X11 or Wayland ?

[leanLux]

Scrolling on MXLinux seems a bit rudimentary (not flowing smoothly), which was kind of ok;
until I now have an additional problem of my FireFox not being able to zoom in or out.

My question is whether I should solve that issue not only locally for FF but globally by either running wayland. What are your two cents on that?

My system is:

Code: Select all

System:
  Kernel: 6.14.10-2-liquorix-amd64 [6.14-13~mx23ahs] arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 12.2.0 parameters: audit=0
    intel_pstate=disable amd_pstate=disable BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-6.14.10-2-liquorix-amd64
    root=UUID=<filter> ro quiet splash
  Desktop: Xfce v: 4.20.0 tk: Gtk v: 3.24.38 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm v: 4.20.0 vt: 7
    dm: LightDM v: 1.32.0 Distro: MX-23.6_ahs_x64 Libretto April 13  2025 base: Debian GNU/Linux 12
    (bookworm)
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: Acer product: Aspire A517-53G v: V2.02 serial: <superuser required>
  Mobo: ADL model: Amalthea_ADU v: V2.02 serial: <superuser required> UEFI: Insyde v: 2.02
    date: 08/01/2023
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT1 charge: 29.5 Wh (100.0%) condition: 29.5/47.8 Wh (61.8%) volts: 12.4 min: 11.2
    model: LGC AP18C8K type: Li-ion serial: <filter> status: full
CPU:
  Info: model: 12th Gen Intel Core i7-1260P bits: 64 type: MST AMCP arch: Alder Lake level: v3
    note: check built: 2021+ process: Intel 7 (10nm ESF) family: 6 model-id: 0x9A (154) stepping: 3
    microcode: 0x437
  Topology: cpus: 1x cores: 12 mt: 4 tpc: 2 st: 8 threads: 16 smt: enabled cache: L1: 1.1 MiB
    desc: d-8x32 KiB, 4x48 KiB; i-4x32 KiB, 8x64 KiB L2: 9 MiB desc: 4x1.2 MiB, 2x2 MiB L3: 18 MiB
    desc: 1x18 MiB
  Speed (MHz): avg: 1073 high: 3728 min/max: 400/2501 boost: enabled scaling:
    driver: acpi-cpufreq governor: ondemand cores: 1: 2619 2: 3728 3: 921 4: 970 5: 1281 6: 781
    7: 1616 8: 400 9: 1248 10: 918 11: 400 12: 700 13: 400 14: 400 15: 400 16: 400 bogomips: 79872
  Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
  Vulnerabilities:
  Type: gather_data_sampling status: Not affected
  Type: ghostwrite status: Not affected
  Type: indirect_target_selection status: Not affected
  Type: itlb_multihit status: Not affected
  Type: l1tf status: Not affected
  Type: mds status: Not affected
  Type: meltdown status: Not affected
  Type: mmio_stale_data status: Not affected
  Type: old_microcode status: Not affected
  Type: reg_file_data_sampling mitigation: Clear Register File
  Type: retbleed status: Not affected
  Type: spec_rstack_overflow status: Not affected
  Type: spec_store_bypass mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl
  Type: spectre_v1 mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization
  Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Enhanced / Automatic IBRS; IBPB: conditional; PBRSB-eIBRS: SW
    sequence; BHI: BHI_DIS_S
  Type: srbds status: Not affected
  Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Alder Lake-P GT2 [Iris Xe Graphics] vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI driver: i915
    v: kernel alternate: xe arch: Gen-12.2 process: Intel 10nm built: 2021-22+ ports:
    active: HDMI-A-1,eDP-1 empty: DP-1,DP-2 bus-ID: 0000:00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:46a6 class-ID: 0300
  Device-2: NVIDIA GA107M [GeForce RTX 2050] vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI driver: N/A
    alternate: nouveau non-free: 530.xx+ status: current (as of 2023-03) arch: Turing code: TUxxx
    process: TSMC 12nm FF built: 2018-22 bus-ID: 0000:01:00.0 chip-ID: 10de:25a9 class-ID: 0302
  Device-3: Quanta ACER HD User Facing type: USB driver: uvcvideo bus-ID: 3-7:3
    chip-ID: 0408:4033 class-ID: fe01 serial: <filter>
  Display: x11 server: X.Org v: 1.21.1.7 compositor: xfwm v: 4.20.0 driver: X:
    loaded: modesetting unloaded: fbdev,vesa dri: iris gpu: i915 display-ID: :0.0 screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 3840x1617 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 1017x428mm (40.04x16.85")
    s-diag: 1103mm (43.44")
  Monitor-1: HDMI-A-1 mapped: HDMI-1 pos: top-right model: Philips FTV serial: <filter>
    built: 2009 res: 1920x1080 hz: 60 dpi: 38 gamma: 1.2 size: 1280x720mm (50.39x28.35")
