August 2017 Living with PLASMA 5

I'm sorry it has been so long since I updated this blog.  At Easter I was rushed by air to a hospital a bit over 300 kilometres away, suffering from bleeding into my brain.  Previously I had anscesses in the brain, this time it was just blood.  However the blood was once again infected with Golden Staph, and once again it also got into my heart.  In the 2011 incident, my three of my heart valves were infected and my Aortic valve was replaced by a prosthetic tissue valve.  This time there was so much of my heart infected that the surgeons were not sure if they could successfully operate.  However, they eventually got down to replacing the entire Aortic Root, including another valve.

Ok, that's out of the way, and once again I am looking at several years of recovery, along with the possibility of it all happening again.  In the mean time, I am restricted again in things that I can do, so I have the opportunity to mess with Linux.

I tend to run low powered computers and my main computer is still the little Gigabyte BRIX running a Celeron processor at about 1.6GHz.  That is combined with 8GB of RAM and a 500GB internal hard drive.  Externally I have three USB 3.0 hard drives of 1TB, two USB 2.0 drives of 1TB and one USB 2.0 drive of 2TB.  These store stuff going back over many years, with some drives being the masters and some, backups.  The stuff I keep is not really valuable, but a lot is stuff I spent considerable time on, like programs and scripts I wrote for particular jobs.  Because everything has only been running on LINUX since 1998, all my programs and scripts will still operate even on the newest computers.

So Back we come to the topic of this post.  In March I had decided to learn to live with Mint KDE 18, which runs in the PLASMA 5 environment.  I had many of the same problems I had experienced before using PLASMA 5, and quite a few of the little annoyances.

One of the worst is that it is no longer possible to have different wallpapers on each virtual desktop.  Now, I know that having different wallpapers is sort of childish, but there are practical uses for it.  For a start, it gives me a quick visual guide to which desktop I am on before I open a program.

Some time ago the PLASMA 5 team announced that they would not bring back separate wallpapers on virtual desktops, and that we should use 'Activities' instead of virtual desktops anyway.  At the time, switching between Activities was a slow, clumsy process involving several mouse clicks.  This was eventually addressed when someone produced a 'pager' for the panel that works just like the virtual desktop pager.  The only thing that was not working was the ability to change activities by using the mouswheel and scrolling on the desktop itself.

That has been fixed, probably long ago, but it took me a while to find it.  First it is necessary to Right Click the Desktop and open 'Configure Desktop'.

 On the LEFT pane, open Mouse Actions and  where it says 'Vertical Scroll', change from Switch Desktop,

to Switch Activity.

PLASMA 5 is still not perfect.  There are glitches, but finding this setting gets rid of one annoyance.  The switch from one activity to another is not as instantaneous as it was using Virtual Desktops, but the scrolling takes care of the delay using those annoying mouse clicks.

You might notice that I have a panel at the right edge of the screen.  It has the Activity Pager that I was using to switch Activities before I decided to look further into using the mousewheel on the desktop.  I had been simply scrolling on the pager.  Above that pager are folders and a script.  The folders each contain an xwinwrap command and a video , but that will be for another blog post.

Gigabyte BRiX BACE-3150 Revisited Micro SD now works

NOTE !!  UPDATED  2017 March 2nd
Micro SD is now also working in Mint 17.3  See special post.

In July 2016 I wrote about the little Gigabyte BRiX  BACE-3150.  At the time it was brand new to me and I was running Linux Mint 17.3 KDE.  Yesterday I wrote about changing the operating system to Mint 18.1 and how I had to give up KDE because the latest version of KDE is loaded with flaws.

Today I would like to go over a few of my likes and dislikes about living with the BRiX because several people have asked me whether such a low powered computer is able to do any 'real' work.

So, first things first.  The BRiX BACE-3150 is really only a higher end intel Atom processor.  A Celeron.  But it happens to have a quad core and 64 bit architecture.  Considering that my 'desktop' computer experience goes back to Z80 processors running cp/m, and I remember just how much work we could do with those, I'm pretty impressed with the BRiX for general purpose computing.

What I am not impressed with is the lack of graphics support in Linux.  But the CPU?  With Mint 18.1 offering an intel microcode driver, the BRiX does most work really well.  I do a lot of work with graphics and a fair bit of video work.  It handles video editing nicely, although it could be faster.  But of course, if you want more power in a small package, there are other BRiX models with full blown i7 or AMD processors.

