and an Intel 965 video chipset (i810 driver) on an Intel mobo. The
> display is a 19" LCD in landscape mode, 1440x900 resolution. Desktop
> effects are turned off.
> 
> I'm also seeing repainting errors, specifically when moving a window
> against the desktop background, which doesn't repaint until I click on
> it.

Full disclosure: before running glxgears I had KDE Desktop Effects
partially enabled. On disabling them the sluggishness in scrolling,
switching desktops etc. improved markedly. I only noticed this after
sending my original post.

However the glxgears test was run with DE *disabled*.

Also, the background repainting bug is still there in KDE, but not in
Gnome, i.e. it's likely to be a KDE issue.

poc