[SOLVED] Slow GUI (Compiz) on Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) using ATI Radeon X300 Mobility

I tried to install Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron) on my Dell Latitude D610 using the Wubi install method. Everything installs just fine, but I feel that the GUI is very slow. My Latitude D610 is using ATI Radeon X300 Mobility, which I think is not the best video card for Linux. Throughout my experience, Linux is more suited with the nVidia cards.

If anyone has every experienced running Windows XP using a VESA/default graphic card driver at high resolution, that’s how it feels. For those who are not familiar, it feels that the screen refreshes very slowly. For example, when I open up terminal, I can see rectangular dotted outline zooming out before the window pops out. After that it slowly draws the window decoration. Another example, when I scroll a web page on Firefox, the top part of the next page would be drawn first, then half a second later, the lower part is drawn. It is very annoying and almost rendering the GUI non-usable. FYI, the GUI is set with visual effects set to “None”.

I have tried to install linux-restricted-modules, xorg-driver-fglrx, xserver-xgl and the official ATI drivers but to no avail. I have run a check on the fglrxinfo and it’s fine. I even tried the glxgears, but only getting about 60fps.

I am still trying to fix the issue, and will update what I found out later on a separate blog entry.

UPDATE:Fixed HOWTO

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[SOLVED] vim or vi Works Differently After Upgrading to Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron)

After upgrading to Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron), my vim behaves very differently. For example, my vim has a .vimrc entry of

:syntax enable

When I tried to edit any text file, it will say that it can’t find the command. Also when I press down arrow while in edit mode, it will print out the letter ‘B’ (without quotes). To solve this issue, I have to install vim again by simply running the command

sudo apt-get install vim

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[SOLVED] VSFTPD Errror Message – 500 OOPS: cap_set_proc or vsf_sysutil_recv_peek

After upgrading my server from Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) to 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon), I got the following error messages “500 OOOPS: cap_set_proc” on some occassions and “500 OOPS: vsf_sysutil_recv_peek” on other occassions. After some googling, I found out that I need to install the module called “capability”.

To check if this module is already installed run the following command:

lsmod | grep capability

If it is not listed, then it’s not installed. To install it run the following command:

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[HOWTO] Triple Boot Mac OS X, Ubuntu and Windows XP on MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo (Part 3)

Out of the three parts, this is the part where I stumble upon the most “unexpected” issues. First of all, Live CD does not work on my 2nd-gen Macbook Pro (MBP). There seems to be some problem with the ATI drivers on the Live CD that prevents X from starting up. I have to use the Alternate CD with the text-based-installer. Also, GRUB will not install. Fortunately LILO will be offered and it installs just fine. Finally X will not work after the reboot and you need to install some drivers before it will work.

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