The graphics problem is rather petty.  It has to do with screen redraw when scrolling a page.  And it did not happen in Mint 17.3.  I first noticed it when I tested Mint 18.1 KDE and now it is in Mint 18.1 XFCE.

For example in Blogger as I type this, every now and then a line of text has little horizontal lines through it.  But the moment I scroll at all, it is crystal clear again.  I couldn't even take a screen shot of the problem because that also clears it,so here's a photo from my phone.   You can see on the line where it says BRiX.  As soon as the mouse takes focus or if I do anything that involves the screen - it goes away.  Again, this is only in Mint 18.1, it doesn't happen in 17.3.

UPDATE:

I'm not sure if this fixes the problem above, but so far it seems to reduce it.

While trying various settings I found 'Synchronise drawing to the vertical blank'.  Now I'm not sure what this means and I will need to do some searching, but there seems to be some improvement.  Below is a screen shot.  It is in Settings, Window Manager Tweaks, and is the third item in the dialog below.

As far as playing video goes, there's no problem.  No tearing, nothing.  It is just screen redraws and it doesn't matter if compositing is on or off, or if it is using Compiz or Compton, it works fine except for the little horizontal lines in the page.  It appears it could also be something to do with rendering for mouse focus and I'm still playing with settings.

Booting back into the Mint 17.3 partition, and that problem is gone.  But there are other reasons to put up with the graphics glitch that outweigh the small annoyance.

I am beginning to wonder if it is related to my use of HDMI output.  This model BRiX has only HDMI and VGA, where later models seem to have HDMI and Mini DP.

So, back in Mint 18.1 XFCE and the biggest change is that the BRiX Micro SD reader which had not worked before now works great.  That, along with the 4 USB 3.0 ports gave the BRiX the lead over every other PC I looked at when I needed a replacement work horse.  A trip to Harvey Norman and JB HiFi recently showed almost every computer and notebook still only had one USB 3.0 and the rest USB 2.0.

With cheap Micro SD cards up to 128GB and also 2TB USB hard drives under $100, the Brix is open to lots of storage and fast file transfers.  So the huge number of USB 3.0 ports and the fast Micro Sd are handy, but what is WRONG with the BRiX?

The fan is noisy.  I have heard that and it is partly true if you live in a hot climate as I do.  I set the fan to its high setting because the temperature in the room where the BRiX operates is over 30 degrees Celsius and I work it hard.  But it is far less intrusive than the other computers I use.

It sometimes goes to a weird greenish yellow screen for no apparent reason when running the HDMI output and refuses to come back to the desktop.

I found that plugging in the VGA cable (connected to the same monitor or TV) then switching to that display would let me log out.  And sometimes it wouldn't.  It was more noticeable when coming back to HDMI after using the TV/Monitor as a TV for a while.  Often the only way to get it working again was to kill the power and boot from scratch.

Since moving to Mint 18.1 I find a CTRL ALT DEL will bring up the log in screen and I can simply log in again.  I just realised that at present I have the VGA and HDMI cables both plugged into the BRiX, so I have to test the idea without the VGA plugged in tomorrow.

There's really not much else to complain about.  Just that funny lines thing on some screens / pages and the losing output on HDMI.

I get more work done in the BRiX than on any of my other devices and I am probably happier with it than with any single computer I remember buying, bearing in mind that I always buy simple low end computers with a view to working them hard then replacing them after three years.

Gigabyte Brix BACE-3150 and Mint KDE

I work my computers pretty hard and after about three years I usually find something is dying. If it isn't the hard disk or DVD drive it's generally something else that has finally worn out. My current Compaq 1040 is more than four years old and has been a problem for quite a while. I'm not well off any more and the budget limits me to between $300 - $400 Aussie dollars. I also find having a laptop on the desk and trying to use it with a dual monitor setup is a real pain – so when I could not put the inevitable off any more, I bought a low end Brix.

The first thing I noticed about the Gigabyte Brix BACE-3150 was that it felt heavier than I expected for such a small computer. The second thing was that, well, it is a small computer. At not much more than 100mm by 100mm square and about 50mm high it can be placed just about anywhere on a desk or a shelf.  It also comes with a bracket and screw to allow it to be mounted on the back of most LED television sets.

There are lots of unboxing videos and various reviews about the Brix on Youtube and on Google. They all give details about the number and type of ports and the specs of the processor. But my needs are specific.

I always buy low end processors. I don't play computer games. I browse the web, play music and music videos, write simple programs (usually BASH scripts), and do a lot of photo editing and a little video editing. Much of the last two are either from the command line or using scripts I have customised for my own requirements. And of course there's the usual hack work. I design some web sites for businesses and maintain some blogs and do the usual word processing and spreadsheeting. I also only buy cheap computers.

