MX-21 beta 2 feedback thread (xfce)

[Eadwine Rose]

Disk Manager? Running through my notes one by one setting stuff up. Just needed to do something in there, nowhere to be found. Checked the manual, where it pointed to disk manager, including location, but not there.

I guess I missed it, did this get removed/replaced?

@Nite Coder is working on porting Disk Manager. It wasn't maintained and is an older Python 2 program that needs to be ported to Python 3 and have all of it library calls updated to newer versions as well because it is tied to a number of depricated libraries. It is a slog, just got the window to appear this weekend, now lots of library calls to fix so that all the functionality is there. Not likely to make the final, but hopefully can be added back in shortly afterwards.

Oh thanks!! That'd be wonderful. This application is simplicity itself to get an automount set up. Click checkbox, done. Just tried that gnome disks thing and it is having issues with ntfs-3g or whatever it is. Annoying, THAT is what it is

To add.. pitbull behavior, took me some hours and a few reinstalls, trying to get the gnome thing to work. Failed. But then.. mount the drive, in tweak select enable mounting by non-root users, add old line from mx19 fstab going by UUID, save, reboot. Fixed. Hah. ~~~

[Stuart_M]

I found a number of audio related changes that make MX-21 worse than MX-19, in my opinion.

Regarding audio quality, I have not been able to tell any difference between MX-21 and MX-19 (provided the audio levels are equal). However, there are other things about the way MX-21 handles the audio that makes me question how the audio interface is accomplished. I want to keep this brief so I'll present one.

I tested with MX-21 beta2 on installed hardware with the most current updates as of 7 September 2021. That includes the Firefox 92.0 update today (the issue was also present on the previous 91.0.2) version.

I am using self-powered speakers that are fed with a digital signal from a USB port into a DAC (I am not using the motherboard analog audio output).

The MX-21 pavucontrol audio mixer "Configuration" tab with the heading "PCM 2704 16-bit stereo audio DAC" is set to "Digital Stereo (IEC958) Output" in the "Profile" drop-down menu.

The problem, anomaly, issue (however one wants to look at it) is when Firefox is playing audio from a Youtube video causing the mixer Playback slider position to change its set position. This will also change the output audio level (volume). This varies based on the video being played. Note that this slider always remains fixed at its set position when Chrome is playing any video (I have only tested with Youtube, Firefox and Chrome). Also note that in MX-19, the same mixer Playback slider always remains at its fixed position for both Firefox and Chrome when playing any audio source.

To duplicate the issue:

• Use Firefox and play a Youtube video.
• Open the mixer to the "Playback" tab and when a video is playing adjust the playback slider to 100%.
• Now move to another time on the Youtube video being played. If the video has audio that causes this issue off 100%, changing the playback time will change the mixer Playback slider position.
  
  There are other actions that will cause the issue, for example removing the audio (pause, mute) for at least 6 seconds (if the audio resumes in less than ~5 seconds then the slider will remain where it was).

As I said, not every video will change the Playback slider in the mixer. It seems like the "Normalized" value in a Youtube video has something to do with this. That value can be seen by right-clicking on a Youtube video and selecting "Stats for nerds" where "Volume / Normalized" can be seen. The first value (Volume) is the setting of the Youtube audio output (always 100% for me). The second value "Normalized" is determined by the audio of the uploaded video.

Here are four videos to demonstrate the issue. The two numbers (xxx/xxx) after the URL correspond to "Volume / Normalized" respectively, followed by where the mixer Playback slider will go when Firefox is used. In Chrome in MX-21, the slider will always remain at its set position, whatever that position is.

https://youtu.be/GdCsMIRsyrg 100/100, slider stays at 100%
https://youtu.be/tXiIpzC74iQ 100/81, slider goes to 91%
https://youtu.be/5bQUqTsC0JA 100/96, slider goes to 99%
https://youtu.be/SC4AhA76DgU 100/88, slider goes to 96%

Further, in Firefox when a Youtube video is muted on the Youtube video screen, the Playback slider will go to 0% (silence), however in Chrome the slider will always remain at whatever its set position is.

