Hardware Acceleration.

[Frank Lion]

I tossed a coin as to put this here or Tech. Either way, I thought this interesting considering the endless problems with this in Support -

http://www.conceivablytech.com/10356/pr ... celeration

...like, why was HA ever enabled by default in Firefox type interesting.

[Omega X]

Now lets await the troll door that was just opened up.

[Frank Lion]

Now lets await the troll door that was just opened up.

There's nothing to open up, people just need to know what type of problems it can cause and how to turn it off, i.e. -

Firefox menu > Tools > Options > Advanced > General and untick 'Use Hardware Acceleration when...'. Then restart Firefox.

While you've been just 'now lets awaiting' around here, other people have been answering endless questions/problems in Support on this one.

[efox99]

It's a nightmare feature.

I remember three good times it froze my computer and my PC made a strange beep noise.

Turned off HA and PC was back to normal. It also causes glitches on my bookmarks list.

I also do not detect any difference in speed on all the sites I visit with HA off.

[patrickjdempsey]

I also do not detect any difference in speed on all the sites I visit with HA off.

You won't. Other than the fact that they tied fonts into it (thanks MicroSoft!) you won't notice any difference unless you hang out all day on "HTML5" test sites... which aren't really about HTML5 in general as much as animations in Canvas or SVG.

[Frank Lion]

On the general point of whether Hardware Acceleration should have been enabled by default on Firefox, I reckon the answer is no. Only 5% of websites even try to use WebGL and as seen above, only 30% of users can use it anyway.

As far as users are concerned, it's pretty simple. If you have seen any visual glitches at all since using Firefox 4, then try SafeMode (which, amongst other things, temporarily disables Hardware Acceleration) http://kb.mozillazine.org/Safe_mode .If the strange visual/graphics glitches disappear when in SafeMode then there is a good chance that you need to disable Hardware Acceleration, as detailed in the 3rd post above.

The whole testing process will take you 2 minutes. Trouble is, there are many, many Firefox users that will never read this and have assumed that Firefox is now 'broken'. It's not.

To answer the question that everyone always wants to ask, no, you will not be 'missing out' by turning HA off, it was never working for you anyway if you now need to disable it.

[LIMPET235]

Ta Frank.
Stickyfying this for a while.

[nwg]

I know I might be on the minority here, but I had UI glitches with HA off. My laptop drivers are old, so I had to force enable HA, and after I did the glitches were gone.

[Frank Lion]

I know I might be on the minority here, but I had UI glitches with HA off. My laptop drivers are old, so I had to force enable HA, and after I did the glitches were gone.

That's fine, whatever works for you. At least you were aware of how UI/Content visual glitches can be related to the Firefox Hardware Acceleration settings.

This whole thing is really more of an 'awareness problem' for people because, as you know, the actual fix is very simple.

[Frank Lion]

See this? - viewtopic.php?p=12324905#p12324905

Guess what? Yep, that's how subtle some of this stuff is. (needless to say, that one will turn out to be a dirty monitor screen or something just to make me look silly)

...suppose I'd better go and see what's going down...

[patrickjdempsey]

My personal favorite:
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=2509391

[Frank Lion]

My personal favorite:
viewtopic.php?f=9&t=2509391

Not a bad idea linking to these threads. People seem to understand/relate to the threads better, whereas when you describe just the symptoms you get a load of 'Yeah, yeah, whatever..' and not a word has gone in.

So, here's a PD type link - viewtopic.php?p=12261407#p12261407

[dfoulkes]

With all this said and with all the H.A. issues around this board... and I can't even imagine what's going on around the world... does Mozilla actually get "real" feedback about their stupid decision to activate that setting at time of installation? Or are they completely in the dark here. It really makes Mozilla/Firefox look real bad in the Net-world... almost as bad as Adobe Flash and their latest mess.

And, I don't user the "browsing" features of Thunderbird so I don't know it that setting is in there but if it is they must be having similar issues.

[Frank Lion]

With all this said and with all the H.A. issues around this board... and I can't even imagine what's going on around the world...

I reckon it must be pretty bad. The problem about Hardware Acceleration 'issues' is that the symptoms are so vague and varied.

Almost every case seems to show different symptoms/glitches, so because people cannot look up, say, 'green images on some sites' and find a solution, then they either tend to put up with it or change browsers.

[dfoulkes]

I reckon it must be pretty bad. The problem about Hardware Acceleration 'issues' is that the symptoms are so vague and varied.

Yep, that's what I've seen and is why one of the reasons I give out so many safe-mode suggestions... figured I'd cover the H.A. thing along with possible extension problems.

I've got to believe that this issue has to be on the top of some Mozilla "memo-list" sitting on somebody's desk. I wonder if Bill Gates would allow a simple-release-glitch like this to exist this long in a Windows release.... I'd think he'd be all over it... somehow/someway.