Category Archives: Linux

Gaming, Linux

Wine 1.7, WoW, Warcraft, Battlenet, white screen, performance, Linux

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The current 5.x release of Battlenet launcher has given many linux wine users a headache with some suffering a white or blank/black screen.

FIX:
winecfg

  1. Under the Applications tab click ‘Add application’
  2. Browse to ‘program files (x86)\Battle.net’, or wherever you have battlenet launcher installed, select ‘Battle.net.exe’ and click ‘Open’.
  3. Back in the main window ‘applications’ tab, select the new entry ‘Battle.net.exe’.
  4. Below, in the ‘Windows version’ dropdown menu select ‘Windows XP’
  5. Click ‘Apply’.

Blank screen problem should now be fixed.

PERFORMANCE:
For better performance of WoW, there are 2 methods, one is to use opengl and the other is to use D3D9 but using a small trick to provide much better performance. Opengl works fine and provides much improved frame rate without any further messing about, but you might not like the visuals. Regardless, the first step to either method is to first switch WoW to using opengl mode.

Using gedit or notepad open the ‘WTF\configure.wft’ file in the World of Warcraft folder and change the line
SET gxApi "D3D9"
to
SET gxApi "opengl"
and save.

Try WoW now. You might need to set your resolution and full screen mode again. Your frame rate should be much improved, as good, if not better than if you were using windows.

if you don’t like the changed visuals you get in opengl mode and want the nice shiny D3D9 look without sacrificing too much performance.

After first making the change above,

  1. Set your in game video options as you like.
  2. Restart the game.
  3. Use the in game system menu -> Advanced and set the Graphics API to ‘DirectX 9’.
  4. Restart WoW.

Now you will have slightly lower frame rate than opengl mode, but much better frame rate and the improved visuals of D3D9 mode than you did before the switch to opengl.

!!Important!!

Apart from setting your resolution and window/fullscreen mode DO NOT change any other video settings. If you do your frame rate will drop substantially and you will have to repeat the switch to opengl and back again.

To get the best visuals V performance you may have to change video settings then switch to opengl and back to directx 9 untill you find the best settings for you.

Also worth a try is replacing Wine 1.7 with Wine-staging. This offers better performance out of the box and the above works for even better frame rates. However; this version of wine is aimed at gaming so may well break any other applications you are using wine for. If you are going to try it out, once installed use winecfg and go to the staging tab. Tick everything.

Before doing your first winecfg it might be worth making sure you already have:

sudo apt-get install winbind libp11-kit-gnome-keyring:i386 p11-kit-modules:i386

Linux, Nerdy Mind

Stuttery, jerky video, Totem, Ubuntu, Mint 17.x, AMD, 64 bit.

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This guide is for people getting stuttery or jerky playback of videos, full screen or not, using Ubunutu 14.x or derivatives ( Linux Mint 17.x etc ) and using an AMD video card

Firstly make sure you are using the propriety drivers:

sudo apt-get install fglrx-updates fglrx-amdcccle-updates

and reboot

Install vainfo:

sudo apt-get install vainfo

Now look at the vainfo output, it will probably look like:


# sudo vainfo
error: XDG_RUNTIME_DIR not set in the environment.
libva info: VA-API version 0.35.0
libva info: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva info: Trying to open /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/dri/fglrx_drv_video.so
libva info: va_openDriver() returns -1
vaInitialize failed with error code -1 (unknown libva error),exit

So your missing the link to the acceleration driver. Do:

sudo ln -s /usr/lib/libXvBAW.so.1.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/dri/fglrx_drv_video.so

Now your vainfo should look like:


# sudo vainfo
error: XDG_RUNTIME_DIR not set in the environment.
libva info: VA-API version 0.35.0
libva info: va_getDriverName() returns 0
libva info: Trying to open /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/dri/fglrx_drv_video.so
libva info: Found init function __vaDriverInit_0_33
libva info: va_openDriver() returns 0
vainfo: VA-API version: 0.35 (libva 1.3.0)
vainfo: Driver version: AMD MMD 1.0
vainfo: Supported profile and entrypoints
VAProfileMPEG2Simple : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileMPEG2Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileMPEG4Simple : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileMPEG4AdvancedSimple : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileMPEG4Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264Baseline : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileH264High : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVC1Simple : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVC1Main : VAEntrypointVLD
VAProfileVC1Advanced : VAEntrypointVLD

Your all set. Video should now play smoothly. IF your still experiencing poor video and you are using Totem player – read on.

I don’t find Totem enough for my needs as a video player so I suggest installing mplayer/smplayer:

sudo apt-get install mplayer smplayer

You can make this your default player for video files from the right click menu of any of your videos.

Some also prefer VLC player.

Linux, Nerdy Mind

Centos 6 / 7 Openvpn forwarding not working

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Seems Centos (thus RH) have changed the way things work slightly. Especially if you have multiple interfaces (NIC’s).

If your having problems with VPN not forwarding correctly, or your openVPN stopped working since updating from Centos 5, then this will most likely be what your looking for.

nano /etc/sysctl.conf

change

net.ipv4.conf.default.rp_filter = 1

to

net.ipv4.conf.default.rp_filter = 2

now reboot and enjoy.

BaDboD

Linux, Nerdy Mind

Ubuntu 14.04 (Linux 64 bit) – No network, no USB 3 / USB 2

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This mainly applies to 970 chipset mainboards, so your mileage may vary.

Symptom, no USB 3 , or Network, or USB 2 using Ubutnu 14.04 (actually from 12.04 up) 64 bit editions. As this is a kernel problem this should affect most 64 bit linux distros, not just Ubuntu.

There seems to be a problem with all recent 64 bit linux distros and 970 chipset mainboards.

There are 3 options.

1) Use a 32 bit distro.

2) In your BIOS enable IOMMU. This will fix your network and USB 2. You probably wont have USB 3 though 🙁

3) Enable IOMMU in BIOS and add iommu=soft to your grub config. This gets rid of the stream of warnings you get at boot with IOMMU enabled in BIOS. USBB 3 should work too.

sudo nano /etc/default/grub

Change the line

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"

to:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash iommu=soft"

Then do

sudo update-grub

and reboot.

This should make the USB 2 and 3 work as well as networking.

Let me know what chipsets/mainboards this helped you with.

[updated]
Changed option 3 as noted by Anthony Barnett. Many hanks for the feedback Anthony.
[/updated]

BaDboD

Linux

Skype 4.1 , Ubuntu 12 – Distorted audio / sound

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If your getting distortion when you open Skype, and/or distorted sound when Skype make a notification sound, read on …..

Go to Skype – Options – Sound Devices. Un-tick “Allow skype to automatically adjust my mixer levels”

If your STILL getting distortion open a command prompt and type

sudo nano /etc/pulse/default.pa

Add tsched=0 to the end of the line that reads ‘load-module module-udev-detect’ so it looks like…

load-module module-udev-detect tsched=0

Save (CTRL-X  –  Y  –  Enter)  and reboot.

Your good to go.

BaDboD