    diag: 1469mm (57.8") ratio: 16:9 modes: max: 1920x1080 min: 640x480
  Monitor-2: eDP-1 pos: primary,bottom-l model: LG Display 0x0671 built: 2019 res: 1920x1080
    hz: 60 dpi: 128 gamma: 1.2 size: 382x215mm (15.04x8.46") diag: 438mm (17.3") ratio: 16:9
    modes: 1920x1080
  API: OpenGL v: 4.6 Mesa 24.2.8-1mx23ahs renderer: Mesa Intel Graphics (ADL GT2)
    direct-render: Yes
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Alder Lake PCH-P High Definition Audio vendor: Acer Incorporated ALI
    driver: sof-audio-pci-intel-tgl alternate: snd_hda_intel, snd_soc_avs, snd_sof_pci_intel_tgl
    bus-ID: 0000:00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:51c8 class-ID: 0401
  API: ALSA v: k6.14.10-2-liquorix-amd64 status: kernel-api tools: alsamixer,amixer
  Server-1: PipeWire v: 1.0.0 status: active with: 1: pipewire-pulse status: active
    2: wireplumber status: active 3: pipewire-alsa type: plugin 4: pw-jack type: plugin
    tools: pactl,pw-cat,pw-cli,wpctl
Network:
  Device-1: MEDIATEK MT7921 802.11ax PCI Express Wireless Network Adapter vendor: Lite-On
    driver: mt7921e v: kernel modules: wl bus-ID: 0000:2b:00.0 chip-ID: 14c3:7961 class-ID: 0280
  IF: wlan0 state: up mac: <filter>
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8211/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet vendor: Acer
    Incorporated ALI RTL8111/8168/8411 driver: r8169 v: kernel port: 3000 bus-ID: 0000:2c:00.0
    chip-ID: 10ec:8168 class-ID: 0200
  IF: eth0 state: down mac: <filter>
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Lite-On Wireless_Device type: USB driver: btusb v: 0.8 bus-ID: 3-10:5
    chip-ID: 04ca:3802 class-ID: e001 serial: <filter>
  Report: hciconfig ID: hci0 rfk-id: 2 state: up address: <filter> bt-v: 3.0 lmp-v: 5.2
    sub-v: 2411 hci-v: 5.2 rev: 615
  Info: acl-mtu: 1021:6 sco-mtu: 240:8 link-policy: rswitch sniff link-mode: peripheral accept
    service-classes: rendering, capturing, object transfer, audio, telephony
RAID:
  Hardware-1: Intel Volume Management Device NVMe RAID Controller driver: vmd v: 0.6 port: N/A
    bus-ID: 0000:00:0e.0 chip-ID: 8086:467f rev: class-ID: 0104
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 953.87 GiB used: 20.43 GiB (2.1%)
  SMART Message: Unable to run smartctl. Root privileges required.
  ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 maj-min: 259:0 vendor: Micron model: 2450 MTFDKBA1T0TFK size: 953.87 GiB
    block-size: physical: 512 B logical: 512 B speed: 63.2 Gb/s lanes: 4 type: SSD serial: <filter>
    rev: V5MA010 temp: 33.9 C scheme: GPT
Partition:
  ID-1: / raw-size: 953.62 GiB size: 937.58 GiB (98.32%) used: 20.43 GiB (2.2%) fs: ext4
    dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2 maj-min: 259:2
  ID-2: /boot/efi raw-size: 256 MiB size: 252 MiB (98.46%) used: 274 KiB (0.1%) fs: vfat
    dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1 maj-min: 259:1
Swap:
  Kernel: swappiness: 15 (default 60) cache-pressure: 100 (default)
  ID-1: swap-1 type: file size: 4 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) priority: -2 file: /swap/swap
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 64.0 C mobo: N/A
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Repos:
  Packages: pm: dpkg pkgs: 2139 libs: 1065 tools: apt,apt-get,aptitude,nala,synaptic pm: rpm
    pkgs: 0 pm: flatpak pkgs: 0
  No active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-stable-updates.list
    1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bookworm-updates main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian.list
    1: deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bookworm main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
    2: deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bookworm-security main contrib non-free non-free-firmware
  Active apt repos in: /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mx.list
    1: deb http://ftp.lip6.fr/pub/linux/distributions/mxlinux/packages/mx/repo/ bookworm main non-free
    2: deb http://ftp.lip6.fr/pub/linux/distributions/mxlinux/packages/mx/repo/ bookworm ahs
Info:
  Processes: 364 Uptime: 5h 50m wakeups: 32962 Memory: 15.33 GiB used: 6.32 GiB (41.2%)
  Init: SysVinit v: 3.06 runlevel: 5 default: graphical tool: systemctl Compilers: gcc: 12.2.0
  alt: 12 Client: shell wrapper v: 5.2.15-release inxi: 3.3.26
Boot Mode: UEFI

