Simple fix for screen tearing - nVidia

This article or section is out of date. Reason: This is page need to be updated. Oguzkagan (talk) (Discuss)

This fix is known to work with the nVidia non-Free driver package on Xfce & Openbox. It should work on any GTK based DE/WM & possibly others. This page will be updated in that regard as feedback comes in.

21-Mar-2015 - Fully re-written due to new information coming in: 

Possible side effects

• It is likely that whenever your mouse touches the top border of your screen it will dissapear (only whilst touching that border).

• It is looking like there have been improvements made to the nVidia proprietary driver package that have removed the problem that this fix had in its earlier days, in that it no longer slows down 3D graphics = games.

• Possible problem with some docks. It is not a problem with the Openbox dock or Tint2. (Will add information to this if it comes along.)

Here is the relatively simple procedure

1. Open /etc/X11/mhwd.d/nvidia.conf in your favourite text editor with root permission.

2. Under Section Device add the following line

Option "metamodes" "nvidia-auto-select +0+0 { ForceFullCompositionPipeline = On }"

3. Save the modified file using the Save As option in your text editor, as /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/95-mhwd.conf

4. Again, as root, delete the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/@90-mhwd.conf file, or 90-mhwd.conf file (whichever you have).

5. Log out/in.

That's it.

Making the new 95-mhwd.conf file as prescribed in the above method, 
means that nVidia won't overwrite it in the future with one of their
future closed source driver upgrades.

Support

Following is a link to this page's forum counterpart where you can post any related feedback: [1]