Is this the intended behavior of the mixer Playback slider?

[oops]

...
@Nite Coder is working on porting Disk Manager. It wasn't maintained and is an older Python 2 program that needs to be ported to Python 3 and have all of it library calls updated to newer versions as well because it is tied to a number of depricated libraries. ...

So Big thanks to @Nite ... disk-manager is a very good tool.

[dolphin_oracle]

I found a number of audio related changes that make MX-21 worse than MX-19, in my opinion.

Regarding audio quality, I have not been able to tell any difference between MX-21 and MX-19 (provided the audio levels are equal). However, there are other things about the way MX-21 handles the audio that makes me question how the audio interface is accomplished. I want to keep this brief so I'll present one.

I tested with MX-21 beta2 on installed hardware with the most current updates as of 7 September 2021. That includes the Firefox 92.0 update today (the issue was also present on the previous 91.0.2) version.

I am using self-powered speakers that are fed with a digital signal from a USB port into a DAC (I am not using the motherboard analog audio output).

The MX-21 pavucontrol audio mixer "Configuration" tab with the heading "PCM 2704 16-bit stereo audio DAC" is set to "Digital Stereo (IEC958) Output" in the "Profile" drop-down menu.

The problem, anomaly, issue (however one wants to look at it) is when Firefox is playing audio from a Youtube video causing the mixer Playback slider position to change its set position. This will also change the output audio level (volume). This varies based on the video being played. Note that this slider always remains fixed at its set position when Chrome is playing any video (I have only tested with Youtube, Firefox and Chrome). Also note that in MX-19, the same mixer Playback slider always remains at its fixed position for both Firefox and Chrome when playing any audio source.

To duplicate the issue:

• Use Firefox and play a Youtube video.
• Open the mixer to the "Playback" tab and when a video is playing adjust the playback slider to 100%.
• Now move to another time on the Youtube video being played. If the video has audio that causes this issue off 100%, changing the playback time will change the mixer Playback slider position.
  
  There are other actions that will cause the issue, for example removing the audio (pause, mute) for at least 6 seconds (if the audio resumes in less than ~5 seconds then the slider will remain where it was).

As I said, not every video will change the Playback slider in the mixer. It seems like the "Normalized" value in a Youtube video has something to do with this. That value can be seen by right-clicking on a Youtube video and selecting "Stats for nerds" where "Volume / Normalized" can be seen. The first value (Volume) is the setting of the Youtube audio output (always 100% for me). The second value "Normalized" is determined by the audio of the uploaded video.

Here are four videos to demonstrate the issue. The two numbers (xxx/xxx) after the URL correspond to "Volume / Normalized" respectively, followed by where the mixer Playback slider will go when Firefox is used. In Chrome in MX-21, the slider will always remain at its set position, whatever that position is.

https://youtu.be/GdCsMIRsyrg 100/100, slider stays at 100%
https://youtu.be/tXiIpzC74iQ 100/81, slider goes to 91%
https://youtu.be/5bQUqTsC0JA 100/96, slider goes to 99%
https://youtu.be/SC4AhA76DgU 100/88, slider goes to 96%

Further, in Firefox when a Youtube video is muted on the Youtube video screen, the Playback slider will go to 0% (silence), however in Chrome the slider will always remain at whatever its set position is.

Is this the intended behavior of the mixer Playback slider?

Thanks for the detailed report.

The playback tab should be displaying the output on a per-app basis. your sample video links were very helpful to duplicate what you are seeing.

My first guess is that since I also only see the affect in certain videos, and that firefox does have integration with pulseaudio, that this well may be exactly what should be happening. the master sliders in output devices do not change, only the currently playing application. I also noticed the sliders in the web player for youtube do not move, so they stay at 100, so the normalization must come out on the firefox side in pulseaudio.

