Join Log in
Score:0
avatar Ubuntu

Poor Desktop Performance on Ubuntu 20.04

vn flag
showtooltips

About a week ago, I installed 20.04 LTS on my main machine without any issue except that at first boot after installation, the screen went black and I had to do some configuring in GRUB. But right after I booted into the desktop I noticed that it isn't running flawlessly.

I'm getting animation lag, screen stuttering, apps taking up to 5 seconds to launch as well as a straight up desktop freeze two days ago. I also noticed random audio pops and sometimes it even breaks, resulting in a really distorted sound. I know there's something off because, as it stands, my Windows installation on the same machine runs smoother than the Ubuntu one. Plus, my other computer (Dell OptiPlex 3070, i7-9700, B310M, 16GB DDR4) running Mint 19.3 on X11 worked like a bullet (really, haven't seem anything that fast) with the exact same SSD I'm using now with this Ubuntu.

So far, I haven't done anything big in terms of tinkering, aside from scavaging every article I could find that was similar to the topic.

I,ve tested NVIDIA 470, 495 and system is up to date.

PC Specs (from Lutris) below:

[System] OS: Ubuntu 20.04 focal Arch: x86_64 Kernel: 5.11.0-46-generic Desktop: ubuntu:GNOME Display Server: x11

[CPU] Vendor: GenuineIntel Model: Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-3570K CPU @ 3.40GHz Physical cores: 4 Logical cores: 4

[Memory] RAM: 7.5 GB Swap: 11.0 GB

[Graphics] Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation OpenGL Renderer: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070/PCIe/SSE2 OpenGL Version: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 470.86 OpenGL Core: 4.6.0 NVIDIA 470.86 OpenGL ES: OpenGL ES 3.2 NVIDIA 470.86 Vulkan: Supported

[SSD] WD GREEN 240GB.

Any help is much appreciated.

114
0 + 0
cocomac avatar
cn flag
cocomac
Those specs seem file. They're a bit old, but they should run Ubuntu just fine. Can you make a live CD (write the Ubuntu image using [balenaEtcher](https://www.balena.io/etcher/), boot to the USB stick, and press Try Ubuntu). In the Live CD, try to recreate your issue. You could also try a 21.10 live CD if the 20.04 one is still too slow. Once your done, shutdown the live CD, remove the flash drive from the device, and when you turn it back on, Ubuntu will be back. Please [edit] your question to include if it still happens with a live CD. Thanks!
0
Reply
vn flag
showtooltips
@cocomac Tried with 21.10 for about 30 mins running from de usb stick. It seemed fine, ignoring the lack of hw acceleration due to not having the correct video driver running. It made me wonder if upgrading to 21.10 would solve the issue. Should I upgrade my version from my current installation or is it better to do a clean one?
0
Reply
cocomac avatar
cn flag
cocomac
I would just reinstall. Especially given that it is running slowly, reinstalling might be better simply because if you've made any changes slowing it down, a reinstall would remove those. Of course, take a backup of anything important before reinstalling. I wouldn't be too surprised if installing 21.10 makes it better.
0
Reply
Sadaharu Wakisaka avatar
pl flag
Sadaharu Wakisaka
Welcome to AskUbuntu, the i7-9700 and i5-3570K are very different, one is from 9th gen 8 core, another is from 3rd gen 4 core, passmark is about 3 times slower. CPU affects how fast GPU can render. And you should consider a thermal problem and power consumption, when the ventilation and/or power supply is not appropriate, the CPU and GPU tend to throttle down and you get sttuttered sound and video output.
0
Reply
Score:0
storestyggeulv avatar Ubuntu
be flag
storestyggeulv

I also recently installed Ubunt 20.04 and have had random sound problems such as delay or missing or much delayed system "pop" sounds when hitting minimize buttons of in nautilus file manager when hitting < and > buttons. Same in Solitaire. Based on some goggling I began to suspect the snd_hda_intel audio driver was going into sleep mode and had to wake up first when the buttons that had pop sounds associated with them. The problem disappeared when I added the folowing file :

cat /etc/modprobe.d/snd_hda_intel.conf
# disable hd audio driver power saving, in the hope to fix
# occasional crackling sound in firefox and system sound delays
# N.B. remember to run "sudo update-initramfs -u" after changes. See also:
# https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/v5.4/sound/hd-audio/notes.html?highlight=snd_hda_intel 
options snd_hda_intel power_save=0 power_save_controller=N

After creating this file and running "sudo update-initramfs -u" you need to reboot to take effect.

My system use an nvidia 1660 Super Graphics adapter which handle the audio the snd_hda_intel driver (which is a general driver in spite of the intel part).

After the fix my file manager navigation, solitaire and minimize buttons etc. ar now very snappy. Hope this helps.

0 + 0
ธงชาติไทย
Elon Musk
I sit in a Tesla and translated this thread with Ai:

mangohost

Post an answer

Most people don’t grasp that asking a lot of questions unlocks learning and improves interpersonal bonding. In Alison’s studies, for example, though people could accurately recall how many questions had been asked in their conversations, they didn’t intuit the link between questions and liking. Across four studies, in which participants were engaged in conversations themselves or read transcripts of others’ conversations, people tended not to realize that question asking would influence—or had influenced—the level of amity between the conversationalists.