[ydl-gen] Slow ibook X11 (2D)

[Warren Nagourney]

Thanks, Stephen, for the help.

Actually, I just gave up running linux on my iBook (I reformatted the  
disk, deleting the linux partitions). I have spent quite a bit of  
time with  three different linuxes: YDL 6.1, Yubuntu 8.10 and Yubuntu  
7.10. Except for some easily solved problems, each one installed with  
few problems. After installation, I found that the user experience  
with the OS was far worse than with OS X and I repeatedly asked  
myself  "why am I doing this?"

Everything worked at best barely acceptably and nothing was as  
smooth, fast and clean as in OS X. I have a fair bit of experience  
with Linux over the last 15 years (on various PPC macs, starting with  
MkLinux on a Powermac 8100). Part of the problem is that OS X has  
gotten to be very good lately and even the latest version (10.5)  
seems to do a good job of supporting the PPC, unlike linux.  The ppc  
GPU drivers are a hit and miss hack - a good job of reverse  
engineering but not nearly as good as supported drivers. I found that  
window moving on iBook linux was pretty smooth but scrolling was  
glacial  -  reminds me of my old 68040 Mac.

There are a lot of things that ppc linux simply will not do. For  
example, there is no Flash and the alternative (gnash) is awful in my  
experience. I never succeeded in getting DVD disks to play on the  
iBook - there is some codec that doesn't seem to have a ppc version.   
The two main window managers are beyond ugly in my opinion and I  
never took to Enlightenment. My favorite window manager is Window  
Maker and it has trouble - for some strange reason, it defeats 2D  
acceleration on theiBook (but not on my PS3). The list of annoyances  
is endless and I am delighted to be back in OS X. I still have Linux  
on my PS3 and with the 2D RSX hack, it is fairly pleasant to use.

Cheers,

Warren Nagourney

On Jan 16, 2009, at 9:54 PM, Stephen Harker wrote:

> Hi,
>
>> I just installed YDL 6.1 on an ibook g4 800 Mhz and the 2D graphics
>> are definitely not accelerated. Does anyone know how to enable
>> graphics acceleration on this machine? (I did a default  
>> installation).
>
> I have accelerated X11 with my iBook G4 (late 2005) and ydl6.1.  In
> fact there was a great improvement with ydl6.1 over ydl6 as my
> accelerated graphics had glxgears going from around 400fps to around
> 1200fps (the chip in these later iBook G4's was only partly supported
> with the earlier Xorg).  I will attach my manualy edited xorg.conf and
> /etc/X11/fs/config that is at least partly relied upon.  Check and
> compare with yours.
>
> -- 
> Stephen Harker                           s.harker at adfa.edu.au
> PEMS
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