Install Beryl on Ubuntu Feisty with AIGLX for Nvidia: Ubuntu (7.04)
This weekend was my Feisty testing weekend (see my previous post on the recent release of Herd 3). Everything seems to be working well enough so far and I’m impressed with a few of the new features. I’ll very likely be upgrading all of my machines upon final release.
In any event, this morning I decided to add Beryl to the mix and, as usual, I’m really impressed with what a community of open source coders can do! To everyone on the Beryl team, keep up the fantastic work!
And, now to the good part.
Installing Beryl on Ubuntu Feisty with AIGLX.
You’ll need to add the beryl-project repositories to your sources list. You can do that by adding the following line to your /etc/apt/sources.list:
deb http://ubuntu.beryl-project.org feisty main
You’ll also want to import the project GPG key for authentication
wget http://ubuntu.beryl-project.org/root@lupine.me.uk.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -
Now that you’ve got these added you’ll want to make sure you’ve updated to the changes
sudo aptitude update
If you haven’t already you’ll need to make sure you have 3D acceleration setup with the Nvidia drivers.
sudo aptitude install nvidia-glx
The X.org 7.2 in Feisty includes AIGLX so it’s pretty simple to get it going. Below are a few things you’ll want to add, or verify are included in your xorg.conf file. As usual, before you make any changes to your xorg.conf you’ll want to make a backup!
Under the Section “Module” make sure that you’ve got the following:
Load "dri"
Load "dbe"
Load "glx"
Now check the Section “Device” and add:
Option "XAANoOffscreenPixmaps"
On my machine (Nvidia GeForce MX 440) I also needed to add this next line to the device section:
Option "AddARGBGLXVisuals" "True"
And lastly you’ll want to make sure that these options are included, normally at the end of the file:
Section "DRI"
Mode 0666
EndSection
Section "Extensions"
Option "Composite" "Enable"
EndSection
OK. At this point AIGLX should be setup and ready to run. You will need to restart X before the changes will take place. If you are reading these instructions on the machine you’re upgrading you’ll want to make sure this is bookmarked to come back to for the final steps. You can use one of the links below this post to save it to your favorite social bookmarking page.
To restart your desktop use one of the following (for ubuntu or kubuntu users):
sudo /etc/init.d/gdm restart (ubuntu)
sudo /etc/init.d/kdm restart (kubuntu)
…ok, and now you’re back. Now we’ll want to install a couple of packages. The beryl packages and the theme decorations:
sudo aptitude install beryl emerald-themes
After you’ve installed these packages you’re ready to go with Beryl! Hit ALT-F2 and run
beryl-manager
You should hopefully see a Beryl splash screen at this point. If not you there should be a new Beryl icon in your notification tray. You can make sure it is running by right-clicking the icon and making sure that Beryl is selected in the desktop manager options.
Enjoy! If you’ve never used Beryl before be sure to check out some of the basic usage commands such as:
CTRL-ALT-right / left arrow : switch to next cube side
CTRL-ALT-SHIFT-right / left arrow : switch to next cube and bring current window
CTRL-ALT-left-click (drag) : move cube with mouse movement
…you might be interested in seeing more at the Beryl FAQ page.
If you end up having any trouble with Beryl you might want to check out the Beryl Troubleshooting page.
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Thanks for the HOWTO, Christer
The Beryl Project is spectacular, however I find the effects a little distracting from real work. No one really drags their windows in circles (as someone said the other day on Digg). Another thing I don’t like about it is that the windows don’t snap to each other after you install Beryl.
Nevertheless, your tutorial was as usual top notch.
Or you could just install ‘desktop-effects’ and use compiz. It’s feisty, after all!
this is confusing – why add Load “dri” if nvidia installation howto says I have to uncomment it!
# Load “dri”
or now you need it again???
Oh, I’m using Feisty and Nvidia MX 400 like you
. But I’ve used another repo :@ download.tuxfamily with edgy 
..but it still works fine 
This worked great, beryl 0wns. Why would anyone in thier right mind BUY Microshit vista? Beryl is 100,000,000 times better and 3d. It gives the meaning 3d the right to exist. Ubuntu and Deian both run beryl great, as far as I can see, Ubuntu or any distro for that matter should put in as default as a windows manaagr selection. Because its impressive and blows vista out of this world. Thanks, great tutorial!
bigs on efnet
or /server 74.92.18.11 BERYL talk all day!
