Ubuntu

Can't enable desktop effects

Asked by Chris Cranford

Is there any way to get an ATI card to be able to have desktop effects?

I finally got Ubuntu working, and I'm liking it so far... Having the snazzy effects and all would be the icing on the cake (and the thing that would make me abandon Vista).

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Jan-Philipp Litza (jplitza) said : 		#1

Basically, yes, it should be possible to get the effects with an ATI card. But it hardly depends on what card you have. The problem probably lies in the direct rendering not being supportet by the 'ati' driver. You need either the 'radeon' or the 'fglrx' driver. Look here to determine which one's right for your card: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RestrictedDrivers/ATI
When you have found out, which one you need, you'll find more information here how to install them:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/ATI (for fglrx)
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RadeonDriver (for radeon)

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Qwerty Maniac (qwertymaniac) said : 		#2

Install the drivers using Envy for ATi and you should be ready to go with Desktop Effects:

Envy and instructions can be found here:
http://blog.shevin.info/2007/04/how-to-implement-babylon-dictionaries.html

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Qwerty Maniac (qwertymaniac) said : 		#3

Oops, wrong link, damn Clipboard:
Its here -> http://albertomilone.com/nvidia_scripts1.html

Regrets

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Hamad Alshehhi (sezoom) said : 		#4

hi Chris,

look at this link:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=488385

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Chris Cranford (cccranford) said : 		#5

Well, I had the fglrx driver installed with composite enabled, and it just tells me that it can't enable the effects.

I'm trying the Envy thing Qwerty suggested right now... Hopefully it'll work!

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Chris Cranford (cccranford) said : 		#6

Okay, tried the Envy thing, still getting 'Desktop effects could not be enabled.'

Trying Hamad's suggestion now. I have a question, though. Will those instructions (which are for Feisty) work with Gutsy?

Thanks.

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Albert Damen (albrt) said : 		#7

Which ATI card do you have precisely?
Some ATI cards are not supported by Compiz and have been blacklisted. These are the identification numbers of the blacklisted cards:
T=" 1002:5954 1002:5854 1002:5955" # ati rs480
T="$T 1002:4153" # ATI Rv350
T="$T 1002:3152 1002:3150 1002:5462 1002:5653 " # ati X300 X600,X600 X700

You can find the identification number for your card by using the following command in a terminal window:
lspci -vn | grep VGA

If the number consisting of "4 characters : 4 characters" is listed above, compiz will not work on your ATI card.

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Hamad Alshehhi (sezoom) said : 		#8

This is must work for you, this solution for all ATI RADEON X600 ATI RADEON X800 ATI RADEON X1300 ATI RADEON X1600 ATI RADEON 9000 and OTHER radeons

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=592016&highlight=ati

wish u get ride of it

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