[entropyfoe]

Eadwine Rose,

I too am missing the disk manager.
Of course I saw it missing in the beta1, so I had an old fstab copy from a working MX 19 install, so I copied the line from it, and appended it to fstab in the beta1. That worked great.

But I tried the same thing in beta2, and it does not auto mount after a reboot. Thunar sees the Data drive, but to mount it I must root authenticate.
I will post the fstabs that worked. Darn, I should have copied the old one from beta1 !

Anyway, I have been busy with some other projects, so little beta2 work so far.
I downloaded from sourceforge. md5 checked out good, so I used the MX Live USB creator to burn it to USB.

Booted quickly, and a 7 minute install went well. I was able to make sense of the installer, selecting custom install option on existing partitions. grub to pbr and did update-grub as root in the MX 19.4. Boots fine.
Above noted data drive mounting problem.
Glad to see a meaningful thunar icon back again !

I will do more testing and report later.

[Eadwine Rose]

But I tried the same thing in beta2, and it does not auto mount after a reboot. Thunar sees the Data drive, but to mount it I must root authenticate.
I will post the fstabs that worked. Darn, I should have copied the old one from beta1 !

You could always install beta1 again where you had it working :) I have installed beta 2 about.. too many times now hahahaha, back in my trusty 19.4 again.. oof.


Glad to see the installer worked out for you (I seriously screamed the first time, but it's ok, Dolphin Oracle got me out of that freak out mode ). By now I have used it so many times that I just click click click on those roll-up collapse things, and I only see what I need.


So, you have mounted the drive in Thunar first? That was the key for me, because then instead of in.. what is it.. /dev? it mounts in /media.
Then in MX tweak-Other select enable mounting by non-root users
Then I added the old line from mx19 fstab (which had a media mount line in it)

I also set root things to root, I just could not live with entering the username every time. My root pass is faster


As for further reporting, I also have that tooltip thing as in post #8, when hovering over network I have to pry off my monitor's bottom plastic casing to see what it says

[Eadwine Rose]

Did some further searching on the Tooltip issue. Ran across a gitlab link, and there it had the solution (at least, it made them show correctly).

Enable "Don't reserve space on borders" in the Panel Preferences.

[Stuart_M]

...a gitlab link, and there it had the solution...

Enable "Don't reserve space on borders" in the Panel Preferences.

Perhaps you missed the three workarounds I made in my Post #8 viewtopic.php?p=651347#p651347. They appear (A-C) above the two images in that post. Any one of the three workarounds will make the ToolTip popups to be 100% on screen (one of which you cited in the post above this).

[hughbert]

I am having a problem with the touchpad after installing 21. I have the same problem on 2 different laptops. At random intervals, the touchpad is unresponsive and I have to hit it 3 times before the pointer will move. Has this already been reported? I've looked under settings for the touchpad and don't see any sleep setting. I didn't have this issue with 19.4. But have the same issue with 2 different laptops, 2 different manufacturers after installing 21.