One of the first things I need in a computer is that it will easily run Linux. Currently for my distribution of choice I've returned to Mint KDE, so I unpacked the Brix, plugged in the power adapter, a HDMI TV and a USB stick with a bootable Mint 17.3 KDE, plus my wireless mouse and keyboard.

I turned it on and a few moments later I had a working copy of Mint KDE on my screen. I entered the password for the on board Wireless to connect to my Internet and everything worked. So I double clicked the install icon and manually partitioned the hard drive the way I like it.

It was about this time I remembered reading somewhere that a reviewer of one model of the Brix had some dramas getting the UEFI stuff in BIOS sorted. Sadly I didn;t have the chance to explore the BIOS and UEFI stuff. The Brix BACE-3150 just accepted Mint KDE and everything worked.

The only drivers I had to install were for my collection of Brother printers. Fortunately Brother has a special section for Linux drivers on their web site which is kept up to date. Mint KDE just found everything else. I had to install a few programs and extras that asre not in the standard installation but for most users even that would not be needed.

The Brix was replacing a Compaq 1040 with an AMD E-350 1.6GHz dual core processor with a 500GB hard drive and 4GB RAM. The Brix BACE 3150 has a quad core Celeron processor that idles at 1.6GHz but automatically runs up to 2.08GHz on demand. Mine was ordered with a 500GB hard drive but I ordered 8GB RAM because I noticed on the AMD 64 bit processor I was very often pushing the system into the top of the available 4GB and flowing over into swap.

With the Brix, the quad core seems to prevent that somehow. I have no idea why, but running the same tasks on the same OS distro and version I haven't even got above the first 4GB RAM.

Something that stands out immediately is video performance however, The AMD system has a far better graphics benchmark score than the Intel system in the Brix. But that is on paper. In reality running the high performance tests on the jellyfish video at various bitrates using both Smplayer and VLC the Brix was still playing smoothly when the AMD started the stop start motion thing.

Streaming HD movies in full screen on a 50 inch TV was perfect on the Brix in KODI and I would recommend KODI and a few add-ons for regular video sessions. Teaming the USB 3 ports on the Brix with USB 3 hard drives and memory sticks worked great too.

Youtube video always depends largely on how heavy the Internet traffic is at that time, but again running the Brix and the Compaq at the same time left the Brix ahead in this area too. I must admit I was using Flashpeak Slimjet as my browser on both computers and a wired connection to the router on the compaq, while the Brix had the advantage of its internal wireless to connect to the router.

In summing up. The Gigabyte Brix was on ebay for $364 including delivery from pclivecomputers in Oakleigh, Vic. They will sell you the basic barebones Brix so you can choose the processor you need and add the bits you want, or you can simply choose an option to suit your budget as I did.

I ordered on a weekend, there was a public holiday on the Monday, and I still got mine up here in Central Queensland on the following Monday. I suspect had I ordered it Monday morning it might have arrived by Friday.

A couple of weeks into living with the BRIX and there was one annoying problem. The thing doesn't shutdown. When choosing to shutdown, everything seems fine, then it simply reboots. It was not happening initially but after a Linux kernel update it started happening. A bit of googling shows it is not only me with this issue, although it is not clear if it is happening with all processor variations. At any rate, with the Brix BACE-3150 it is happening. Fdor now, the only solution is to be sure to hit the main power switch (at the adapter) as soon as everything seems to have shut off. Otherwise, the light on the Brix comes back on and it reboots.

It is not a huge issue, but it is annoying to have to remember. I have no idea if this happens on any Brix with Windows installed. I can live with it though because everything else so far about the Brix has been a positive experience.

!!!!   N O T E   !!!!    After a couple of Linux updates the shutdown problem seems to have taken a holiday.  Now when it is turned off, the Brix stays off.

Something I will mention on closing is that KODI under Linux Mint suffers the same shutdown problem as KODI under Raspbian on the Raspberry Pi.  If you choose exit, instead of dropping back to Linux, it just hangs the system, often at a black screen.  Choosing Exit often does the same.  So I find the best what to get out of KODI is to choose a reboot, then either work in Linux, or shutdown from Linux.

The other option is to go into KODI System > System and choose to run in Windowed mode, then close the KODI window.

Be sure though to swap KODI back into Full Screen mode while you are running video or it will not play smoothly.