Screen refresh rate defaulting to stupid

[Spadge]

Another day, another display problem with kubuntu/nvidia.

My life has been plagued with these sorts of problems for years now. You'd think I'd learn.

Following the amazing success story when 14.04 was still in beta (as per here: https://www.kubuntuforums.net/showth...l=1#post348072 ), I recently noticed tearing is back in some VLC playback, but not all. I checked my refresh rates and my xorg.conf had disappeared. I set everything back up, forcing 60fps in the nvidia drivers control panel, in xorg.conf itself, and in the KDE display setup doohickey.

Then everything is working fine.

After a reboot, I check and find that KDE has set itself back to 59.93 without ever being told to by me.

Is there a file I can edit somewhere that will allow me to tell KDE in no uncertain terms that it's never to pick 59.93fps?

Thanks for your help.

[Spadge]

All I have found so far is this:

spadge@Jupiter:~/.kde/share/config$ cat krandrrc
[Display]
ApplyOnStartup=true
StartupCommands=xrandr --output DVI-I-1 --pos 0x0 --mode 1920x1080 --refresh 60\nxrandr --output DVI-I-1 --primary

[Screen_0]
OutputsUnified=false
UnifiedRect=0,0,0,0
UnifiedRotation=1

[Screen_0_Output_DVI-I-1]
Active=true
Rect=0,0,1920,1080
RefreshRate=60
Rotation=1

[Spadge]

Any ideas, anyone?

[SteveRiley]

Hm. I have only a minimal xorg.conf -- just enough to configure certain parameters on my nVidia card:

steve@t520:~$ cat /etc/X11/xorg.conf 
Section "Device"
    Identifier     "Device0"
    Driver         "nvidia"
    VendorName     "NVIDIA Corporation"
    BoardName      "NVS 4200M"
    Option         "TripleBuffer" "1"
    Option         "OnDemandVBlankInterrupts" "1"
    Option         "RegistryDwords" "EnableBrightnessControl=1"
    Option         "RegistryDwords" "PerfLevelSrc=0x2222; PowerMizerLevel=0x3; PowerMizerLevelAC=0x3; PowerMizerDefault=0x3; PowerMizerDefaultAC=0x3"
EndSection

I haven't had a krandrrc file for quite a while now. I wonder if you might have a conflicting xrandr statement somewhere. Does running
grep -iR randr ~/.kde/* reveal any clues? Like perhaps in any of the files in ~/.kde/share/apps/kscreen?

[Spadge]

The only two files that come up with any screen settings in that cmd are:

~/.kde/share/config/krandrrc:
StartupCommands=xrandr --output DVI-I-1 --pos 0x0 --mode 1920x1080 --refresh 60\nxrandr --output DVI-I-1 --primary

~/.kde/share/apps/kscreen/db4f9b5549c43c7aeb1950bf6d2b5cef:
[ { "enabled" : true, "id" : "f02c855610e623cca2046935a30eb2d0", "metadata" : { "fullname" : "xrandr-M2794D-423748", "name" : "DVI-I-1" }, "mode" : { "refresh" : 60.0, "size" : { "height" : 1080, "width" : 1920 } }, "pos" : { "x" : 0, "y" : 0 }, "primary" : false, "rotation" : 1 } ]

and they both say 60fps.

Which should be fine.

[Spadge]

It looks like it is working now ... after I have spent many time gently beating it into submission.

Switching to the incredibly dangerous xorg-edgers 340 version of nvidia drivers and replacing the entire nvidia- driver tree piece by piece has removed 59.93 from the selectable refresh rates. It now defaults to 60fps and I think I am happy.

spadge@Jupiter:~$ sudo dpkg -l nvidia* | grep ^ii
ii nvidia-340 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 NVIDIA binary driver - version 340.24
ii nvidia-340-dev 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 NVIDIA binary Xorg driver development files
ii nvidia-340-uvm 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 NVIDIA Unified Memory kernel module
ii nvidia-common 1:0.2.91.5 amd64 transitional package for ubuntu-drivers-common
ii nvidia-libopencl1-340 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 NVIDIA OpenCL Driver and ICD Loader library
ii nvidia-opencl-icd-340 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 NVIDIA OpenCL ICD
ii nvidia-prime 0.6.2 amd64 Tools to enable NVIDIA's Prime
ii nvidia-settings 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 Tool for configuring the NVIDIA graphics driver
ii nvidia-settings-updates 340.24-0ubuntu1~xedgers14.04.1 amd64 Transitional package for nvidia-settings

[SteveRiley]

Glad you got it working. Personally, I've never been bitten by Xorg-Edgers. In fact, it's one of the first things I install whenever I build a new system. Fresh X + fresh drivers = goodness all around.

[Spadge]

You're lucky then, because when it bites you it bites you GOOD.

Last time edgers naffed up my system I was left with no working kwin - I could log in, open up something but then couldn't switch to another thing or close or move that thing's window.

But yeah, everything is working fine now. I've even got VLC to stop tearing.

[SteveRiley]

Do you pick-and-choose individual packages from Xorg-Edgers, or simply let the package manager replace everything it wants to?

[Spadge]

Do you pick-and-choose individual packages from Xorg-Edgers, or simply let the package manager replace everything it wants to?

I just let it go wild on my install.

[SteveRiley]

Good; that's what you're supposed to do. I guess I've been exceedingly lucky, for I've never experienced an Edgers bite ever.