Code: Select all

System:    Host: <filter> Kernel: 5.10.0-8-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: N/A 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.10.0-8-amd64 
           root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet splash 
           Desktop: Xfce 4.16.0 tk: Gtk 3.24.24 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm4 dm: LightDM 1.26.0 
           Distro: MX-21_beta1_x64 Wildflower July 27  2021 base: Debian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye) 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: Dell product: Inspiron 5759 v: N/A serial: <filter> Chassis: 
           type: 10 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: Dell model: 05NVNV v: A00 serial: <filter> UEFI: Dell v: 1.7.0 date: 05/10/2019 
Battery:   ID-1: BAT0 charge: 14.9 Wh condition: 14.9/41.4 Wh (36%) volts: 16.9/14.8 
           model: SMP DELL VN3N047 type: Li-ion serial: <filter> status: Full 
CPU:       Topology: Dual Core model: Intel Core i7-6500U bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Skylake 
           family: 6 model-id: 4E (78) stepping: 3 microcode: EA L2 cache: 4096 KiB 
           flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 20799 
           Speed: 605 MHz min/max: 400/3100 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 599 2: 600 3: 599 4: 600 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: VMX disabled 
           Type: l1tf mitigation: PTE Inversion; VMX: conditional cache flushes, SMT vulnerable 
           Type: mds mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT vulnerable 
           Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI 
           Type: spec_store_bypass 
           mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Full generic retpoline, IBPB: conditional, IBRS_FW, 
           STIBP: conditional, RSB filling 
           Type: srbds mitigation: Microcode 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel Skylake GT2 [HD Graphics 520] vendor: Dell driver: i915 v: kernel 
           bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:1916 
           Device-2: AMD Sun XT [Radeon HD 8670A/8670M/8690M / R5 M330 / M430 / Radeon 520 
           Mobile] 
           vendor: Dell driver: radeon v: kernel bus ID: 01:00.0 chip ID: 1002:6660 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.11 driver: ati,modesetting,radeon 
           unloaded: fbdev,vesa resolution: 1920x1080~60Hz 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel HD Graphics 520 (SKL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 20.3.5 
           direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio vendor: Dell driver: snd_hda_intel 
           v: kernel bus ID: 00:1f.3 chip ID: 8086:9d70 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.10.0-8-amd64 
Network:   Device-1: Intel Wireless 3160 driver: iwlwifi v: kernel port: e000 bus ID: 02:00.0 
           chip ID: 8086:08b3 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           Device-2: Realtek RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet vendor: Dell driver: r8169 
           v: kernel port: d000 bus ID: 03:00.0 chip ID: 10ec:8136 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter> 
           IF-ID-1: tun0 state: unknown speed: 10 Mbps duplex: full mac: N/A 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 223.57 GiB used: 9.41 GiB (4.2%) 
           ID-1: /dev/sda model: SSD 240GB size: 223.57 GiB block size: physical: 512 B 
           logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter> rev: 6A scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / raw size: 107.42 GiB size: 105.18 GiB (97.91%) used: 9.38 GiB (8.9%) fs: ext4 
           dev: /dev/sda5 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 45.0 C mobo: 38.0 C sodimm: 36.0 C gpu: radeon temp: 44 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): cpu: 0 
Repos:     No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/brave-browser-release.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] https://brave-browser-apt-release.s3.brave.com/ bullseye main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/ bullseye main non-free
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/windscribe-repo.list 
           1: deb https://repo.windscribe.com/debian buster main
Info:      Processes: 239 Uptime: 53m Memory: 7.54 GiB used: 2.04 GiB (27.0%) Init: SysVinit 
           v: 2.96 runlevel: 5 default: 5 Compilers: gcc: 10.2.1 alt: 10 Shell: quick-system-in 
           running in: quick-system-in inxi: 3.0.36 

[dolphin_oracle]

I am having a problem with the touchpad after installing 21. I have the same problem on 2 different laptops. At random intervals, the touchpad is unresponsive and I have to hit it 3 times before the pointer will move. Has this already been reported? I've looked under settings for the touchpad and don't see any sleep setting. I didn't have this issue with 19.4. But have the same issue with 2 different laptops, 2 different manufacturers after installing 21.

