OpenGL and Screensavers

Patchy · 11-18-2005, 06:10 PM

Hi,

I've not found an answer to this, but I'm going to try anyway:

I have installed the right ATI driver, hardware acceleration works in Games and all that. Even OpenGL games. BUT, why are my OpenGL screensavers so slow?

CPU usage is right up at 100% when screensavers are being used, suggesting it is using software OpenGL rendering, not hardware.

glxgears gives:

Code:

patch@patch:~> glxgears
31220 frames in 5.0 seconds = 6244.000 FPS
38860 frames in 5.0 seconds = 7772.000 FPS
38250 frames in 5.0 seconds = 7650.000 FPS
37230 frames in 5.0 seconds = 7446.000 FPS
38376 frames in 5.0 seconds = 7675.200 FPS
38479 frames in 5.0 seconds = 7695.800 FPS

"glxinfo | grep render" gives:

Code:

patch@patch:~> glxinfo | grep render
direct rendering: Yes
    GLX_ATI_render_texture
OpenGL renderer string: RADEON 9800 Pro Generic

Which proves the ATI hardware acceleration works.

My question is: is there a way to tell the screensavers to use hardware acceleration?

p_kelchen · 11-19-2005, 01:53 PM

You are using direct rendering and OpenGL should know it. Perhaps go into the control panel for the screensaver and look at the options in it, there should be OpenGL options. Some make the CPU peg at 100%, such as using maximum framerate.