Hi all, I have a weird problem with the response time inside X. I am running Debian Etch, kernel 2.6.12-1-686-smp on a P4 3.4GHz HT with a SATA drive and 1GB RAM. Whenever I start X (XFCE 4.2.2), I experience the following problems:
a) When autocompleting a command with TAB in a terminal (mrxvt), it "freezes" for maybe 3 seconds or more, then proceeds. After the first time I do it, I have "fast" autocompletions (for other commands too), at least for a while. I would swear that this problem is not in the console. b) When moving the cursor over the icons in the panel, I sometimes get delays in their focus (and trigger responsiveness). Maybe 90% of the time the focus is immediate, but a 10% of the times it is not, with delays of even 10-20 seconds!! c) Some (all?) the apps take a long time to launch. Maybe they always did (with my previous computers/kernels), but I'd swear that 30 seconds to open KMail, or over 15 to start Firefox is not quite correct. d) Right-clicking on the background produces an XFCE menu (as it should be), but also with a delay, sometimes null, sometimes of 3-6 seconds. Somehow (don't ask me how) I thought that I could fix the problem compiling a custom kernel (2.6.13.4 from kernel.org), because there are three options that sound interesting: 1) Preemption Model: "No Forced Preemtion (Server)", "Voluntary Kernel Preemption (Desktop)" and "Preemptible Kernel (Low-Latency Desktop)" If I understand it right, going from first to third make the system less "efficient", but more responsive to user input. 2) Preempt The Big Kernel Lock" Its "help" literaly says "Say Y here if you are building a kernel for a desktop system" 3) Timer frequency: 100, 250 or 1000Hz From the "help": 1000 HZ is the preferred choice for desktop systems and other systems requiring fast interactive responses to events. Well, I compiled the damned thing with 1) at "Preemptible Kernel", 2) at "Y" and 3) at 1000Hz, and still have the very same problems. Could it be related to the HD? I have read somewhere that ReiserFS (the FS I use for all my partitions) may have been so much "tweaked", that it was pushed too far and it has speed problems. Could it be the problem? Somewhere else a guy with similar problems got a response asking if DMA was enabled, but my "dmesg | grep -i dma" shows: DMA zone: 4096 pages, LIFO batch:1 ata1: SATA max UDMA/133 cmd 0x1F0 ctl 0x3F6 bmdma 0xFFA0 irq 14 ata1: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 398297088 sectors: lba48 ata1: dev 0 configured for UDMA/133 is it fine? I am presently quite lost, and would appreciate any clues on how to fix it, or at least what info I need to provide to get the right diagnosis. TIA, Basajaun -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]