Thanks a lot! I have just upgraded from Edgy to Feisty and after upgrading I had no decorators in beryl. I am using a GeForce 6100, and the key to make it work was the
Option “AddARGBGLXVisuals” “True”
line. So thanks a lot!
nvidia video cards don’t need DRI !!
uncomment DRI module and delete the relative section…
p.s. before write a tutorial…please read the X log…
lol
I am a total noob with linux (I installed for the first time 5 june 2007) and I installed beryl with no problems first try. Thank you my friend, your hard work is definately appreciated here!!!!
People buy microsoft poducts ie. vista, because it works, adn it works with devices around the world, not just a few people who have linux.
While I’m proud of myself for being able to fix this from the console, it broke my xorg.conf file.
Could you find a way to get rid of the smart quotes? Copying/Pasting them is very bad…
It broke my xorg.conf when I copy and pasted the lines into gedit. The smart quotes broke my xorg.conf and I had to nano it. Worked after replacing your lines with normal quotes.
I love beryl, but I have no title bars!?
I’m running a Nvidia 7300
I had the no window decorations problem and found that my x server was only running in 16 bpp. If yours is the same bump it up to 24 bpp and your titlebars might come back.
I’m having the same window decoration problems with an Nvidia FX5500. They also disappear when I use Compiz as my window manager, but not Metacity. After I added the line:
Option “AddARGBGLXVisuals” “True”
it cleared up until I restarted. Once I restarted the machine, they disappeared again. Any ideas?
I’m gonna continue playing with it for a while and see if I come up with anything.
Note: john613, didn’t ignore you. Already at 24bpp.
Ok, I’m a noobius maximus when it comes to linux OS’s. I have Ubuntu Fiesty, and when you got to the X.org portion, you lost me, I have no idea what it is, or where to find it or the config file. Also when i did the sudo aptitude update, it said the public key is not available. It said to run apt-get update, but that didn’t work either. You said on your machine (Nvidia GeForce MX 440), um. . .you lost me there, also. Sorry for being a retard, but this is exactly why I wanted to get away from Windows and it’s thief of a creator. I can’t learn with windows. Could you help, possibly without laughing at me? lol
Thanks!
Thanks for writing this out. Between your tutorial and seeing the OS of youtube im a convert. I would still love to find a guild on how to do a dual boot with XP64..
I dont know exactly how to install beryl offline… can you tell me???
hi there , i have a Question about this Linux and beryl thing ! lol . 1st i should say that i never used Linux before but i always wanted to try this out. i have dell laptop latitude D820
2gb ram, 80 gb hard and with Intel core 2 duo 1.83 processor.1st i need to know if i can use virtual machine to install and run Ubuntu? the is the answer is yes can i install beryl 3d for my Ubuntu running on that virtual machine ? if it possible please let me know what are my option is and what do i need to do ? where should i download Ubuntu beryl and what is the best way to instal those? i’m student so i can’t get rid of the windows ! lol so i need to know if i can keep my window and run ubuntu with beryl at the same time ?
thanks for your time
nimooly – no, you can’t run beryl inside a virtual machine as there are yet virtual machine applications that can fully support the 3d acceleration needed to run beryl.
there are plenty of students that get by fine without windows, go check out http://www.softwarefor.org and ditch windows!
Hy , i’m using Ubuntu Feisty with nVidia GeForce4 MX/MX440 , i fallow’ed the instructions on your page but now i can’t run the OS anymore i receive all kind of error , i think it’s because i modified xorg.conf , is any way that i can boot in something like safe mode and modify it back or repair the file ?
Worked first time for me with Gutsy and nVidia FX5200 card:) thank you.
hi ,
when i type this command :
wget http://ubuntu.beryl-project.org/root@lupine.me.uk.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -
I get this :
HTTP request sent, awaiting response… 404 Not Found
22:38:47 ERROR 404: Not Found.
gpg: no valid OpenPGP data found.
can anybody help me with that ?