[j2mcgreg]

Code: Select all

RAID:
  Hardware-1: Intel Volume Management Device NVMe RAID Controller driver: vmd v: 0.6 port: N/A
    bus-ID: 0000:00:0e.0 chip-ID: 8086:467f rev: class-ID: 0104

Unless you are actually using some form of RAID, you should change this to ACHI. Leaving it 'as is' can cause odd behaviour.

[Adrian]

You are using Xfce, Xfce doesn't really have Wayland support yet.

[siamhie]

until I now have an additional problem of my FireFox not being able to zoom in or out.

Zooming works for me. Does the zooming work from the menu? (View>Zoom)

Ctrl + to zoom in
Ctrl - to zoom out

[FullScale4Me]

Scrolling on MXLinux seems a bit rudimentary (not flowing smoothly), which was kind of ok;
until I now have an additional problem of my FireFox not being able to zoom in or out.

Firefox Zoom uses a two key combination: to zoom in CTL+ and CTL- <---this is besides the Zoom options on the View menu.

Firefox has a few options related to scrolling for you to explore......

Disabling hardware acceleration has been beneficial to some people where scrolling maxes out the PCs capabilities making a jerky display.

[leanLux]

Thanks, siamhe and FullScale4Me, the most simple solution worked straight away !

Adrian, what you said makes sense. I’m running MX-23.6 with Xfce 4.20.0, and I noticed Wayland isn’t listed in LightDM, so I figured it’s still hidden or not fully supported. From what I’ve read, Xfce 4.20 includes preliminary Wayland support, but it’s not ready for daily use yet. The devs are working on porting components like xfce4-panel and xfdesktop to Wayland using wlroots, but the window manager xfwm4 still relies on X11 and won’t be Wayland-compatible until at least Xfce 4.22

And j2mcGreg; Thanks for pointing that out! I’m using MX-23.6 with an NVMe SSD, and I haven’t intentionally set up any RAID configuration — so I guess the Intel VMD controller is active by default. I’ve read that switching from RAID to AHCI can improve compatibility and reduce weird behavior, especially with Linux distros.
Do you know if MX Linux handles this switch gracefully, or would I need to adjust BIOS settings manually? I’m also wondering if this affects boot stability or performance in any noticeable way.
Appreciate the heads-up — I’ll dig into it further!