Code: Select all

System:    Host: <filter> Kernel: 5.10.0-8-amd64 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: N/A 
           parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.10.0-8-amd64 
           root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet splash 
           Desktop: Xfce 4.16.0 tk: Gtk 3.24.24 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm4 dm: LightDM 1.26.0 
           Distro: MX-21_beta1_x64 Wildflower July 27  2021 base: Debian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye) 
Machine:   Type: Laptop System: Dell product: Inspiron 5759 v: N/A serial: <filter> Chassis: 
           type: 10 serial: <filter> 
           Mobo: Dell model: 05NVNV v: A00 serial: <filter> UEFI: Dell v: 1.7.0 date: 05/10/2019 
Battery:   ID-1: BAT0 charge: 14.9 Wh condition: 14.9/41.4 Wh (36%) volts: 16.9/14.8 
           model: SMP DELL VN3N047 type: Li-ion serial: <filter> status: Full 
CPU:       Topology: Dual Core model: Intel Core i7-6500U bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Skylake 
           family: 6 model-id: 4E (78) stepping: 3 microcode: EA L2 cache: 4096 KiB 
           flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx bogomips: 20799 
           Speed: 605 MHz min/max: 400/3100 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 599 2: 600 3: 599 4: 600 
           Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: VMX disabled 
           Type: l1tf mitigation: PTE Inversion; VMX: conditional cache flushes, SMT vulnerable 
           Type: mds mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT vulnerable 
           Type: meltdown mitigation: PTI 
           Type: spec_store_bypass 
           mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp 
           Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization 
           Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Full generic retpoline, IBPB: conditional, IBRS_FW, 
           STIBP: conditional, RSB filling 
           Type: srbds mitigation: Microcode 
           Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected 
Graphics:  Device-1: Intel Skylake GT2 [HD Graphics 520] vendor: Dell driver: i915 v: kernel 
           bus ID: 00:02.0 chip ID: 8086:1916 
           Device-2: AMD Sun XT [Radeon HD 8670A/8670M/8690M / R5 M330 / M430 / Radeon 520 
           Mobile] 
           vendor: Dell driver: radeon v: kernel bus ID: 01:00.0 chip ID: 1002:6660 
           Display: x11 server: X.Org 1.20.11 driver: ati,modesetting,radeon 
           unloaded: fbdev,vesa resolution: 1920x1080~60Hz 
           OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel HD Graphics 520 (SKL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 20.3.5 
           direct render: Yes 
Audio:     Device-1: Intel Sunrise Point-LP HD Audio vendor: Dell driver: snd_hda_intel 
           v: kernel bus ID: 00:1f.3 chip ID: 8086:9d70 
           Sound Server: ALSA v: k5.10.0-8-amd64 
Network:   Device-1: Intel Wireless 3160 driver: iwlwifi v: kernel port: e000 bus ID: 02:00.0 
           chip ID: 8086:08b3 
           IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter> 
           Device-2: Realtek RTL810xE PCI Express Fast Ethernet vendor: Dell driver: r8169 
           v: kernel port: d000 bus ID: 03:00.0 chip ID: 10ec:8136 
           IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter> 
           IF-ID-1: tun0 state: unknown speed: 10 Mbps duplex: full mac: N/A 
Drives:    Local Storage: total: 223.57 GiB used: 9.41 GiB (4.2%) 
           ID-1: /dev/sda model: SSD 240GB size: 223.57 GiB block size: physical: 512 B 
           logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s serial: <filter> rev: 6A scheme: GPT 
Partition: ID-1: / raw size: 107.42 GiB size: 105.18 GiB (97.91%) used: 9.38 GiB (8.9%) fs: ext4 
           dev: /dev/sda5 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 45.0 C mobo: 38.0 C sodimm: 36.0 C gpu: radeon temp: 44 C 
           Fan Speeds (RPM): cpu: 0 
Repos:     No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/brave-browser-release.list 
           1: deb [arch=amd64] https://brave-browser-apt-release.s3.brave.com/ bullseye main
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye-updates main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list 
           1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye main contrib non-free
           2: deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bullseye-security main contrib non-free
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list 
           1: deb http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo/ bullseye main non-free
           No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/various.list 
           Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/windscribe-repo.list 
           1: deb https://repo.windscribe.com/debian buster main
Info:      Processes: 239 Uptime: 53m Memory: 7.54 GiB used: 2.04 GiB (27.0%) Init: SysVinit 
           v: 2.96 runlevel: 5 default: 5 Compilers: gcc: 10.2.1 alt: 10 Shell: quick-system-in 
           running in: quick-system-in inxi: 3.0.36 

there is a setting to disable the touchpad while typing. we have it set to .5 seconds on beta2 but I think beta1 was still set to 2 seconds, which was way too long. try adjusting or disabling that.