should I install compiz on my laptop?
 

I really like compiz and the cool effects you can do on it but right no w I have a tough question. Should I install compiz on my aging thinkpad t23 I have no clue on its video card stats but i am guessing it would (hopefully) support beryl based on my ram and processor.

Take note: this computer runs windows xp and directx9 fairly well and I have played 3d games such as mall tycoon 3 and zoo tycoon.

The laptop is about 3 or 4 years old and running well (even with windows).

Thanx, Lopagof

You can use the lspci command to find out more about your video card.

It all depends on the video card. If it can do direct rendering and is capable of 3D acceleration then go for it. If not, you'd be wasting your time as it won't run anyway.

I have Beryl running on a Dell that has an Intel i915GM and it works great.

I'm not much into glitz
 

Mind you, when I said "No" in the poll, I was saying that *I* shouldn't install Compiz. I didn't say anything about you. If you like glitz, then it might be worthwhile. (Some people seem to like it, certainly.) If you decide that it's for you, you'd best first check on how well it's supported by your particular choice of distro. You might want to upgrade or change. (It's my understanding that Compiz is still pretty new and under heavy development. OTOH, I had to read the other responses before I remembered what Compiz was, so I'm pretty out of the loop. Still, anything more that a year old is probably too old.) You probably need to check your hardware, too. I don't know what the parameters are here, since I don't even use all of the BASIC fancy effects. (E.g., I tend to consider animated gifs more annoying that desireable...I say this while noticing the bottom left icon in the smilies menu.)

I've managed to get it to work on a GeForce 4 MX based card (which should indicate the age of the system).

It depends on just how much of the eye-candy you want to have turned on. Cranking up "flame on close", or "snow on desktop", or... most of the large(r) full screen effects really slowed the system down. On more recent hardware, it was pretty but died with the lack of multi-monitor support. :cry:

Essentially, if you can't get it to work well, turn it back off. I tried it on an Athlon64 X2 5000 with a GeForce 7600 and worked brilliantly .... on the one monitor. As soon as I had my dual monitor setup, I'd lose one and X would soon-enough need a restart (CTRL+ALT+Backspace).

YMMV. Good luck!