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Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog)
The Chromium blog reports on some developments in graphics handling in the free Google Chrome-based browser. The intent is to speed up graphics rendering by taking advantage of the GPU. "At its core, this graphics work relies on a new process (yes, another one) called the GPU process. The GPU process accepts graphics commands from the renderer process and pushes them to OpenGL or Direct3D (via ANGLE). Normally, renderer processes wouldnt be able to access these APIs, so the GPU process runs in a modified sandbox. Creating a specialized process like this allows Chromiums sandbox to continue to contain as much as possbile: the renderer process is still unable to access the systems graphics APIs, and the GPU process contains less logic."
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Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Aug 31, 2010 15:54 UTC (Tue) by callegar (guest, #16148) [Link]
Since version 6 beta of chrome, the google browser gives me hard-lockups of the whole machine (keyboard leds flashing, keyboard dead, network dead, magic sysreq not working, hard reset or power cycle required). Strangely, this is happening on a 64bit ubuntu 10.04 machine with AMD Phenom II cpu and Nvidia graphics (with proprietary drivers) and not on a laptop with the same 64bit OS, and Intel cpu and graphics. To trigger the issue is sufficient to open the browser, navigate to some page and quit the browser. At exit the machine dies.
I now wonder if this may be due to the GPU usage. Unfortunately, posting this either as an ubuntu bug (no application should hard-lock the whole machine) or as a chrome bug provided me with any hint. Particularly the latter appears to be extremely silent.
Is now anybody in a position to either suggest or exclude a link with the GPU usage? Or anything that I may try to avoid the issue?
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Aug 31, 2010 16:07 UTC (Tue) by jpeddicord (subscriber, #57393) [Link]
I've had nothing but trouble with the NVIDIA driver on 10.04, and would get (seemingly-random) hard lockups every so often. Try using the newer 256 driver, or, if you're daring, upgrade to the Maverick (10.10) beta in a few days. I've been using Maverick since development opened and it's been more stable than 10.04 has been, ironically.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Sep 2, 2010 17:48 UTC (Thu) by fkrogh (guest, #4493) [Link]
Same problem on a Gentoo system. I like Chromium, but don't use it except when I have an upgrade of something that might fix the problem.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Sep 6, 2010 14:00 UTC (Mon) by callegar (guest, #16148) [Link]
What kind of cpu do you have?
After many experiments, for my system lock ups I am excluding:
1) The Nvidia graphics subsystem (since I have tested chrome on a machine with a quad core xeon, same 64bit distribution, same Nvidia proprietary graphics drives and it is OK there.
2) The 64 bit distribution for the same reason.
3) The plugins, since I have switched off all of them
4) The packaging by google, since ubuntu's chromium daily hard lockups my first machine just the same as google's chrome.
5) The fact of running on a multicore system (again because of 1).
6) Config dir and cache, since I have cleaned both (btw is there any other place where chrome may leave some data?)
I would say that the only difference now is the CPU. On all my Intel machines chrome is fine. On my sole AMD Phenom II it hard lockups the machine leaving it with flashing keyboard leds whenever one exits the browser. For information that machine had never ever locked up before on any other ubuntu lucid application.
Can anybody tell me if they have problem with Phenom II X4 CPUs? Apparently, floating on the net there are reports that chrome OS does not like them... (http://gamblis.com/2009/11/23/google-chrome-os-0-4-223-do...)... any clue?
Notes:
a) Due to the hard lockup I have no clue at what is going on... cannot succed in getting any log.
b) Now that chrome 6 has gone stable, there is no more chrome for me (chrome 5 was ok on that machine)
c) Chrome and chromium 7 behave the same in this regard.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Aug 31, 2010 16:28 UTC (Tue) by ean5533 (subscriber, #69480) [Link]
GPU acceleration is turned off by default, so unless you explicitly turned it on, it shouldn't be an issue.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Aug 31, 2010 19:52 UTC (Tue) by elanthis (guest, #6227) [Link]
Not to mention it's only in version 7, not version 6.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Sep 1, 2010 10:54 UTC (Wed) by callegar (guest, #16148) [Link]
Thanks for excluding GPU usage as a possible cause of my issues...
I am now noticing that a third machine with the same linux distro, 64 bit again, NVIDIA graphics again with proprietary drives (maybe a different release) and Intel Xeon CPU is fine.
If I find something I will post it to the chrome forum.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Aug 31, 2010 16:39 UTC (Tue) by robert_s (subscriber, #42402) [Link]
You're using the proprietary drivers so nobody can debug it but nvidia. You should probably contact them.
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Aug 31, 2010 20:05 UTC (Tue) by oak (subscriber, #2786) [Link]
I was wondering about whether there's a GPU renderer per each page (as those are separate processes), but the stuff at the end of the design doc:
https://sites.google.com/a/chromium.org/dev/developers/de...
Answered that:
As even a single page can have e.g. multiple WebGL objects, this can get a bit complicated, see the diagram at the end of the design page... The 3D driver better have a robust multiple GL context support!
Chromium Graphics Overhaul (The Chromium Blog) Posted Sep 3, 2010 8:45 UTC (Fri) by alankila (subscriber, #47141) [Link]
Tested the nightly on Linux. Looks like some things don't work yet for whatever reason, but at least some of those IE9 tests ran about 10-20x faster than they used to.
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